I don't think it's even driven by data. I bet it would be easy to use data to show much of a brilliant job Dyche did at Burnley, for example. It wouldn't have stopped people turning their nose up at him though because of 'style of play'. Completely baffling. I think you're right about Eustace. He's obviously gong to have a growing list of people recognising the job he's doing, but when it comes to the small number of clubs who might actually go for him? You can imagine a lot of reactions going something like "he's done brilliantly at Rovers, but do we want someone who's so defensive/not gone promoted/not a big name" etc.

I might end up looking silly further down the line for this, but I'm not worried at all about Eustace being poached. Prem jobs going to Championship managers - especially those without a promotion on their CV - are as rare as hens teeth. When it comes to other Championship teams, it's surprisingly rare to see managers go directly from one club to another. Stoke have got form in bringing in Schumacher from Plymouth and Alex Neil from Sunderland, but they are the only examples I can think of in the last couple of years. Ultimately there's not much money around if you don't have parachute payments, and so that means i) most clubs are roughly as attractive as each other when it comes to resources, and ii) clubs aren't willing to pay £1million plus in compensation even if Eustace were interested. If a parachute club, or maybe e.g. Middlesbrough really wanted him come the end of the season then I'd worry, but even there teams tend to be picky in wanting a manager who already has a record of promotion to the prem.

In one sense you're completely correct. But at least we're not really one for sacking coaches these days, especially once they get a bit of credit in the bank like Eustace has. Most clubs in this league are either skint, dysfunctional or both. We are probably both, but it's a big risk to be making sidewise moves in the Championship. If he got an offer from a club with parachute payments, then that's obviously a different kettle of fish.

When you think that Birmingham (who signed Wright) spent well into eight figures for one player, that is an appalling return for five players.

I still can't really work Baker out, but the one thing he clearly isn't a natural at is bringing lots of energy off the ball. Definitely not a like-for-like Travis replacement. He might still play, but I'd be tempted to give JRC a go. As @Tyrone Shoelaces says, he's in stinking form, but there's less pressure on his mistakes leading directly to chances than when he's in the back four, he's the one who is most similar to Travis, and it might even be a chance for him to see a lot of the ball and play himself into some form. This is the sort of fixture which screams soft Rovers loss. Even pre-Venkys we used to routinely lose these sorts of games! I'd be pretty happy if we end up with three points after this and Sheff Wednesday. Any more and I'd be over the moon.

You could well be right about that. The one thing that stood out above everything else vs Sheffield United though was just how physically dominant they were. Not just that of course, but when a team is so much quicker and stronger then you really have to go some to outplay them. I'm not sure whether Leeds have quite the same physical edge. I think they've had some issues with players being unavailable in midfield. Rothwell's been a mainstay in there, and we know better than anyone that as good as he can be going forward, he has his flaws. Their away from has been slightly dodgy too, so I don't think a result is out of the question at all.

The Swansea game shouldn't be much of a barometer of how tonight should go. After last night's 0-0 draw, that's now seven out of their eleven games this season which saw a maximum of one goal. Definitely puts our struggles with the ball into consideration. I think more of a football match should break out tonight. Whether that suits us not remains to be seen.

Agree about Carter. It's not that he doesn't have decent ability on the ball, maybe 20 years ago he would've been brought through as a right back rather than a centre half. He hasn't let anyone down there at all, but there too many times you can tell he isn't natural in that position. Should be an emergency measure only going forward. On Brittain vs JRC, I think when he's on form JRC has to get in the team somewhere. Sadly though he hasn't shown anything like so far this year for whatever reason, whereas Brittain has set up two goals already despite missing half our games. Brittain starts for me.

Yes, pretty productive. Wouldn't go any further than that, but 13 goals/assists since the start of last season (which he missed a decent chunk of through injury) is decent. Not brilliant, but if we had another one or two with those sorts of contributions then we wouldn't have relied on Szmodics as much as we did. And I think his decision making is miles better too. When he first arrived he was a bundle of energy who would run at players, but his final ball was like rolling a dice and he'd regularly run himself into blind alleys. Now he takes fewer touches and when he gets the ball in the right areas (not often enough) looks to pick a pass more. You could never see him providing the sort of assist like did at Leeds away a few years ago, for instance. I'm not saying he's a world beater and he'll always be up against it being as small as he is, but I think he's developing pretty well all things considered. Definitely agree with your second point. It seems like we've had rocks or diamonds up front for a long while. Or in Brereton's case, rocks that turn into diamonds!

To be fair I think all of our attacking midfield/wide players who've been here for any length of time get a bit of stick. Hedges gets plenty of criticism on here (including from me) and Sigurdsson and Markanday are only dodging it because they're out of the team. Having said that I agree that he's a decent Championship player. I don't know what sort of contract we would need to offer to keep him, but it would be disappointing to see him go for nothing.

Of the three behind Gueye, I thought he was better than Hedges (who was totally anonymous going forward) and behind Cantwell, but that's only because Cantwell grew into the game a bit more in the second half. Dolan's big problem is his lack of physicality, and his lack of pace over longer distances. In games like yesterday where we have hardly any ball, we don't have much pace and the whole team is a bit off with their passing, Dolan just doesn't have the tools to impose himself on the game. Having said all that, he had a few decent moments and scored (set up?) the winner, so he deserves credit for that. I actually quite like the way that he's developing. He's pretty productive with goals/assists and his decision making is streets ahead of where it was when he first joined. Still only 22 as well. But he's never going to get bigger or quicker, and so I think he's always going to be a player that struggles to get into certain types of games, yesterday being a perfect example.

Looking at Swansea's results this season puts yesterday in a slightly different light, I think. All of their games are low scoring affairs apart from a single 3-0 win against PNE. Nobody's put more than one goal past them all year, and they've dominated the ball every time they've played bar one. Taking that into account, yesterday was always going to be a tough watch. But it's also a game that we could've very easily lost, and 100% would've lost last season. A very good three points where we were great off the ball, even if we were poor going forward. I think part of how bad we looked with the ball of our feet was linked to our lack of pace. I lost count of the number of times we gave the ball away by playing passes in front of Dolan/Cantwell/Hedges but they were beaten to it by a Swansea defender.

I've thought for a while that home advantage seems to count for a lot more during midweek games, but that's unbelievable. I wonder if other clubs have got a similar pattern.

The failure of David Moyes there made me reassess what you need to be a manager of a club like Man United. Ten years of relative success at one of the bigger clubs in England and he was totally unprepared. If anything the length of time at a "normal" club seemed to be a hindrance to getting to grips with what is a totally different job. There's such a small pool of people genuinely prepared to take on those sorts of clubs, in not surprising that the likes of Ancelotti keep getting hired over and over again. I'm not sure if Southgate will ever manage again to be honest. After being England manager does he have the hunger to slum it at a lower-Prem team or below, and I think Man United are the only club significantly above that level who would be stupid enough to hire him. He wouldn't last a season if they did, but it would be seriously funny in the meantime.

Definitely. An absolute classic of the genre. Especially since it's against Coventry who I have literally never seen us beat, with my first ever game at Ewood being the 2-1 FA cup loss in 97. On Hedges, I think a big reason why Eustace keeps him in the team is his physicality. On the ball I think he's a bit of a plodder, but he has the size and engine to get up and down the pitch a lot easier than our other options there who are all well under six foot. I think when Cantwell gets up to speed then he'll start on the left and drift inside, with Hedges struggling to start.