who are you to call souness inept?! what is your bases for him being inept? why was the first half of southampton PURELY down to him?! incase you hadnt noticed we have 11 players on the pitch. i also find it strange that when we pick it up in the second half an play some great football souness isnt applauded at all... surely our comeback reflects the fighting spirit and effective tactics of our great manager?... as for that link, i read it myself last night and i found it quite a chuckle. souness may not show comedy in the way he talks or the way he looks but he sure shows he has a perfectly adequate sense of humour when it comes to post match interviews. like iv said before - if its not the ref, its the weather, or the fans, or the pitch, or the bird that flew a little too close to the players. and hes got a point anyway, we dont get the same things awarded as the bigger clubs. that must be obvious in the amount of penalties the top 5 have in comparison to us. one thing i will say - did any of you see the body language and facial expressions of souness at southampton? his heart and soul are 110% behind the team and the club. i hate the way that his passion cannot seem to be mirrored by the players on the field and as it is souness that gets the flack, i feel more and more empathy for him each week

gresko hasnt been at all near his best. then, while hes left footed, being played at left midfield is still playing him out of position. douglas has shown promise and souness might have wanted to try him out at left mid. with an experienced defender like gray behind him he is given the support he requires and he hasnt played badly. tugay didnt play the entire match and came on for an injured flitcroft and was pretty much the only replacement we had. also, todd didnt have a bad match at cm

in your opinion we dont have a left midfielder to get injured but lets not get into the left midfield saga again. didnt know that tugay and douglas were both fit and available but when u think about it, it was a wise tactical decision. as a central defender, playing todd as a defensive midfielder would not be a lot to adapt to and he played the role reasonably well. then you have to remember that todd has played well for us this season whereas tugay has made noteable mistakes and was most likely to be low on confidence. then douglas is a youngster and the holding role in midfield is more suited to a more experienced player such as todd. with flitcroft venturing faward there will not always be michael gray behind to support like there is on the left side of midfield.

ok 4 out of the first 5 ARE due to injuries. todd playing in cm was due to our bare thin centre midfield and many said he played pretty well there too. dunno about these cb's playing in attack...

oh to this i agree 100%; all too often managers are blamed for, or carry the can, following bad results or bad seasons, even when it is clearly their fault. once more i agree 100%. that is one of the reasons souness appears more and more dejected after every match and why i believe he might take the flack for this season. but hey, it aint over yet... admittedly, the squad is far weaker then this time last season but this isnt due to souness transfers or transfer policies but amazingly unfortunate injuries. it is by no means controversial to say that souness' team selections are baffling, but baffling is not the word i would use. it is difficult to keep a consistent line up when we have one good game followed by one bad game as souness states. also, souness has regulars or particulars that he keeps faith with, regulars that more often then not come good. nissa is an eg of this - sure he had one particularly good game, against man city i believe, but souness preferred to stick with babbel and todd who, in my opinion, had played consistantly well in that period of time and deserved the right to keep their place in the side. i find it hard to recall any players played out of position NOT due to injury problems, which in my opinion, is not a flaw in tactics. the defence seems to be a riddle that nobody can solve. "residing," over the defence would not be the correct word in my opinion as due to injuries it has almost been forced upon him. however, souness appears to have shown faith in those he has purchased as to give them an oppertunity to prove themselves or to have shown faith in those that have more premiership experience. and finally, il reitterate that motivation is not simply the responsibility of the manager but the playing staff and the captain. as the captain has been shifted so many times this season that could be one reason. however, everton find themselves in a VERY similar position to us. is this to say that moyes hasnt the ability to motivate his team? surely not one of the best managers of last season?

once more that is an opinion, as is mine, but is an opinion i dont agree with im afraid. motivation not only lies within the manager but within the captain and the team. as we finished 6th last season with much of the same personnell i do not believe this can be attributed to our dismal showing, nor can it be placed simply on the manager. in addition to this, i have failed to note many noteable flaws in tactics, would be happy to listen to those you have seen. finally, largely i have agreed with souness' team selections considering the extent of our injuries and the experience of souness as a tactician and manager. thanks revidge blue, i do try my best to back up my opinions. while admitting that the sale of duff was a huge loss, it was also a large gain; ferguson, reid, emerton, amo are proven and talented players and have provided greater depth, although not strictly in the left midfield position and cost half the money of duff. however, wi dont believe the board was in the position to refuse a bid for duff. was it he that had a clause in his contract that allowed him to be sold for 17million plus? and chelsea is a very illustrious club. agree totally with berg for amo - seems like he swapped one proven player for another and berg has proved to be the better. not too sure as to his thinking behind that one but im sure he had good intent.

indeed i should close my very large gob a lot of the time but this is my opinion on why we are languishing in 15th place as opposed to last seasons 6th... first off the sale of duff has had huge reprecussions. last season he was out for a long period and his return saw a flurry of goals, which on occasion won us matches, and a subsequent rapid rise up the table. the absense of such a hugely influential player has upset the balance of the team and has made us lose our left sided attacking impetus. blackburn simply did not have the appeal or frinances to lure an equally talented left sided midfielder to the club and there were few available to him. second, injuries have ravished the team. the loss of ferguson has seen us lose our creativity and solidity, especially as he was starting to play some amazing football up until his injury. in addition to this, the loss of thompson saw us lose a versatile and extremely talented midfielder as well as depth in midfield. reids latest injury has left us down to bear threads on the left side of midfield and players have been pulled out of position to help cover, upsetting the balance of the team. in defence is where we have had the most trouble and a large part of this can be attributed to the injury of short who is a rock at the back. these injuries have seen us unable to maintain a consistent back four and this has created a lack of understanding and experience playing together. thirdly certain players just havent performed as they have been expected, as they did last season or because of a general decline with age, andy cole being a prime example of all three. after a flurry of goals in the early part of the season, cole has scored just once in a hell of a lotmof games ans has often been criticised for his lack of effort. yorke has been largely abysmal and has showed very little to be praised. tugay is also beginning to show a decline and has made numerous costly mistakes. friedal, admittedly is a superb keeper and last season was phenominal. however, this season while playing adequately, with exception of the last month or so when he has made some outstanding saves, he has not performed to the same standard he did last season. thats my opinion in any case...

jesus, i finally thought this thread was gone for good, slipping down the lists of threads as far as it did. now here it is again to annoy us all and incite arguements over criticsms of souness that are totally inept and inaccurate. as a huge fan of souness i have argued his case on many occasions on ths thread and each criticsm has been dismissed in turn. but as im a sad B****** il do it again. reid was an excellent and highly rated winger for millwall, capable of playing on the left and has played but a handful of games this season. it is short sighted to label him as being rubbish and when he did play he wasnt all that bad. it will always be hard to replace somebody of duffs calibre and souness hasnt managed to do it. what souness has managed to acheive is a far deeper and more talented squad with half of the transfer funds we received in the summer. which brings me on to dunn... first of all, the sale of dunn really hasnt left the squad depleted considering we brought in ferguson who is a far more complete and taleneted midfielder for just 2million more the dunn was sold for and that central midfield is by far our most competetive position. then you have to consider the huge losses weve sustained from injury... also, could you please explain how dunn was treated disgracefully? cos i fail to understand how he was...

how the hell can you pin an exact age of when footballers peak?! some players are amazing when theyre young and slowly fade away or are consistently good or consistently bad. different players will peak at different times and will have good and bad seasons. replacing our older players like cole and yorke with younger players wont just add to lack of experience but will add freshness, competition for places, and generally better footballers. and we have a blend of experience and youth now, which we didnt before. what a narrow minded comment...

how many times have clubs sacked a manager or a managers left and the club has slipped down the league... providing souness is still here (which i pray he will be) we have a real chance of europe next season. and now with those youngsters coming through we have a far deeper squad to prepare for injuries. does anybody know how long cole and yorke have left on their contracts? because if we can atleast get something for them this summer (because it does look like theyl be out, especially yorke) we might be able to snap up a left midfielder and mayb a cheapo striker. heres to hoping and hopeing parma get more and more in debt so we can get bresciano...

ian muther******* dowe?! oh...i get it, your being sarcastic. great result! i applaud souness on an inspired team selection. stead and gallagher appeared to work quite well together and i knew gallagher would eventually work well off a big player like stead - heres to the future. played douglas as well which i was pleased with. what was especially nice to see was souness' no-nonsense touch; having yorke out of the squad brought a huge smile to my face and even jansen was played over cole. finally a kick up the back side! souness once more shows he has real balls - risking stead, gallagher and douglas was a risk and it paid off. well done that man. i agree with slater_scott though, the thread should be locked and nobody should be allowed to commit such blasphomy and suggest souness should go, even if it is at the end of the season. id like to see souness on the touchline till hes an old grey haired man (well more so then he is now anyway)

i dont believe souness is out of inspirations in all honesty - each game we look impressive. infact i think souness shows strength of character appearing each and every week for post match interviews and shows so much passion on the sideline. i feel more and more empathy for souness; a man that has done so much for the club, as he looks more and more dejected each time we lose. i think any one in his position would look the same.

u speak intelligently, you clearly know what you're talking about unlike rover6... however, you have spoken of dreadful signings this season. personally i cannot think of one signing that has been bad, let alone dreadful and frankly signing ferguson was a HUGE signing for this club.as long as hes back to the VERY high standards that he was playing at in the run up to injury, he will guide us into the top 8 next season im sure. secondly, souness has not had a particularly long spell at ewood - nothing like say peter reid at sunderland and to believe his time has been up for some time makes me wonder if you've forgotten how he took us into the premiership and acheived a shock 6th place for us last season. motivation of the team is not just souness job; due to injury we have switched captains more times then i can count and undoubtedly that has affected team spirit. the players arent cutting it and i dont think that is the managers fault - souness even appears to have chilled out somewhat from last season yet we came 6th last time around... the will to win is there - the amount of times we have taken the lead till the close of the game only to make ridiculously stupid defensive mistakes. he is ready to admit that we have defensive problems, but we have been rocked by injuries and gresko has been AWFUl this season. i remember the games leading up to fergusons injury - the full backs were pushing up nicely delivering quality balls and we had an amazing quality to our play. but because of our out of touch strikers and utterly appauling mistakes at the back, we have lost. he has used a number of combinations at the back but none seem to work. without short we are not rock solid as we were last season. next season, providing we are in the division and we have the same squad we do now, we WILL be top half of the league and i hope itl be souness that leads us there. i cannot think of many managers in the league that are more experienced or more successful and there are none that are available that even come close to the brilliance of souness

what i want is for rover6 to come an explain himself....

u got it right there mate. souness is a phenominal manager and i honestly thought wed do just as well as we did last season. if we had a top goalscorer and didnt have the injuries wed be right up there.last season souness was billed as one of the managers of the season with moyes an that. why all of a sudden does he "have to go'??!!!

im sorry, maybe i should add little pictures and arrows to aid in your reading...

haha SO true. i didnt read all the other like 90 pages of replies cos its too much but i hope people slated him for this. it just infuriated me!

when i read this post my heart sank.i find it appaulingly inaccurate in so many ways. firstly, how can a premiership manager and a manager with SO many years of experience in football and all over europe have "primitive" tactics?! i have watched blackburn play on numerous instances since the charlton match and we have looked superb minus the hurrendous mistakes of individual players and a lack of touch up front. you speak of lack of confidence... mayb that isnt souness fault but the fault of a group of incredibly talented players that simply arent cutting it on the pitch. souness has been involved in team building exercises an such an the defenders of ewood showed a good team spirit. as for the left wing - anyone will tell u that the sale of duff will leave u a huge void. admittedly tommo aint the best suited player to that position but with so little money given to spend and the lack of players available that fall into our wage structure, he is still a decent repacement. reid is a young player and was a good signing but hasnt quite settled and has been rocked by injury. who would u suggest we buy/put out on the left? as for grabbi, grabbi was a proven goalscorer but 7million was just too much and he was a flop - one of souness few mistakes as manager. if he cant cut it, then get him out! my criticsm is not that he withdrew him from the bench but that he didnt sell him ages ago, admit defeat an such. as for lying to the fans... thats ****, he will use excuses which i find to be commical genius; if it isnt the referee, its the pitch, or the opposition fans or the weather or a bird that flew a little too close to the players... but as u speak of confidence, would saying that players were **** EVERY match raise their confidence??!!! NO! any decent manager would know that. as for ferguson.... WHAT R U THINKING?! ferguson = deal of the season (if he hadnt have gotten injured) seeing as parker went for 10million an has performed on only a few instances and is relatively new to the scene, ferguson was a bargain being scotland captain and rangers captain and a true performer. at rovers he was slow to start, but MY GOD when he got going he ran the game! he was amazing. one of the best cm's iv seen this season in the premiership! newcastle for eg, he ran the game, got injured and it started to slip away from us until we got a lucky handball goal. we have missed him and havent been the same since his injury. alan mahon is not a good player - hence why division one clubs r after him. souness is not the problem! finances and players playing badly is our problem!!! i think more fans should stick up for our manager that has done so much for us. sorry for the essay and im sure im going to displease the moderators... sorry! but that post was incredibly wrong in so many ways.