5 minutes ago, BigUts said:

Not if he costs £3.5m!

I can't see us paying that for anyone who isn't a striker to be honest, and even then only if Brereton goes. Having said that it begs the question as to why we would agree in principle to that price if we never had any intention of paying it. Maybe we only saw him as a short term loan and the prospect of buying him for a few quid smoothed out the move in January?

12 minutes ago, RoversTilliDie said:

I think it's time for a new manager next season like most supporters, but some of the criticism aimed at Tony Mowbray has been unfair. It's not all he's fault things went pear shaped.Let's give him a decent send off at Saturdays last home game and move on to next season,We have some decent players at the club that would do well in the premier, we have the basis for a premier team we just need more strength in depth,

I've been slower than most on here to get to the Mowbray out camp, and I agree that some of the stick that's aimed his way isn't warranted. I think he's shown at different times that he has quite a lot of what is needed to be pretty successful at this level, but sadly none of that really matters because of these horrible spells of form that his teams always seem to go through every new year. I'd be more inclined to share the blame around a bit more for this season if it wasn't such a consistent trend that's followed him his entire career. 

9 minutes ago, Tom said:

Could go either way if Bournemouth lose they could get nervy on Saturday but alternatively they will need to win

 

We'll certainly see what they're made of now! I think they'd have been well up for the game on Saturday anyway, so I'm happy at least they'll be under more pressure (assuming they don't come back to win of course).

42 minutes ago, deanives said:

What does everyone think of lenihan at RB in a back 4? 

I'm shocked at how comfortable he seems in the position, I know he doesn't give us the attacking threat that nyambe or another attacking rb does but he looks and reminds me of an old fashioned rb of yesteryear

He was very good, and put a cross onto Brereton's head which was better than any that Nyambe has done for me. Horses for courses though, Bournemouth will be a very different game and (assuming he's fit) I'd have the specialist right back who remains an excellent 1-on-1 defender.

What that means for the rest of the back 4 (or 5?) god only knows. 

6 minutes ago, speeeeeeedie said:

I think so too. He didn't score but played well last night. 

I said a week or two ago that the Sheffield Utd loss was the worst one. It's looking more prescient as the end nears. I still don't understand why Khadra took the penalty.

Agree, I look at that one and the Coventry result as being the biggest kicks in the teeth. Sheffield United looks like being the worst seeing as it's them who we're competing against and we didn't even get a point in the end, but with Coventry being the first game back from the international break (and the first with Brereton back), I think having the wind taken out of our sails there has proven to be a disaster. 

Is there any prospect of getting an increased allocation for this? I imagine there's a big group who will be waiting until the weekend's results before making the call about whether to go. 

16 minutes ago, speeeeeeedie said:

Last night was any of; a return to form, PNE on the beach, Rovers under no pressure. The players certainly looked happy to be playing. 

I thought that they played well. The spark was the front 3 constantly harassing PNE and not giving them any time at the back.

I feel that it's too little too late though. 

The what if's are numerous. How many last minute goals cost points? 

Would it have been different if Brereton didn't get injured?

We might well have still tailed off, but I think you have to say yes. Those two missed penalties alone look like being decisive. 

3 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

Just watched the highlights again. Travis did really well to shape his body for the side foot finish. We need to get him in there more often. Brererton a bit unlucky hitting the post and skimming the bar with those two headers. He’s definitely improving that side of his game.

Never saw him as a natural header of the ball until this season, but he has really stood out as a threat in the air this time around. Brilliant goals against Millwall & PNE, the one for Chile too. Sure there are others I'm forgetting too. 

Agree about Travis too, his goals when they come around tend to be well taken, so that's definitely a sign that we need to get him in those positions more often. 

23 minutes ago, islander200 said:

No we didn't miss him last night.

But he has been a good servant to the club and it will be a sad state of affairs if he doesn't get to say a proper goodbye to the fans on Saturday.

He deserves a place in the squad, if it was anything other than injury as to why he was missing last night then it is a joke imo.

Zeefuik and Poveda shouldn't have been given a place on the bench ahead of him.

 

I think we can worry about saying proper goodbyes to players once we finally have nothing left to play for. Being hard-headed about it, he can have no complaints about being dropped after his performance with the ball vs Stoke, where for me he was the worst culprit of the lot for hiding and taking the easy option. The total opposite of how we played yesterday.

I'd have had him on the bench over Zeefuik to be fair, but Poveda I can definitely understand as an option who can call upon if we needed a goal. I think if a player has made it clear that he's going at the end of the year (even if most of the blame for that can be put at the clubs' door) there's no need to treat Nyambe any differently to a loan player who we also know will be gone in a few games. 

2 minutes ago, Sparks Rover said:

Nobbers love him mate...player of the year etc....did you not hear the sky commentator saying Lowe should build his team around him next season....and he will

That was the impression I had before yesterday to be honest, just made the comments on their forum all the more surprising to me. 

5 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

I thought your pal had a game to forget. He was playing  too deep with no support. Too many opponents to mark. That’s not his game. You want your playmaker further forward. Frustration crept in at the end. 

I don't watch him enough to really comment, but I had a brief look at their message board after the game and he's been getting absolute pelters. Quite a few of their players are to be fair, so maybe there's not too much you can read into that. 

36 minutes ago, jim mk2 said:

Gallagher would probably notch 10 plus goals over the course of the season if he played centre forward all the time but sorry, he is not a good player. His touch, passing, ability to lead the line, lack of physicality and general all round play is poor even when he’s played in his “best” position. 

The talk about him being played out of position is massively over done in my view - it's a factor to be sure, but his touch and his lack of a proper goal scorer's instinct to be in the right place are much bigger ones for me. They'll prevent him from ever being near a top-flight standard player.

That said, he was very good yesterday, and shows that he can still be a real handful at this level, despite his deficiencies. I even like the attitude that he's shown in recent home games when the rest of the team went into their shells, and whilst Brereton was the more impressive of the two yesterday, his all round play looked a million miles ahead of Archer and Riis (admittedly in a strong team performance). 

If we were to go back a few summers ago I think we all would still spend the £5million very differently, but I'm willing to see him as a useful player in the squad now. He just doesn't have the quality to be the main man, so we can't be relying on him as that next year if Ben goes. 

6 minutes ago, OsloRover said:

Not sure why people are getting on Hedges' back. He looked good to me last night, especially considering his lack of game time for us.

I thought he looked okay to me, a big advantage over Dolan (who I like, and need to remind myself how young he still is) is that he has the physicality to keep the ball more easily. 

7 hours ago, WacoRover said:

Looking at who’s out there, Bilic isn’t immediately looking for work, but he could probably be had. Bilic has one of the highest win%, 45.6%. We could do a lot worse. 

Bilic would be a very decent statement of intent. 

I think so much of success at this level can be right-place at the right-time, so I'm pretty open minded about who we end up getting assuming Mowbray's on his way. Hughton's record was stellar until he was a disaster at Forest, and there are loads of other cases of managers doing well with one club and stinking the place out at another. I wouldn't be against a left-field choice like Wagner or Farke were at the time, but I suspect that requires a bit more imagination than we presently have in the Ewood boardroom. 

1 hour ago, glen9mullan said:

Fantastic performance, and if we can play like that Saturday and get a result regardless of the QPR game Friday we take this to the last game of the season.

If I block out the previous 44 games, i'd have taken that in August.

We can talk about the if's, buts, Could of, Should of but that result last night especially clawing back on the goal difference has certainly given the the last two games a pulse.

I've posted a lot of frustration, annoyance, and if anything a lot of somewhat negative thoughts the last few weeks.

However, i'm going to park all that for now, its all very valid, but now is not the time for the inquest.

Waking up with a bounce in my step, excited for the weekend and dreaming the near impossible is a feeling I want to savour, even if its just for a few days or couple of weeks.

Sam Gallagher was a warrior last night, he has taken his fair share of grief from me, but will he ever score a more important goal for us?

Three academy lads on the scoresheet, 

Local rivals absolutely tonked in their own back yard.

Rothwell, sublime, he maybe off, he may have gone off the boil, but last night he was majestic.

Proud of them all after that

 

I'm glad you mentioned Gallagher. He showed when Brereton was out that he can't be relied upon to be the main man up front if/when Ben goes, but his work on and off the ball yesterday was top class and deserved his goal.

Agree too about parking the inquest until the end of the season, although it's really hard to watch the performance yesterday and think what if.

Putting aside the poor performances, the number of games when we were either unlucky or shot ourselves in the foot from either a winning position or when we had gilt edged chances to win is extraordinary. Coventry x2, Luton (h), Sheff U (a), Swansea (a), Bristol City (h), Peterborough (a). Three points taken from twenty-one, when even just a handful more would've comfortably seen us still in the top 6. 

Still, after yesterday I'm happy at least that the fat lady isn't singing just yet. If QPR get anything this Friday then I might start believing again. 

6 minutes ago, Dan said:

I’m not so sure there aren't comparisons to be made. Mowbray and his mates are using Rovers for their own personal(financial) gain. Mowbray is a horrible man, with an evil vindictive personality. He doesn’t have the clubs best interest at heart and has contempt for the supporters. Seems we still have agents running the club that have ties back to Anderson and Kean, Mowbray is part of the same agency.
 

I believe Kean was worse, but many times in the last few years I’ve started to dislike Mowbray as much, I’ve seen straight through the nice guy act.   

We need to replace Mowbray as a priority because of repeated spells of poor form on the pitch, but there isn't anything like enough evidence to be making statements like that. Kean's agenda was as clear as day well before he eventually left, with plenty of evidence to back it up. You simply can't say the same about Mowbray, even though he's been here for more than five years. 

1 hour ago, TruRover said:

This summer is a rebuild no doubt about it - however I think the strength of our academy puts us in decent shape for it. Basing us off a classic 4231 position as with what we have next season I feel it would work best.

Kaminski 

NEW - Carter - Wharton - Pickering 

Travis - Buckley 

Markandy - Dack - Diaz 

Gally 

First and foremost I don’t think it’s a forgone conclusion that Diaz stays. We probably value him at the 20million mark, though his lack of playing time and goals in the 2nd half of the season may put teams off. It wouldn’t surprise me if no team gets close to our valuation. The ideal scenario for me would be getting van Hecke and Khadra in a swap deal for him. 

There is no doubt that we need a new RB to replace Nyambe - and personally Zeefuik hasn’t proven himself to fork out a couple of million on him. I wouldn’t be opposed to another loan for him but I would personally go for Drameh from leeds (currently on loan at Cardiff). 
 

If van Hecke doesn’t return then and Lenihan leaves we will need at least 2 CBs. One who is first team quality and one who can provide decent back up. Kipre or Ajayi from westbrom (who have been out of favour this season) could be decent shouts.

Left back we are covered. 

2 CMs are needed - one to provide back up to Travis, and one to push Buckley for that position next to him.

The 3 positions behind the strikes looks alright to me - Diaz (?)Hedges, Dack, Markandy, Dolan and potentially Khadra, who I feel we will be able to get back either on loan or perm. If Diaz goes we will need to bring someone in tho even then I like the look of Markandy, Dack, Khadra behind a striker. 
 

The striker position will be key. I really feel Gally upfront can make a name for himself next season. Don’t judge him on his performances under this manager. Back up is needed tho and I again would look at leeds and see if we could bring in Tyler Roberts - could also grow into our first choice. 
 

So in short we need at least 6

 

GK: Kaminski, Pears, Sterg.

RB: New, JRC.

CB: Ayala, Wharton, Carter, New, New, Phillips. 

LB: Pickering, Edun.

CDM/CM: Travis, Buckley, Edun New, New, Garret.

Attackers: Markandy, Dolan, Dack, Hedges, Diaz (?), Khadra (?) New (?)

Striker: Gally, New
 

Personally I think it's at least 90% certain that Brereton is gone. It may be for a lot less than we would like, as you say, but like Armstrong, if he won't sign a new deal we may just have to just make the best of the interest that we have.

Getting near to replacing his goals will have to be the main concern. Gally, who has some good points to his game, won't be able to get nearly enough without bringing in at least two out and out wingers who would suit him if we played him as a number 9. Hopefully whatever money we get for Brereton can fund a move for a reliable goalscorer, but I say that in more hope than expectation.

Pretty much agree with your assessments elsewhere. We'll obviously need a new right back, although after Nyambe's performance against Stoke I'm more convinced than ever that he is replaceable (albeit I'd be very happy if he signed a new contract). If we play four at the back then maybe just one new CB is needed alongside Wharton, with Carter/Ayala/Phillips as the back ups. I'm hoping that another season's improvement in Buckley and Dack with a full pre-season will soften the blow of losing Rothwell, but we'll still need more creativity from the midfield too. 

I'm not sure how many new faces we'll need in the end, but I'd say that at least three or four will need to be starting XI players from the start, so that in itself makes it a big summer for us. 

19 minutes ago, JoeH said:

Ryan Nyambe has a PL club lined up apparently. Lenihan more and more likely to stay with offers coming from elsewhere not much more appealing than staying at Ewood. There's not a transfers thread that I can find so thought best to stick in here.

They fancy sending Garrett to League One for a season to see how he does. Phillips has plenty of LG1 suitors too but for now the plan is that he'll stick around. They don't feel a need to rush him. 

I find that really surprising. His pace and power, and arguably his 1-on-1 defending are prem level. Other aspects of his game?

I know the 'how important is it for fullbacks to be able to attack' debate has been done to death on here, but any prem team looking at his performance vs Stoke can't be thinking that he has what it takes to contribute going forward. Time and time again the ball went to our right and the attack died with him. Dreadful team performance to consider, but he looked a mile away from a top-half Championship defender, never mind a top-flight one. 

8 minutes ago, Mike E said:

On the Dyche rumours (which I don't believe), money is irrelevant tbh. He has 3.5yrs of pay coming his way, up to £15m. We could pay him £1m/year and promise him PL bonuses and he'd effectively be topped up by Dingle pay for 3 years.

It's almost worth hiring him for that alone 🤣

All the more incredible considering they've made the call in a panic about potentially lost future revenue. Is that pretty much equal to their record transfer fee?

Just now, Theaxe15 said:

I don’t think Mowbray even deserves much credit for the League One success. We started terribly (with 5 at the back if memory serves me correctly) so he was forced into changing the system which just happened to suit Dack, amongst others, perfectly. He even tried messing with the formation when we were on winning steaks (an awful first half at home to Bury springs to mind).

His issue is constantly getting sussed out. Play his teams once, you know how to play them next time. It soon catches on. Some managers have the tactical nous to change it, some managers have the man management skills to inspire players out of a bad patch. Mowbray has neither. He’s a thin-skinned dinosaur with thickly lined pockets and that’s fine by him.

 

To be fair, another way of phrasing that exact same point is that his change of system brought about a positive change in form which led to promotion. We finished up getting close to 100 points after that terrible start, and we've seen countless examples of big clubs struggling in that league recently, so I don't think there's any harm in giving him the credit for that one.

Doesn't stop him from needing to go after this season's capitulation though. 

8 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I find it very difficult to place all of my thoughts on Mowbray's reign into a concise summation. 

He does deserve a tremendous amount of credit for stabilising the ship after relegation to League 1. Yes, some managers might have been able to avoid the drop in the first place and relegated sides are always promotion favourites, but many sides have struggled to go back up and it was essential that we do it at the first time of asking.

Since promotion, he has managed to reestablish this club as a solid Championship team, but after that the positives stop. His inconsistent tactics and inability to get the best out of most of his players has been tremendously frustrating. His signings have been mostly questionable and he seems to be a poor judge of talent. 

Yes, he gets some credit for our form in the first half of the season, but he was unable to regain momentum once the luck ran out and things started to slip. He feels very much like a manager who struggles in the face of adversity and who is unable to adapt. Each season has been plagued by major drops in form (particularly towards the backend of Championship seasons) and the fault has to be placed firmly at the doorstep of management in that regard. 

But my biggest criticism of him has to be in his demeanour. I cannot imagine having a boss who carried himself as he does. Who'd body language and messages were so negative. It's impossible to think that this has had no impact on the team.

He won't go down as our worst manager, but it is his time to go (and has been for some time) and we can hope for someone to come in with more energy and more creativity.

I know many will agree with you, so I'm not saying you're wrong to bring it up, but personally I don't get why his body language/interviews etc. riles people so much. He's had a pretty miserable demeanour since day one here as far as I see it, and plenty of that coincided with the team doing well. I don't agree that his signings were mostly bad either. I think there are enough success stories to say that he can spot a player.

I agree though that it's hard to concisely summarise all the different aspects of his time in charge. If I was to try, the thing that it really boils down to is your point about the major drops in form. I think if these were just a little less predictable/less severe, you could even now make a perfectly good case for him being worth a new contract (not least because we'd still be in the play off mix). But sadly they're not, and it almost makes all other aspects of his performance irrelevant because it means that we'll always have that ceiling of what we can achieve under him. 

1 hour ago, rog of the rovers said:

Mowbray's time at the Rovers will forever be linked with this season.

''To not even reach the playoffs, with where we were at the end of January 2022.''

These words will be synonymous with his reign, whether he goes in three hours, three days, three weeks, three months, three years.

Can't argue with that. Speaking for myself, I would have been happy with us parting ways last season, but knowing how straightforward finishing in the top 6 should've been from our position in January, I was happy to eat my share of humble pie at the time. I expected there to be a sticky patch, possibly even a very bad one, but I never in a month of sundays thought it would cost us a play off spot from where we were.

The really perplexing thing is how to explain where these death spirals come from. It doesn't seem at all as though Mowbray flogs his players into the ground, or that the injury situation at his various clubs tends to be that bad after Christmas. I use various types of data in my work, and one thing you always need to be careful of is wrongfully claiming that that one thing actually causes a certain outcome, when in reality it might just be a chance association, coincidence or a number of other things. Having said all that, the way that Mowbray has these spells so frequently, over multiple seasons across multiple clubs and playing squads, strongly suggests that he is at the root of it all, even if it's not obvious from the outside what it is about his management which results in these spells.

It's such a shame, because even now I would like to remember his spell in charge fondly because I genuinely think there are plenty of aspects to him as a manager which are/were positive. The L1 season is obvious, but generally his recruitment record is better than most, with a couple of diamonds in there, admittedly along with one or two howlers too. Unlike almost all of our post-Sam managers, he has had the imagination to actually implement a coherent style of play which wasn't just throwing out XI players on the pitch, as was the case under Coyle, Bowyer and others. We might easily end up with somebody worse than Mowbray if we replace him in the summer, but we simply can't carry on with a manager who almost every year oversees a dramatic and sustained loss of form in the second half of the season.

2 hours ago, Boz said:

Hearing a number of Dyche linked rumours from reliable folk, who have connections.

MIght just be soundings out, as to whether either parties might be inclined to just talk.

I don't know where manager's salary fits in within FFP, heard Dyche was on £5m pa at Bumley, which is way too much for us if a manager's wages forms part of FFP.

Plus it's not been Venky's modus operandi to date in going looking to pay big money for management, been more keen to look at cheaper options, with then links with agents? 

So to me the chances sound remote.

Like you I can't see this happening at all, for a number of reasons. That said, the wedge that he was on at Turf Moor is neither here nor there now, as none of the clubs that he's likely to get in the near future will be paying him anywhere near that. 

Because most top-flight teams will have their lazy preconceptions of him, he'll probably have to make do with a Championship club in England. Ridiculous really, but I can't see any Prem club going for him until (ironically) somebody gets desperate in a relegation scrap next year, and even then he's unlikely to get his chance that way. His next move will probably be to a club which isn't a million miles away from where we are in the pyramid as things stand, but one who can offer him a better chance of growing something than what is currently on offer at Ewood. 

38 minutes ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

There’s an interesting article about Dyche and Burnley in todays “ Guardian “. What caught my eye was that fact that although they  “ put it about a bit “ as we used to say, they’ve only had two red cards in five years. We’ve had 5 this season already apparently. You don’t win many games playing with 10 men, we certainly don’t.

Struck me during the first half yesterday that there are lots of different ways that players can show character. Being brave on the ball when things are tough is obviously one, fronting up to physically imposing teams being another.

One that doesn't get talked about as much is not trying to show how much you care by picking up stupid cards when the team is getting outplayed, which we have definitely been guilty of this season, including the first half yesterday. That stat there for the Burnley is another little bit of evidence which shows that their success has been built on a lot more than just a throw-back manager trying to bully teams. Like Sam was here, he's a manager who takes care of the minute details and demands total discipline from his players. Whoever gets him next year will have an excellent manager on their hands, especially if it's in the Championship. 

19 hours ago, Mellor Rover said:

Up until this week, I thought Sheff United would. But there last couple of results have put them out of reach of us with their game in hand never mind Bournemouth!

I don't see anyone catching them now myself. Think if we or anyone around us were to catch them, they'd need to win 7 of the next 8 which isn't happening.

I still think there's huge uncertainty to be honest. If Bournemouth get their act together and actually beat a decent number of the sides they have left to play, then I agree it would take one of the pack to win almost all of their remaining games. 

With Bournemouth's form and run in though, they could easily end up limping their way to 10-12 points, which would make them realistically catchable for me.