It was clear that the club had lied about this when the Liverpool and Man Utd cup games at Ewood were allowed to take place on a Wednesday night with far bigger crowds than Preston or Leeds would attract. Were the police in a position to veto and insist on a noon Saturday kick off on the basis of spectator safety then they would have done so for those games, which in any measure were far greater risks than PNE or Leeds in the 2nd division have ever been. As it happened those 20000+ crowds, in Liverpool's case almost 30,000 in an FA Cup quarter final replay with 8000+ scousers in the ground, passed without any major incident. Remarkable. No other club does it, but then again most other clubs would draw the line at 5000 away fans, especially if more than that required and early kick off. They would sacrifice the extra 1500 away fans to enable kick off to stay at 3pm. To my knowledge there has been no fixture v Leeds or PNE in recent history that has seen any major trouble or safety issues. Leeds fans made a mess in Wetherspoons the other year (which they could still do for a 12 noon kick off). 5500 Rovers fans can go on the beer around Preston all day for a 3pm kick off without major incident.

It was clear that the club had lied about this when the Liverpool and Man Utd cup games at Ewood were allowed to take place on a Wednesday night with far bigger crowds than Preston or Leeds would attract. Were the police in a position to veto and insist on a noon Saturday kick off on the basis of spectator safety then they would have done so for those games, which in any measure were far greater risks than PNE or Leeds in the 2nd division have ever been. No other club does it, but then again most other clubs would draw the line at 5000 away fans, especially if more than that required and early kick off. They would sacrifice the extra 1500 away fans to enable kick off to stay at 3pm.

Almost every one of those Chelsea managers won a major trophy, all within a year of getting the job. Leeds have achieved nothing yet but their managerial chaos didn't relegate them to League One like it did with us. I agree, in an ideal world you'd keep a manager for several years and some clubs seem to chop and change for the sake of it, but I don't agree that a manager should be awarded more time in some sort of principled stance to make a point about giving him time. If results are unacceptable or faith is lost then the manager has to go. The problem is that we are too reliant on our manager. Even before Venkys we had a very traditional old school manager/chairman set up with John Williams running the club and old school Souness, Hughes and Allardyce left to get on with the job of managing the team. Clearly it worked for us at the time, but we were very reliant on those big personalities and lived in fear of them leaving as replacing them would be such a big ask. Allardyce was clearly the ideal man for Rovers when he was here, and I wish he had been kept, but I also don't accept that his sacking immediately signified the end of the world - if we'd have conducted a proper recruitment process for his replacement rather than appoint his bib and cone man we could have progressed as a club. Under Venkys our managers - until Lambert all of them very inexperienced and arguably not qualified for a club of this size - have held far too much sway and influence. As much as I respect and appreciate the job Mowbray has done - my concern is that we're now in a position where we are utterly reliant on him in terms of keeping the owners on the straight and narrow and holding the club together - we are completely unprepared for a scenario in which we might have to part ways with him. That isnt me for one minute saying I want him to go any time soon - but it is a fact he will do at some point and we need to be prepared for that. Other clubs meanwhile have structures that enable a swift managerial change without much disruption to the club and team.

It seems to me that Mowbray is now, in his own subtle way, sending messages to the owners and their representative, that he clearly feels substantial funds are going to be needed to take us towards promotion contention. It also appears he is coming round to the idea of sacrificing Dack to generate the funding required. Anyone who seriously believes that Venkys will reinvest £20 million from Dack should we get that is extremely optimistic having witnessed what happened to the funds following sales of Rhodes, Hanley, Duffy and Gestede. It will disappear into the ether. The difference between Mowbray and Paul Lambert is that Mowbray will be more diplomatic with the owners and play the longer game, and won't throw a wobbler if they don't provide the funds he seeks. I see Mowbray made a reference to a £10 million signing that he hopes they would approve should he find one that would help the team. I don't necessarily think that is required but conservatively we're going to need at least 5 or 6 first team ready players, and I'm afraid unless we strike gold and unearth some serious quality from abroad or lower leagues then that sort of thing is going to cost a lot of money.

I make it 10 in 11 years - Hughes, Ince, Allardyce, Kean, Berg, Appleton, Bowyer, Lambert, Coyle and Mowbray - unless she was discounting Kean as he wasn't a manager. Anyway, although a turnover on that scale sums up the turbulence we have had under these owners, I don't believe in isolation it is necessarily a bad thing - IF you have the background structure to cope with it and get the majority of the appointments correct. Sadly of those names only 3 or 4 have been successful appointments and the rest failures for various reasons - in fact Ince, Kean and Coyle should never have even been considered and will likely be 3 of the worst to ever grace this club. Chelsea for example have gone through Sarri, Conte, Mourinho x 2, Ancelotti, Villas Boas, Di Matteo, Grant, Scolari, Benitez and Hiddink x2 in the space of 15 years yet have been immensely successful - because they've appointed quality managers and have the structure behind the scenes to deal with a high turnover in managers. Leeds have gone through managers like mad but have finally arrived at a formula that works for them.

Perhaps we are approaching the Lambert/Rhodes stage here. Minimal January activity, manager starts looking at cashing in on the star man to raise funds for multiple needed quality players to kick on next season. I'm afraid we then get to the problem which is Venkys agreeing to reinvest the money into the squad. Seems Mowbray has more faith in them than I do on that one.

I always thought the rules of the Lancashire Cup were that it had to be open to spectators. Either way, if this one isn't open to the public the people at Lancashire FA will be missing out on a potential moneyspinner.

Brace yourself for this one being a daft kick off time. Probably lunchtime midweek to discourage people from going.

https://www.rovers.co.uk/news/2019/february/preston-game-not-to-be-streamed-live They've managed to prevent Sky from making it a red button game. Not sure how many more that will see turn up.

The Bolton situation just sums up what a shambles the rules of the League are. Bolton have been on thin ice for years, winding up orders galore, close to administration, yet are allowed to carry on doing it and face no sanction from the league, whilst well run clubs like Rotherham and Burton punch above their weight with limited yet well managed finances. Bolton managed to escape at the last minute last season and in doing so consign Burton to League One, probably never to return, and give Bolton access to Championship income for another year. They could still do the same this season and climb above Rotherham. Bolton spending money and paying out what they clearly don't have. Meanwhile Birmingham are being pursued for breaking FFP rules and supposedly gaining an advantage over rivals in doing so. Great. Punish them. But how can Bolton not be guilty of similar? Then you've Blackpool where a convicted rapist who was found in court to have stripped the club of millions of pounds is ok to own it whilst Belokon who has a guilty verdict from a Court in Kazakhstan cannot.

On that one the club will merely say that they can only get them on sale when they take delivery of the stock, so they are in Umbro's hands on that and can't be blamed for it. I'd argue that if our deal with Umbro is such that we miss out on the key summer holiday season and can't start selling new shirts until August then it's probably time we terminated our deal with them and went elsewhere.

If being on sale longer doesn't change anything then how come so many other clubs have already got theirs on sale in February? What do they know that we don't? It seems logical to me - the longer something is on sale for the more people are likely to buy it. I'm not really referring to longstanding season ticket holders who can be relied upon to buy no matter what, I'm referring to drifting people who make their minds up depending on performances, form, price, money left over in the bank etc. Those are the people we should be going out of our way to try and entice and I think it is worth doing something different to try and capture them. Sadly thinking outside the box is something we don't get much of at groundhog day Ewood. No imaginative pricing, always late with putting tickets on sale, put prices up then question why ambitious targets aren't reached. I don't really blame Waggott as it is my belief that he needs to get prices signed off from India before they can go out and that won't happen until the annual review. If you restrict your sales period to June and July before the season begins (during which we have no games, people don't come to Ewood and spend their cash going on holiday etc) then in doing so you restrict the scope for selling substantially more.

Seems this is going to be relatively well attended, although for the first time in a while we're playing them on a Saturday rather than a Tuesday night. Well priced tickets too. A draw would be decent. I've no idea what to expect. They are hard to beat at their place although last time out lost to lowly Bolton so it isn't exactly mission impossible to go there and win. The obvious way to do it is to start with a clean sheet and go from there but I won't be betting on that happening.

Exactly what Huddersfield did - brought in Wagner, knocked tickets down to £150 and marketed it as the 'Wagner revolution'. Targets for sales, progress shared with fans, encouragement to try and reach milestones, exciting signings to go with it. All about timing. Sitting around doing nothing until May and then hiking prices up another 17% and shutting another stand won't get people queuing up. Nor will signing a couple of free agents from League One and other players who clearly aren't going to improve the team.

They are either living in denial and genuinely believe that mucking around with kick off times, putting it on tv and putting prices up/shutting home areas doesn't negatively impact on home crowds or they're just coming out with it to try and shrug off any responsibility and instead blame the supporters for a lack of 'commitment'. Another one is the illogical claim that leaving season ticket sales until May or June rather than getting them out now like many rivals have done also has zero negative impact on numbers sold. What have we got to lose by breaking the tried and tested formula and get them out months earlier? Even if it sees no increase in numbers sold, it will still give people more time to budget and get themselves sorted. Life on easy street, Less numbers is lower risk, early kick off means it can be over and done with early and everyone can go home to bed relaxed that the day has passed without major issue.

This 'European network' that we are supposedly developing I feel is codswallop. I don't doubt that we are miles behind other clubs on international recruitment and development, as I've said before the limit of the club's gaze is the far side of Darwen. That's the result of a lack of investment and neglect of those areas over a prolonged period. But I don't think there is a serious push from within the club to address this, I don't accept that it should take 3 years to develop this 'European network' and I don't believe that Mowbray is the sort of manager eager to explore that market but has been prevented from doing so by factors beyond his control. I think the club is set up on a provincial, small scale basis, and that is evidenced by the recruitment, and that sort of thing suits the owners and those running the club on a daily basis. It is a result of that provincial approach which has seen Kean-Berg-Appleton-Bowyer-Lambert-Coyle-Mowbray in the dugout and never a foreign or 'outside the box' appointment which would require a far greater level of search and recruitment. As far as I can see Mowbray has never been a manager who has relied very much on the foreign market for his players, preferring instead to source British - that was the case at WBA, Boro and Coventry - so unless he's going to suddenly change his decade long approach to transfers I can't see him being keen to go down that road. Even if he was desperate to and those running the club were anxious for us to catch up in that area - there are many ways of doing so that are quicker and more effective than taking 2-3 years to build up a 'network'. The recruitment of a well connected and experienced Director of Football, technical director or whatever you want to call it with contacts and know-how of the European market would deal with that issue quickly. Watford were taken over by their Italian owners and within months had implemented their structure and were expertly navigating the European market and picking up bargains and quality players from all over the place - done by employing people who knew what to do - they didn't sit on their hands for 2-3 years waiting for a 'network' to be put in place and bemoaning having to play catch-up.

I'd just like us to be quick out of the blocks for one and get the majority of our spending and business done early doors to give the new players a full pre season. Mowbray said he wanted that last summer but it didn't happen as we left it to late on before bringing in Reed, Brereton and Armstrong. I don't expect that to happen as we've still to go through the annual review with Madame in May or June before approval is given to spend and we will be playing catch up whilst all the decent free agents will be snapped up.

I don't accept that. We had 3 reasonable chances to score, but took none of them. We were playing the team 2nd bottom of the league who had won 1 since early November, so having a few chances is the bare minimum to be expected. Even if we had taken one of those chances, there is no way we'd have gone and got a 2nd or 3rd in the first half. We would have sat back on a lead and Reading would have been able to respond, we've seen it at most away games that we've gone 1-0 up in.

The problem we've also got, beyond Mowbray deciding to become ruthless and make brave but potentially unpopular decisions, is convincing Venkys and the money men to do it. We've spent most of our efforts since promotion on dishing out improved longer term deals to most of our players. The next phase is going to be convincing them to cough up multi-millions and even bigger contracts to entice decent players to join us who will improve what we have. Given their track record they are more likely to ask Mowbray to cart on with the team he has assembled, which is much easier and cheaper than making root and branch changes.

Aye, I imagine there's plenty like you, plus plenty of others who have tickets who won't bother when they discover the game will be live on Sky Sports, plus plenty who would have gone at 3pm for the local derby but won't bother doing at lunchtime. Many, many reasons for that, ranging from other commitments, saving money by watching on tv or just not enjoying it as much at 12 noon, people making the decision either don't recognise or don't pay any attention to but then come out with stuff about 'commitment'. As I've said many a time - any other club in the league that willingly allows or even requests that its most popular fixtures to be moved to 12 noon?

The official Lancashire Constabulary Police twitter account for Preston confirmed the other day that the reason the game is at 12 noon is because Rovers made a request to have it at that time and the police had agreed to that request, not because the police had insisted on it kicking off then. So I suppose it depends which account you believe - the police (supported by the fact that everyone else can avoid noon kick offs and so can we when Man Utd or Liverpool come to town) or Rovers. I know who I hold responsible, but even if I'm wrong and the police are insisting on it, that still doesn't mean Rovers can't do anything about it.

From Caley's perspective what incentive is there for bigger crowds? Does he get paid more if there's an extra 5000 turn up? No. Does he have more pressure on him and work to do? Yes. What time does he clock off after a noon kick off? Probably home in time for tea, job done. For a 3pm kick off he might not get home until 7 or 8pm. No good. I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if it was something so petty as that. That's the extent to which people have entered the comfort zone with minimal accountability here. The myth that it is done on police instruction is gradually being exposed as a lie and hopefully the pressure will grow on those responsible to explain their decisions. If you want to increase home crowds start by playing more at 3pm Saturday and not being on TV as a result. From Middlesbrough onwards I reckon all but Stoke and maybe Bolton will be available on Sky TV. Surely Waggott is looking at that and can join the dots.

The club has to take accountability for the decline in atmosphere. They chose to shut two stands and move longstanding season ticket holders from their seats. No matter what the JW Lower corner block is never going to be a sensible place to create a singing section. It's too low down, too out of the way and too small. The club know this, the lack of any promotional material suggests that they didn't want to encourage people to sit there. Notice that Reading have a singing area of a few hundred fans next to the away end like the DE was, they refuse to close it to enable huge away followings like Rovers do. The revelation that the PNE noon kick off is at Rovers request and not the police is confirmation of what we are up against. Comfort zone stuff. 1 of 7 home games between Middlesbrough and August at 3pm on Saturday, 6 of 7 away games at 3pm Saturday. Sickening

I don't think anyone is suggesting Mowbray was wrong to point them in Waggott's direction when asked for his view, or that Mowbray should have recommended a 'cowboy' for the job. The concern is more to do with him seemingly being involved in decisions that the manager shouldn't have anything to do with.

I don't go as far as to suggest he instructed Venkys to employ him. More along the lines of Mowbray telling them they needed to appoint a competent CEO who could be trusted to run the club properly, Venkys having no idea of who or what to look for, so they trust him and ask him to recommend someone, and he points them in the direction of someone he got on with at Coventry, another club with maniacs running them.