[Archived] Henning Berg - Rovers Manager

[Kelbo]

Venkys and the stupid woman have lots to be accounted for, by default, they may just have got the right manager, fingers crossed!!

[chris_h]

I don't agree with any of that - we never did get back to winning ways under Kean so how do we know for a fact he was wrong?

Kean and the owners didn't set out to naff off the fans deliberately, they were incompetent and naive respectively. But no - one outside of a padded cell should think either WANTED to go down and lose 25m of Premiership TV money and the attendant publicity.

I can only liken it to the situation at Liverpool when Gilette and Hicks were there. Liverpool fans hated them with a passion. But they stuck with the Club whereas many of our fans walked away. Their fans pack out Anfield with 42,000 fans in the middle of August for a meaningless European preliminary round against DNS Airbus of Wales or whoever.. If we have a Cup tie we're lucky if 1/3 of the normal League attendees show.

I don't blame any stayaway fans for being fickle. They've had a lot to put up with And it's a free country. But nevertheless being fickle it is, in my view.

Pretty much bang on.

[philipl]

There is plenty pointing to a big betting profit made on the relegation if only you open your eyes to it.

OK people will howl at this post but explain the following performances:

Rovers v City home and away

Rovers v Bolton home and away

Cardiff v Rovers forfeited away

Spurs v Rovers

WBA v Rovers

Swansea v Rovers

I personally did not have Rovers v Wigan as fixed but I have seen a list of fixed English matches which included it.

[chris_h]

There is plenty pointing to a big betting profit made on the relegation if only you open your eyes to it.

Shut up

[philipl]

Shut up

Gosh. Your eloquent argument is underwhelming.

[yoda]

Hey mods, I thought this was the Henning Berg thread

[old darwen blue]

Call it an inferior product if you will, and I cannot argue with your stance but what I saw on Saturday was far superior entertainment than I have seen for years at Ewood and I include much of the pre Venkys.

Agree with you totally Al

Excellent signature by the way!

[USABlue]

Top dogs at the minute......

http://www.leagueweb...ncomb/Divisions

Poor start? Harsh that. After the Palace performance I'd say he's made a decent start up to now. The mood of the crowd is much better cos the players are on the front foot and by most reports two draws is not a 'fair' return on the last two fixtures.

You know jim gordon, he'll ride this for all it's worth then when Berg strings a few wins together and we climb the table he'll quietly skulk off till he finds another niche to bitch that gives him the jollies.

[Stuart]

How on earth is it fickle that some boycotters are still sticking to their principles?

It isn't and I don't think those people are getting much stick but many have changed their principle reason for staying away. In some cases more than once...

[Ewood Spark]

I don't agree with any of that - we never did get back to winning ways under Kean so how do we know for a fact he was wrong?

Kean and the owners didn't set out to naff off the fans deliberately, they were incompetent and naive respectively. But no - one outside of a padded cell should think either WANTED to go down and lose 25m of Premiership TV money and the attendant publicity.

I can only liken it to the situation at Liverpool when Gilette and Hicks were there. Liverpool fans hated them with a passion. But they stuck with the Club whereas many of our fans walked away. Their fans pack out Anfield with 42,000 fans in the middle of August for a meaningless European preliminary round against DNS Airbus of Wales or whoever.. If we have a Cup tie we're lucky if 1/3 of the normal League attendees show.

I don't blame any stayaway fans for being fickle. They've had a lot to put up with And it's a free country. But nevertheless being fickle it is, in my view.

Spot-on Simon.

[donnermeat]

There is plenty pointing to a big betting profit made on the relegation if only you open your eyes to it.

OK people will howl at this post but explain the following performances:

Rovers v City home and away

Rovers v Bolton home and away

Cardiff v Rovers forfeited away

Spurs v Rovers

WBA v Rovers

Swansea v Rovers

I personally did not have Rovers v Wigan as fixed but I have seen a list of fixed English matches which included it.

How would the Cardiff match contribute to relegation?

[Mattyblue]

You seriously comparing us to Liverpool rev? They have an enormous fanbase.

Their early round Euro games will bd attended by a large amount of non regulars getting a chance to go- basic supply and demand.

But as they struggled to sell out most weeks under Hodgson- 10000 empty seats at his last PL home game, it's not just us that are 'fickle'.

And as for chris h, BRFC have been one of, if not THE best supported club by population for years.

[Athlete]

There is plenty pointing to a big betting profit made on the relegation if only you open your eyes to it.

OK people will howl at this post but explain the following performances:

Rovers v City home and away

Rovers v Bolton home and away

Cardiff v Rovers forfeited away

Spurs v Rovers

WBA v Rovers

Swansea v Rovers

I personally did not have Rovers v Wigan as fixed but I have seen a list of fixed English matches which included it.

spurs away never a more dubious game since Everton V Wimbledon ask London bookmakers

[Stuart]

Why do certain posters continue to knock the fans (not getting behind the team) as the reason for our demise?

"Kean was incompetent", "Venkys were naive" but if we'd have had fans like Liverpool we'd have been ok? I guess that isn't what you meant Rev but it's easy to infer. Who the kean sold all our best players and replaced them with dross? Who told us of "good times ahead" and that relegation was "2 steps backwards to take one big step forwards"? It's difficult not to take the latter pearler as an admission relegation was necessary if not deliberate.

Yes, there is some blame attached to the fans and that is that we didn't unite earlier, in numbers, to show the owners how the majority felt and allowed those who didn't agree with what Kean and Venkys "were trying to do" were branded "1%" or even "not real fans".

It may not have made a difference but after the Wigan game, something changed and the next phase (coincidentally?) was Shebby in and Kean out. I wonder if it was the reaction to the Wigan game that finally made Kean's position untenable? If only that had happened 6 months sooner...

[chris_h]

You seriously comparing us to Liverpool rev? They have an enormous fanbase.

Their early round Euro games will bd attended by a large amount of non regulars getting a chance to go- basic supply and demand.

But as they struggled to sell out most weeks under Hodgson- 10000 empty seats at his last PL home game, it's not just us that are 'fickle'.

And as for chris h, BRFC have been one of, if not THE best supported club by population for years.

I doubt that anybody would seriously compare us with a global brand like Liverpool. The point is that Liverpool supporters hated their owners at the time at least as much as Rovers fans have hated Venkys yet there was no discernible decrease in the support of their team. That has nothing to do with Global branding or size of support, its about a passion and love for your club.

Matty, I have been a Rovers fan for a long time. In the lean years I was called "mad" and "daft" by Blackburn residents for going to away games. These would have been the same sort of people who sneered at Jack Walker for putting millions into the club. Dress it up with stats if you want but there is a cynicism, apathy and lack of passion in Rovers hinterland. No amount of artificially inflated and subsidised gates will convince some of us who have lived amongst it otherwise. I'm sorry to say but that lack of passion isn't there in Burnley or Preston.

We aren't alone, some Bolton fans will tell you the same about their town.

[Mattyblue]

You saying there is greater 'passion' in Burnley and Preston?

[chris_h]

You saying there is greater 'passion' in Burnley and Preston?

I am. Based on my experience of working in those towns and living amongst supporters of those clubs.

[47er]

I don't agree with any of that - we never did get back to winning ways under Kean so how do we know for a fact he was wrong?

Kean and the owners didn't set out to naff off the fans deliberately, they were incompetent and naive respectively. But no - one outside of a padded cell should think either WANTED to go down and lose 25m of Premiership TV money and the attendant publicity.

I can only liken it to the situation at Liverpool when Gilette and Hicks were there. Liverpool fans hated them with a passion. But they stuck with the Club whereas many of our fans walked away. Their fans pack out Anfield with 42,000 fans in the middle of August for a meaningless European preliminary round against DNS Airbus of Wales or whoever.. If we have a Cup tie we're lucky if 1/3 of the normal League attendees show.

I don't blame any stayaway fans for being fickle. They've had a lot to put up with And it's a free country. But nevertheless being fickle it is, in my view.

Well Rev, you should choose your words more carefully because if you "don't agree with any of that" then the problems are not, in your opinion, "entirely down to our clownish owners", people "don't have complete

discretion about where theirentertainment money will go" and the ex-manager and owners "haven't deliberately treated fans with contempt". Its obviously just naivety that vastly increased the number and intensity of the

stewarding, body pat-downs, confiscation of banners, aggression against chanting "Kean Out", taking photographs of fans eg in the Darwen End and, most of all, extending Kean's contract when he was clearly clueless and we loathed him.

None of this constitutes deliberate contempt of fans, just inexperience? Really?

According to you, its also not up to the owners to work out how to get the fans back-----whose job is it then?

Finally we will never have proof of whether the fans would return if Kean's results turned round if only because they never would turn round.

However I seriously doubt that results on the field would have meant that Kean would ever be forgiven and that fans would have come back.

If you believe this, you're as simple as Ewood Spark in believing that a fan's role starts and stops with events on the field.

It doesn't matter what anyone says anyway, fans will return when and if they want to, no matter what is written on here.

Its going to be a long job judging by current attendances but this is all down to Venkys and none of it is the fault of the fans.

[alexanders]

What concerns me PhilipL is that you live in Malta, known as bookies paradise.

I do think it is quite easy to fix matches and I posted an article about a croatian agent fixing matches by buying a team and install it with footsoldiers.

I am sorry but there are many signs that it might be match fixing (relegation fixing), but I really dont believe it.

[Jock]

You saying there is greater 'passion' in Burnley and Preston?

They seem to talk about their clubs with more affection but still dont go on match day.

Preston fans are obsessed with us being fickle but its just jealousy as most have never seen their team play in the top division and they know they wont in their lifetime.

[RoverScot]

There is plenty pointing to a big betting profit made on the relegation if only you open your eyes to it.

OK people will howl at this post but explain the following performances:

Rovers v City home and away

Rovers v Bolton home and away

Cardiff v Rovers forfeited away

Spurs v Rovers

WBA v Rovers

Swansea v Rovers

I personally did not have Rovers v Wigan as fixed but I have seen a list of fixed English matches which included it.

Manchester City were in very good form for the first match and its conceivable to lose 3-0 to the champions away from home.

Bolton at home, we had Pedersen at left back and lowe at right back due to injuries and they got two early goals, Bolton away was the Muamba match with mixed emotions surrounding it.

Cardiff away was a good championship side beating our kean led reserves.

WBA and Swansea away was when N'zonzi had fallen out with Kean and wasn't motivated to put a shift in with Dunn being overrun in midfield.

Tottenham away was one of the strangest things I have seen in football.

The best explanation is that Charlatan Kean exploited a power vacuum in October 2010 and then, through his wife, got the affections of Mrs Desai who has an extraordinary amount of executive power at the club for a woman who is disinterested in football. Kean stood to gain more from his contract in keeping the club up than he would from dodgy bookmakers getting the club down.

[Amo]

IIRC, Revidge has been a Venky's apologist for some time now.

[Mercer]

I really get tired of people continually slagging our own supporters, As if the terrible situation is not entirely down to our clownish owners!

We are even discussing whether fans are "justified" in staying away! JUSTIFIED in deciding how to spend their own time and money!

Football is one form of the entertainment options competing against others. People have complete discretion about where their entertainment money will go or even if it will go anywhere

in the current circumstances.

In the 1960 Cup Final disgrace, a pack of amateurish Directors took the fans loyalty for granted. They soon found out their mistake.

In the last 2 years, a set of idiots have gone much farther and treated their fans with contempt, sometimes deliberately.

We take a lot as Rovers fans but many have said "we are not taking this".

It will be a long time before the combined efforts of Venkys and Kean are forgotten, results on the field are only a part of the answer. Kean peddled this myth------if we got back to winning ways the fans would soon be back.

Thus he insulted the fans even further possibly without even realising it! They operate on deeper and more complex levels than Kean or Venkys could work out.

People on here forecast this outcome long ago and the owners carried on regardless. Plenty on this Board were also too simplistic to work it out "Get behind the team!" being their sole advice and remedy.

Up to the owners and the admin to work out how to get the fans back now and if the conclusion is "sell up"-------------good.

Don't blame the fans!

Absolutely spot on !

A cracking post.

[den]

IIRC, Revidge has been a Venky's apologist for some time now.

Anti trust, anti John Williams and also against "fickle" fans .

[Majiball]

Where is that coming from? I thought, in terms of wages at least, we'd already done most of our cutting back last season from January onwards. We got rid Samba, Nelsen, Salgado, Roberts, Andrews, Yakubu, Hoilett, N'Zonzi, Petrovic...possibly more as that was just off the top of my head. I know we've added a few high earners in Gomes, Murphy, Etuhu, Best, CKR and Rhodes, but surely we're spending a lot less now than we were.

So the people who came in and splashed new contracts and pay-rises well beyond our means have now decided to start handing out sensible ones?

I can well imagine most of our new players are on very good contracts even the ones signed and not playing.