Agree with everything you’ve said there FLB. I’ve said it before, Douglas did very well last season in the games that he played. When we were sinking slowly and everyone was worried, Douglas was one of a few at the beginning who really got stuck in when it mattered. Douglas as well got a lot of unfair criticism in my opinion of certain members here, because he was being played on the left wing and wasn`t the winger that we all wanted, yet when he played there, he gave 100% every game and wanted to play, he did a good job and has to be in Souness`s plans for the season coming up. FLB – I can’t remember, but wasn’t Douglas played in central midfield against Bolton back in January? I remember him then playing well in that game, wasn’t frightened of getting stuck in. I hope he gets another chance, he deserves it.

If this story is true, then I’ll be very annoyed with one person, Souness. Souness has the right to do what he wants, buy, get rid of players he wishes to do so. If he did this I’d be disgusted with him as a manager and a person. If it’s true then Souness yet again wants to throw out another good player. I’ve said this before, but I clearly think that there’s something wrong at the club which we don’t know about. Souness has had arguments, rows with many players since he’s been at Ewood, he has argued with Cole. It’s obvious that they aren’t best mates, both on and off the pitch, but surely, Souness particularly has to look at what Cole brings to the team. Cole, last season proved that he wants to play for the club, he worked his socks off, game after game, scored goals and was assisted to many goals for others as well. I hope it isn’t true, but Souness hasn’t hesitated in getting rid of players before.

I remember listening to North West Tonight, quite a while ago, saying that because of the maintenance, repair works on the Stockport line that there are buses that will accommodate travellers wanting to go to Stockport. Can any of the Manchester members confirm this?

It’s a bit expensive for just a friendly; I’m still unsure whether I will go to this one. As much as it will be a good laugh, the costs for the trains, match ticket and other things including food and drunk, just for a friendly especially the price of Stockport tickets is poor. I’m definitely going to the Preston game though. Train times to Manchester Piccadilly

Which stand is everyone going to be going to?

Told you so. I thought when reading Quinn’s autobiography, that it had humour, with good writing yet and good honest view of everything, so it seemed. Quinn’s account of the Keane/McCarthy incidents in Saipan (I think) was fascinating to read, especially since Quinn was regarded as one of the mature members of the Ireland Squad. I’ve just started reading, The White Sea-Bird, by David Beaty, quite good so far.

Good point raised. I don’t agree with supporters who sing songs about that kind of nature what so ever. Even as much as I dislike United I wouldn’t go to that resort to chant to them about the Munich Air Disaster. If anybody on here does sing/chant about the Air Disaster then I advice those to read, The Day a Team Died, by Frank Taylor OBE.The scenes a Hillsborough happened when I was at a very young age, but what I will always remember is the shock on the face of my dad from when he first heard it. Rooney shouldn’t be to blame for this, The Sun have used him appallingly. An own goal? Rooney caught in crossfire between 'The Sun' and an unforgiving city

Chelsea trying again to buy Drogba. Mourinho has said at the press conference a couple of days back that he would like one more striker, you never know with Chelsea now because of their spending power all they have to do is wave a cheque in your face and they’ve got the player. Mourinho in my opinion is playing it well under the media spotlight Chelsea set to buy £24m Drogba

Great signing, I can’t actually believe we have got a player with Matteo`s qualities in for a free transfer. A player, who is a leader from the back, gets players fired up and a player who can only help the likes of Nissa and Jay improve gradually for when they establish themselves as the centre half pairing in years to come. Brilliant bit of business yet again. Blackburn sign Matteo

I don’t think we have had many poor seasons in the last three seasons. Our poorest season for a long time was last season, possibly because we expected a lot much more of the team but were heavily hit by injuries and a lot of poor performances. The two seasons previously, I can’t see how you can say they were poor 92er? In those two previous seasons we qualified for Europe, all be it poor European campaigns, we finished tenth in our first season back, won a trophy. The following season we finished sixth, lost two very good promising players which in my opinion was maybe and probably one deciding factor why we lost two thousand season ticket holders.

I agree with these points. People here can be a bit hard on newcomers, and regular people here have groups which sometimes bitch at each other. If fall out with a senior member, especially if they're a mod, a fair number pile in as well. New and potentially decent members may be put off when these situations happen. You all probably don't like this statement, but it can be true. However, there are some like Lofty and Mr. Respectable, who add nothing positive to this board in my opinion. If there’s something or anything that I don’t like what people do to other members on the message board is criticise them. There are incidents where someone will make an absolute idiotic comment and there asking for it. I am a younger member of this board and do enjoy the laughs and jokes everyone shares however sometimes it does tend to drift off the topic for a number of pages. However some of the time there are some members on here will say, that’s rubbish or something along the lines of that. In my opinion if I’ve taken some thought into what I’ve posted, I expect and appreciate that not everyone on here will have the same opinions as I have, otherwise we would be all boring people. But, if someone doesn’t agree with my post then I would like to think that they would give some sensible points and constructive ones to argue my point of view, and I would do the same.

Yes, at this time last season we were. I had renewed by this time last year. As we had our best finish to a season for years. It was strange to think why fans weren’t renewing since we had finished sixth. But I’m not positive but didn’t the prices of season tickets go up last season? I don’t think the on-going speculation this time last year of the sales of Duff and Dunn helped which probably was the deciding factor in some supporters’ minds in not renewing.

Thought this was interesting move. Desailly in my opinion has given Chelsea some fantastic service over the years. He’s too old for me, so I don’t think we should sign him, although my guess is that he’ll probably look for a move abroad either France or Italy. Desailly leaves Chelsea

This here in my opinion shows the desperation that the ticketing people at Rovers want people to renew. I know season ticket packages, renewals etc have been sent out to the people who want them etc. But to send letters to supporters asking them to renew shows how bad it has really got. I’ve renewed and I’m fully confident that we won’t see a repeat of last season. What will be interesting is to see the attendance from the game like Rovers v Fulham this season. Can’t see anymore than 18k in at the maximum. It’s not up to me to tell people to renew or not, it’s that I can’t see how much the club can actually do in providing people, the more than reasonable prices for season tickets. If fans don’t want to renew for what ever reason then so be it, everyone’s entitled to what they want to do. But the figure mentioned as 11,000 shows how bad it really is. Also it’s not as if the club haven’t promoted it well enough. I’ve seen it in the L.E.T, on the back of buses on the Radio. The only reason why a huge amount of fans haven’t renewed is because of how poor the team performed last season. My guess is once the players start winning matches again, we’ll slowly see the flocks of fans coming back.

Well said. The prospect of managing Chelsea will be massive now, especially with the expectations of the whole football world now, because Chelsea has turned into a club with a strong spending power market. Mourinho however feels confident, but I wouldn’t bee too confident. The media speculation in this country is maximised much more greatly in this country compared to Portugal where he’s managed. He’s an experienced manager and hasn’t gone about buying a whole range of players just for the sake of it. The players that Mourinho has brought in seem sensible. What Mourinho is trying to do here is that he wants at least two players at the minimum for every position in his squad, which can only help him for when the Champions League and Premier League fixtures begin to really cluster together.

I doubt it very much. Although you may have a record of you buying tickets from the ticket office that may come into it. I don’t know, you would have to ask someone who buys match tickets through the ticket office for home games. United will be allocated the whole Darwen End and despite the movement of the season ticket holders in the Darwen End, I doubt that we’ll actually fill all the home areas of the ground.

I don't know if the new system will be ready by then. If it is it will be an opportunity to test it, but don't be surprised if we are back to old fashioned ways. Btw, I'm not sure if the new system is meant to be saving us money either. I think it will save the club money slightly. They won’t have to employ people to work behind the screens to take the tickets. However my guess is that they’ll be about two stewards on every new turnstile. Possibly one searching the supporter and the other making sure that the fan is using the correct ticket, explaining to the fan how to work it etc. I’m not bothered to be honest what kind of system they use, all I’m bothered about is getting into the ground with enough time to spare before the game.

I have no sympathy for him what so ever. Yes, he did play well and he did come out as a much better played come the end of the tournament, a lot better than I expected. He does have a good future ahead of him both at club level and international level. However he plays for United and they all have that same level of arrogance and think that there bigger and better than anyone else. Such as Ruud arguing with the official that has lead him to be banned from Holland’s first two WC Qualifiers. The goal was offside in Ruud`s case, he argued, moaned like a little kid and didn’t get what he wanted. Do I feel sorry for him and Ronaldo? Not at all.

If it goes through, it’s yet another world famous star to arrive at Stamford Bridge this summer, his wages will be huge. But credit to Chelsea, going out and getting a world class midfielder, on a free transfer. I know Tottenham were in for Davids, but I can’t believe is that there wasn’t a lot of clubs offering him a contract. Credit to Chelsea, for getting a good player on a free transfer.

I agree with that. There isn’t much going on now for a couple of weeks because Euro 2004 has finished. When I’m posting something, I try to look at it as, what am I posting about? Am I giving extra points to the discussion? Am I debating a point, which could lead to further discussion? I may have my faults on here as well as other people do, however in my opinion if someone’s going to post a message, they should look at it as, is this post going to further the discussion? If it is, make a constructive balanced argument with several points to explain why. But everyone’s themselves and that’s the way how they post.

Even though the club in past years have always had a big international team come to play Rovers in a friendly at Ewood, it’ll be a test for two things. The first being the Rovers team, standard of fitness, performance level. The second is the state of the ticketing status at the turnstiles. It will be an opportunity to test them, however at least there is a pre-season game where the club can test and see how good they really are when it will be used properly for the first time. Say something bad happens to it, then at least it gives the club ten days to analyse the problem and find a solution to it. I hope it all goes smoothly, but you just never know with Rovers.

How about having to start work at 7.00pm in Leyland? Which may well be the case for one ST holder in our house, not me though I did pay for the ticket. I don’t have a clue why they want to put a match on tele at that stupid time. Personally, football is a weekend event where it happens on a Saturday afternoon at three. I’m having a problem where I work on weekend nights. It means I’m not going to make work on time, for those particular evenings when the game is on. Matches on tele, more money for the clubs I suppose there not going to complain. But as other people have said, is it going to affect the attendances? My guess is yes. And why? Fans that don’t have season tickets aren’t going to drag themselves out of the house on a Saturday evening when it’s at that stupid time. The power of Sky........

I saw in one of Saturday’s papers that a sixteen year old girl, a football fan, has been banned from all games for six years. Can’t remember which paper it was might have been the Express, but she was caught throwing several missiles, directed at both the Southampton fans and the Police, during the incidents after the South Coast Derby.

I can’t believe it. I’m on holiday and hoped to make the United game just as I land in Manchester at 1pm. Stupid Pay Per View……. Well annoyed now, miss the Southampton game too, which I wanted to go to again, but at least it’ll be on Sky on holiday.

Rovers are going to announce changes because of Sky’s live coverage of our Sky games some time before tomorrow. SKY GAMES COMING SOON