JHRover

The last time they were 'interested' ( and I use that word very liberally here ) was in 2017 when after 2-3 years of cuts and chaos under Suhail (Bowyer sacked, failed Lambert experiment, Coyle appointment, selling all assets, sound familiar?) we got relegated. Somehow that event, rather than being the death knell for their regime and ownership, spurred them into some sort of review or action. Probably because of the media attention it brought and another £10 million hole in income from less Sky tv money so the head honchos decided to sit up and take some notice and work out what had gone wrong. Fortunately for them Mowbray dropped into their lap, and as so many do with Mowbray they fell under his spell once he had got himself out to India and talked to them at length at their palace. Outcome? Mowbray was backed more heavily than any manager they've had here in 15 years (except maybe Kean) and was given free reign in that he was allowed to sign his own players, appoint his mate and even insist they bring in a Chief Executive for the first and only time of their ownership, at considerable expense. Anyway, I think Mowbray convinced them to turn the money taps back on for a few years, leave him alone to get on with it and that by the end of that period we'd be in great shape for promotion or at least have a squad of assets to liquidate to recover funds from. 3-4 years go by and we weren't getting any nearer, so they get bored with the cost of this and start to listen to others. Pasha is talking a good game in the background. He can deliver the same result - Championship football - at half the price and even better he's 'one of them' who they already trust and he will take care of all the boring bits like dealing with managers and executives and running the club. All they have to do is review the balance sheet every 12 months, tip in the difference required and leave him to it. He'll make sure things tick over and we bring in plenty of cash from player sales to minimise their losses. What's not to like? These people are probably bone-idle and have never wanted the hassle of running a football club. The idea that 'one of their own' will take care of it all for them and not rip them off whilst doing so probably sounds great to them. They get the best of both worlds - the 'benefits' of owning a significant football club, at much lower cost than previously, and most people think they are doing us a favour for it (I'm being serious by the way, most fans I speak to genuinely think they are needed here). So from their warped positions they are probably quite content with things as they are. Whilst we are all exhausted with the draining misery of their occupation of our club and the continuing lasting damage it is doing they are probably getting quite comfortable with their trusted man sorting everything out and it costing them a fraction of what it once did. Just remember what happened the last time the curtain twitcher was in control and allowed to run the show without challenge - relegation to League One - because fundamentally he, and nobody willing to work under him, let alone the budgets he want's to impose - are compatible with competing in a high standard league. We've seen it all before only some are too blind or stupid to see it happening again.

They're just bullshitters whose sole purpose is to retain their 'Head of' status, that they have no right to occupy to start with, for as long as possible because they know full well they wouldn't get anywhere near equivalent status at any other Club, in any other league. One look at their past roles tells us that. Yasir Sufi doing 'community development' roles for Lancs CC and Rovers, next news he's 'head of' commercial. Shadow man Pasha, I doubt even he knows what his job is these days as his title seems to change every time he speaks, but I'm sure his little kingdom beats driving cars for Balaji or whatever he was doing before coming here (does anyone know yet what his background really is?) Talbot, once secretary to proper executive staff, by process of elimination finds herself as 'Head of' operations Gestede, a random ex-player with nothing to do after hanging up his boots, suddenly finds himself 'Head of Football Operations'. His favourite excuse of 'the previous players didn't want to be here' shows him up. He's playing to those who still want to boo those nasty ex players and staff for leaving, without addressing the bigger issue of WHY all our players wanted to leave, which of course (even if true) ultimately comes back to the rotten regime at Ewood. Truly scary stuff but striving for excellence, growth, improvement has never been on the agenda here. I'd forgotten Brett Baker even exists The lesson to learn is that saying the right things and being willing to tolerate the freak show here sees you get a nice title and cushy number, the only inconvenience to which is having to turn up to these sort of meetings and blag your way through it with a litany of excuses and hard luck stories.

Maybe this time he will have found himself a serious football club, the type that reward good results and league position with proper backing, don't slash budgets half way through transfer windows or have slippery shadowy characters running around in the background undermining transfers.

Absolutely. No doubt at all in my mind that certain elements behind the scenes were actively working against Broughton. He did the hard yards - got those deals lined up, probably put in a painstaking amount of time and work to get them ready, then he was deliberately thwarted at the 11th hour. I suspect by the one who is now running the show and who has been there throughout. All part of the great Rovers mystery. Who was the one responsible for bringing Broughton in if he wasn't going to be trusted and empowered to control recruitment and was going to be undermined? Maybe the shadow man who wanted a puppet he could control and has now got that it seems. Maybe someone else at ownership or board level and shadow man spent 18 months working to remove that threat to his position. The fact that Broughton was prepared to sit infront of the media and take responsibility for deliberate sabotage from elsewhere says a lot about him - more professionalism and courage than any of the slippery liars that hide away in the boardroom these days. Just a shame a lot of the fanbase still can't see what is staring them in the face and believe people like Broughton and JDT were the problem here.

I'd have thought even you would have dropped the old FFP excuse by now Chaddy. It has been nothing more than a convenient excuse used to explain a lack of interest/investment from the owners. The last 4-5 years have (if anyone needed it) provided proof that our problems are nothing to do with FFP, and probably never have been. Fortunately for those who hold BRFC hostage a shiny new excuse came along just in time - the Indian legal action. Now that one is wearing off they've just given up altogether and are effectively admitting that the owners just don't want to invest, not that they can't.

Says who? Lancashire Telegraph? They get their info (or did) from the club stooges, that was until they started to act like real reporters so the club cut them off as they weren't toeing the party line. And why has nobody else needed to sell prime real estate and players for over £10 million to avoid such embargos?

Has anyone purchased the 2026 Official Calendar? It appears this is a 150th anniversary version, complete of course with the Yorkshire White Rose (does ANYTHING we have come with a red rose these days?) I'm slightly surprised they chose 2026 to be the celebratory calendar, falling after the anniversary, rather than the 2025 calendar. Hopefully the calendar isn't just the usual 12 players photos (half of which will probably leave in January/the summer) and they've actually made some effort with it being the anniversary special (e.g. historic Rovers photos of cup triumphs, league successes etc.) UPDATE - no, of course not, it is the usual 12 players photos, so actually nothing to do with the anniversary other than they've used the Maltese cross/white rose combo to make out as though it is part of the anniversary range. Anyone want to guess how many of the 12 players will still be here in December 2026?

Norwich seem to have an interest in Scandinavian appointments. Wouldn't surprise me to see him turn up there.

So we get promoted this season to the PL, and offer Tronstad a 3 year deal on double his money and a chance to play in the PL. Is he rejecting that to move back to Norway? No It is all relative. Make him a good offer he stays. Show him we want to accomplish something as a club he stay. Muck him around like everyone else, go nowhere as a club other than backwards and of course he'll leave at the end of his deal.

Could have signed a proper striker in the summer. We knew Gueye wasn't good enough. Convenient with Tronstad. Another one going for personal reasons and nothing to do with Rovers. Still helps us avoid a new contract and pay rise. Centre back - why didn't we sign a Hyam replacement?

Why does he want January signings when the 'owners backed us' with investment and 10 new signings in the summer and Rudy delivered the goods?

Nailed on home win this. They're doing well, have been very solid at Deepdale and will be typical Preston - up for it, physical, direct, organised and all round horrible. We will be nice and have lots of possession but get nowhere with it. Another downside to the 'project' of Gestede is some of these foreign signings won't know what has hit them in a Lancashire derby there. People who would have served us very well in this from last season - Batth, Weimann, Travis, Wharton - not here to be called upon.

TEN parties have already provided proof of funds to the administrators of Sheffield Wednesday. 'But who would buy us if Venkys left?'

Everything is 'after the international break' now that we are in it

Judging by the numbers sat up there it even looks like interest in Yasir's free bus is on the wane.

This is the folly of releasing FOUR kits over the course of a season. It is just ridiculous and unnecessary. Rovers need TWO kits - home and away. We could have used both this year to properly commemorate the anniversary - a retro / one off home shirt and then an away shirt - perhaps the gold version with other anniversary references. Job done. Get adequate stock in over the summer and ensure the shelves are full through the season. Totally needless for us to have 3 kits in any season. The blue and white halves does the job in most games and an away shirt to be used at Millwall/QPR/Preston/Birmingham/WBA/Leicester/Portsmouth Totally needless to release a 'one-off' special kit for the anniversary game. Why not just use this all season and make the most of it? And in the end the whole thing botched by people who have no idea (I'm not sure what commercial experience the likes of Suhail and Sufi have but certainly not enough to be running a multi-million pound organisation). You might have had people willing to pay £80+ for that white Maltese shirt for the occasion of Saturday. But are they really going to pay that much for a shirt released in January and never worn in a match?

It would also be a clear acknowledgment of failing on the part of Gestede to now go out into the free agent market in bring in someone like Craig Dawson to see us through. After spending the last 6 months talking about a project, recruitment, way of doing things, exciting times, bright new future and heaping praise on themselves and the owners for their investment and bringing in 10 new players in the summer, if they now accept that they've left us short and that we need to take emergency action to bring in defensive reinforcements it would basically mean them accepting that whatever they did over the summer wasn't enough. Not going to happen. It will be square pegs in round holes until at least January and to hell with the consequences.

We aren't going to sign experienced free agents because it isn't 'the project', we aren't paying competitive wages and our budget is probably maxed out from the summer. The accountants and Suhail will not authorise and extra wage or two on the payroll. If that means we get relegated off the back of it, then so be it. It will be the same approach in January unless they can offload people first to raise money, despite Nixon's nonsense about investment coming, which is simply an attempt by the regime to buy time and get them through the next three months. That's why Ismael is saying this.

Occasionally you might get a 'surprise' relegation - if Sheff Utd, Norwich or Southampton stay down there they would be huge surprises based on their squads, investment and expectations. In reality - and it seems Southampton have already turned a corner now that Still has gone - all three are likely to get themselves out of trouble because they shouldn't be going down. I am still struggling to work out who the minimum two other clubs are going to be that we need to finish above to survive this season. On paper you'd think Oxford and Portsmouth maybe, but both seem to have the ability to pick up results, particularly at home, when they need to. Swansea were my pre-season prediction to struggle and it looks like some rot has set in there, but I don't think they'll just sit back and leave it to chance - they'll sack their inexperienced manager and replace before too long. I suppose maybe QPR another but they seem to be competitive. It is going to be a close run thing in my view. You can't lose 5/7 at home and win 1 and expect anything other than a struggle. One thing is for sure - we aren't going to be anywhere near 7th this season so perhaps the chuckle brothers running the show could explain why we've clearly regressed by 10+ places in the table under their management.

When he joined we had Waggott and Broughton running the show. I've made my views on Waggott clear before and others don't rate Broughton but at least there was some facade of professionalism and footballing nous there. Within 3 months Broughton had gone, Waggott pushed aside and someone had parachuted Gestede into the top position despite having no CV or track record to warrant it. It has since become clear that Gestede is being employed to oversee massive cutbacks and a revolving door policy of predominantly foreign players. We are about as far away from what Eustace walked into as possible. Pretty reasonable to suggest that the goalposts moved and what he signed up for wasn't what ended up happening.

There seems to be a misconception that Rovers are, or should be, vulnerable to the advances of Eustace and the might of Derby County. With the exception of Beck and Sanderson, neither of which were our players to begin with, none of those who have joined Derby - Batth, Weimann, Travis - we needed to let go. We chose to. Our choice. We chose to run their contracts down, we chose not to engage them in talks about new contracts, we chose accept the cash offered for our captain. Reading comments such as yours it seems to be structured in a way that poor little Rovers are the victims of some evil scheme by Derby and Eustace to extract our quality against our will. But that is nonsense. We had the power of contracts in our favour for all these players including Eustace and his staff. We agreed those contracts could end and took the cheaper option of avoiding improving them and grabbing the compo. Our choice. We could have dealt with the contracts, improved and extended them, or even sold the players to clubs other than Derby. Our negligence has cost us. Eustace knows what an absolute shambles this club is and knows that we have a diminishing pool of quality players that the disgusting owners and board will grab cash for any of them even at the expense of results. Not our fault he's trying to do a good job for a club with some ambition. This is competitive cut-throat business. Not amateur hour although I think our lot would prefer if it was.

We can all throw figures around. 3 wins in 4 yes. 3 wins in 13 home games. 1 win in 7 home games. 5 defeats in 7 home games. 19th in the table. The 'players are playing for him' doesn't really interest me - it's a results business and if they aren't up to scratch then 'playing for him' doesn't really compensate or help. But remember that the ownership and management won't be concerned about results one way or the other. So we can chat all day long on here the only way Ismael gets the boot is if he turns the spotlight on Pune and their mate in the shadows.

No way old Tony could cope with the commute from Teesside to Norwich after his struggles with getting to/from Brockhall.

Norwich have sacked Manning at last so they'll be on the lookout for a new manager too. Russell Martin probably top of their list with his connections there.

Seems strange, only a few days ago Rudy was boasting of the owners' support and investment with their '10 signings' and now we have lost a few to injury and we are all concerned about coping with a threadbare squad. In reality they've left us short, again, by cutting corners and costs on recruitment, contracts and the squad. Only an imbecile would sell Hyam on deadline day with no replacement coming in and then seriously expect treatment table regulars Carter and Wharton to see us through a 46 game season. But that's where the difference comes in - this lot aren't arsed if it means we lose more games or plummet down the table. They'll just shrug shoulders and moan about 'bad luck' whilst collecting their bonuses for cutting the wage bill and bringing in millions.