Eddie

I might, but then I'd change my public tune. I've worked for bosses who I didn't like or trust. I didn't quit, I needed a job, but I also knew I had a responsibility to my team and certainly didn't mislead people when it came to my intentions.

I don't know, maybe I'm just speculating on a messageboard? Stick to the Times or BBC if you want cold hard facts. Otherwise, give it a rest and grow up. Disagree if you want, but if you're just waiting for someone to be talking on provable facts at all times then you're in the wrong place. It's such a tiresome little response from one of the usual suspects.

I think it is all becoming clear why this is the case. He didn't really want to go, or at least, not to Derby. Not now. This was a leverage move and he expected to come out on top. Yes, he wanted to leave, but not for a club fighting relegation. This was a chance for a bit of a raise and maybe a few more promises for the summer. He didn't care about the promises, he wanted the extra money and the extra security if they decided to sack him. He may have actually learned from the JDT experience and saw how quickly things can turn sour. Playoffs today. Relegation battle tomorrow. Take the money and run, John. But, you know, you've shown your true colours. Even the lads can see it.

This is not me defending the club, but anyone on here that is claiming that Eustace is blameless in all of this is either being intentionally naive or simply doesn't believe that there can be multiple wrongs in the same story. The club failed Eustace, as they have failed every manager before him, and continue to fail every supporter and member of staff of this club. Their wrongs and failures are more egregious and significant than anything that anyone else has done during their torrid time at the club - that involves Anderson, Kean, everyone. The club will only begin to have a sense of dignity and decency when they have left. But... They failed Eustace in a very predictable way and one that he should have been able to predict. Why? For the very reasons that I have laid out above. For him to turn his back on this club, his players, and our supporters after only 12 months is, quite frankly, unacceptable. To have done so after preaching togetherness, toughness, and resilience makes him a liar. There are no two ways about it. To do so after potentially having applied for every job under the sun over the last few months...well...that makes him a scumbag. He has convinced players to sign for this club during that time. He has advocated for, and seemingly pleaded with, players to get new contracts. He's almost lucky that our club is such a shambles that no one was offered an acceptable one. What makes this significant? He proves them right. He has only strengthened the position of Waggott and Gestede and everyone else at the top. Because they now get to turn to our uninterested owners and tell them that 'see, only we stick with you'. This is why you can't give managers any power. This is why you can't listen to anyone else. Only we are here through thick and thin. Only we have any loyalty. They're all just after the next payday. If you don't think that this is any way damaging and reinforces the awful structure that we have within this club, then you are a fool. At least JDT had the decency to fire off a few warning shots before he left. The only saving grace in all of this is that it is such a massive shambles that it is garnering (some) national attention. Will that be enough to change anything? I highly doubt it. But this is another sad day in the history of Blackburn Rovers. The owners are mostly to blame, Waggott and his crew are also responsible, but Eustace leaves with blood on his hands.

I hope they go down and we somehow pull off a miracle and make our way through the playoffs. And I hope it haunts Eustace for the rest of his life as his managerial career fades into obscurity. Our promotion is a longshot, but I do hope they go down, he's sacked 12-18 months from now, and then struggles to find a job. He's done well this season, but I'd barely begun to forgive him for operational lower the standards last season. Better off without him.

Don't think I'm a tad confused. I'm well aware of our losses and we have people on here who do an excellent job combing through the accounts each year and point out every relevant detail. But we have owners who will put in the bare minimum to keep the lights on and the transfer dealings will supplement those minimal efforts and allow us to make the handful of signings we deem necessary to survive.

Calm yourself. I'm a stranger on the internet.

More games. Liverpool also probably have the smallest squad out of the big 4 (which I'll just consider to be City, Arsenal, Liverpool, and Chelsea for the sake of simplicity). But even with City we have seen how you're often only one or two injuries away from a crisis.

Plenty are. I could literally share hundreds. I would actually guess that the majority of Liverpool supporters see it as something of a blessing in disguise. It clearly wasn't a priority and that was reflected in their team selection. You often live in your own world, Jim.

Yes, Jim, us winning the League Cup (as a Premier League side) and having decent cup runs as a good Premier League side are comparable to Plymouth winning a 5th round tie against Liverpool B and getting an extra fixture to work into their relegation battle. An extra fixture that they will likely lose. We've had some good cup runs in recent seasons, they've been enjoyable and a decent distraction, but I would rather not stretch our thin and overworked squad with extra cup games in a competition that we stand zero chance of winning. The last non-Premier League winner of the FA Cup? Oh wait. Never happened. But the last non-first division winner was in 1980. A Championship side hasn't even made the final since 2008. In other words? We stood no chance.

Yep. I'm sure Plymouth supporters will remember that one forever. It will really soften the blow of relegation to League One. What did I enjoy more? Blake scoring at Liverpool or Jansen scoring at Preston? Tough one.

I'm sure he was told lies, but that still doesn't mean he's not an idiot for believing them. If the owners had only been around for a year or two and been able to say that the JDT fiasco was an outlier, then I could understand believing the promises. But he had 10+ years of evidence and probably a fair amount of inside-football information to let him know exactly how this club is run. We all know from the Andy Cole story that Waggott that he's been a known quantity for 30 years. It would take 5 phone calls to get a good sense of what this club is about. Wouldn't you do that? When I take on new jobs I do a bit of my own due diligence and that is a lot harder than it would be to get information about a football club that has 30 first-team players a season, multiple former coaches, former senior staff, etc. 70% of the players we sign talk about reaching out to a former Rover and asking them if it is a good place to play. You don't think Eustace didn't do the same? Couldn't have got a quick call with JDT or his agent to get a sense of exactly what happened? Spoken to Coyle? Lambert? Bowyer? Mowbray? It's a long list. I think he knew exactly what he was getting himself into.

Whoever comes in next will look at JDT freezing himself out, Eustace basically walking out, and think that everything is fine. How would they possibly read the tea leaves? But, no. We will get a manager in who knows exactly what the problems are, but who will know this is one of the best 30 jobs in English football and one of the best 100 jobs in European football and will jump at the chance to get back into football, or raise their profile, or believe that they've seen enough from what Eustace and JDT to think that they have a chance of getting things right for 12 months and getting us promoted. The money won't hurt.

I think he's been pretty good this season, but nowhere near as incredible as most have claimed. Last season I think he was pretty awful. Overall I would give him a B. I don't think he's guaranteed success in the future. We could do better. We won't. But we could.

You're correct. I should have just assumed that he was an idiot from the get-go and realised that he was incapable of realising that the club was lacking in ambition and dysfunctional before he joined. Not like there were obvious signs or anything...

Don't upset the Eustace cult. Let's not forget, he came in here 12 months ago and read from the hymn book. Didn't miss a beat about operation survival and what a mess the club was. 12 months later and he'll leave us because of lack of ambition when the club is in the top 6? Smacks of an opportunist who talks out of both sides of his mouth. IF he leaves, then he deserves the lies he may have been told over the last 12 months as he was telling just as many himself. Unfortunately for us, our club will eventually be filled with the types of characters that our ownership and leadership deserve.

I'm not being positive about it, but it depends what you define as 'operate'. I think we could live out some very depressing Championship seasons for quite a while. We will always have enough pull to get the odd decent loan and free agent signing and to put together squads that are OK for this level. Now, things could very easily go wrong and I don't see how we recover in League One in our current state, but I don't think we are guaranteed to go down over the next 2/3 seasons.

My God, they've even put the 'you know' in the quote.

We will get some compensation for Dolan. Tyjon will probably end up being worth something. Not Wharton levels, but a talented English attacking player will always be worth a few million. Pears could be shifted for a couple of million if we ever saw fit. Please God. We will get Sigurdsson off of the wage bill this summer and likely give up on the Cantwell experiment at some point over the next 18 months and trim wages further. You then take the Dennis wages off of the wage bill and we will be looking at a much lower spend next year compared with this. As history has also shown, every couple of years we will get an academy talent through who will be worth 2/3m+. I'm not advocating this approach, but I don't think the club is going to go out of business.

JDT is the only manager who's really managed to get a tune out of him. That isn't some pro-JDT statement, but I think he's a fairly limited player and it is the only time that the system really worked in his favour.

I don't think so. We are out of golden eggs for now, if we are committed to only spending exactly what we can afford as a self-sufficient club then we will be able to keep the lights on through transfers. There will be enough academy talent and the odd player increasing in value and we will be able to keep things going. Put it this way, the couple of hundred thousand generated from an extra cup tie isn't going to make the slightest bit of difference. Let's say things got THAT bad. What is that? Another week of staying in business? It's a drop in the bucket.

I don't think we need any money. We clearly have no intent to use the money generated from transfer revenue for anything other than basic overheads. I don't think the club generating extra revenue has any impact on anything.

No it isn't.

Because we have a small squad that is stretched enough as it is. We have a small chance of making the playoffs, an even smaller chance of making our way through them, but a 0% chance of winning the FA Cup. It allows us to focus our attention where it matters and to get that tiny bit of extra rest that could prove the difference in one or two matches.

Happy to be out of the cup. No shame in the performance and killed ourselves by letting them score 2 quick goals. A few positives mixed in with some known negatives. Let's see if Eustace will leave. Let's see how quickly the new signings can get up to speed. But there's no reason to be too down about going out to a Premier League side.