You lost me at Sonny being “overrated” - literally the best holding midfielder we’ve had since we dropped out of the PL. Arguably better than most we had in the PL for the last few seasons we were in there. Completely agree it would necessitate us signing two good CM’s and I wouldn’t trust em to get those done either.

With any normal situation, I wouldn’t be against us selling Travis. I think he needs to kick on, and his early season scintillating form isn’t going to fool the vast majority of us. He didn’t get a sniff when he went out to Ipswich and there’s a good reason for that…Sonny is miles better than him. BUT, we are not a normal club and I don’t trust them to replace him properly which would massively destabilise us. Argh…feels like this week, signings, sales and V’s court case will potentially pivotal to our history!? 🤦🏽‍♂️🤡🤞🏽🙏🏽💙

None of us (bar maybe unleaded and one more) have a clue who or what we can afford. Chaddy is ultra positive (I prefer it), but why people think they can slap him down and ridicule his hypothesis in a thinly veiled attempt to make themselves appear like they know something is laughable. No one knows what Venkys will do and there’s no precedence other than they’re completely inconsistent. Under V’s tenure, we’ve gone full windows and spent nothing, we’ve loaned great players and shit ones, we’ve signed players for a million and some for two million. We’ve spent £5-7m on players in surprise “special” cases…and set up multimillion pound deals before ‘forgetting’ to press send (on more than one occasion)🤬🤦🏽‍♂️ Honestly, no one knows what this lot will do. PS - We’ve never been in a stronger position (in terms of FFP headway) and the owners could find the £14m you speak of down the back of their couch. A change of the wind could sort Stansfield.

He hasn’t played CM in the first two games…

No mate, Moran came into a team that had finished 7th on goal difference to miss out on the playoffs. A team that until late November, continued to perform at a good level before spiralling out. I’m not one to hammer players normally but I’d happily say he was poor. He’s obviously diminutive and young so I wasn’t expecting him to be physically ready. It was his turnover of possession which shocked me. His ball retention was awful and final ball even worse. Is there a player in there? Probably…but I never even saw a glimpse of one tbh. fwiw - I think there’s players in Hill, Chrisene and Ayari who all played significantly less football for us than Moran. Hirst wasn’t great but he never even got a chance with Rovers. Whenever he did play, I felt he offered more than Gally anyway. I think the £5m option to buy hindered him. Plus JDT obviously didn’t rate him.

Pears Brittain Carter. Hyam. Pickering Travis Sonny JRC Dolan Hedges Gueye Hilton, Duru, Batth, Mcfadz, Bucko, Weimann, Siggy, Ohashi, Tyjon Norwich 1 - 3 Rovers - Gueye, Ohashi x2 level 1-1 and at 60 mins Yuki, Siggy and Weimann come on to spark a Rovers win.

I appreciate you trying to find some positives but I go back to their performances last season and I’d question what on earth your scouts saw in them. The one I’d most forgive is Ennis. He’d played well-ish for Schumacher and barely had a chance at Rovers. Crappy stop gap signing - flushed £1m down the bog, fine. But Gally and Moran are fuckin unforgivable mate. Gally is a stump. Runs his heart out but literally never even looks like scoring. I think he could end up being a centre half. He only wins headers from defensive corners. Last season was his worst of 5 terribly average ones and he missed his *obligatory third of the season through injury. What did they / you see in him that was worth a quid, never mind £1.6m!? Moran - honestly terrible. Under JDT, I was convinced Moran had some dirt on him. Literally struggled to get into any game. Was poor technically and had to have one of the worst pass ratios over 5yrds out of any player in the football league. As soon as JE came in, he never played again. I appreciate this probably feels like I’m going OTT but honestly, if I found out your chief scout was a plant and secretly supported your arch rivals it’d make more sense. It’s like you purposely targeted the worst players in the crappest team (us) last season. I don’t know whether to laugh or cry for you 🤷🏽‍♂️🤣

Relax mate. I can tell you’re worked up but tbf, the only player of not we’d sold before SS was Gally and they replaced him with Ohashi and Gueye, who after 3 games, I could definitively say, are better than him. Im not saying we will do better than SS, it’s a big ask but keep your powder dry man.

Kinel mate, honestly I swear I’m not being salty…but if you asked me who has been the most ineffective players at Rovers over arguably our worst performing period in the Championship, I reckon Ennis, Gally and Moran would be in my top 5. I don’t know who is scouting these players for you but but they’re absolute taking the piss. Opinions aside, there’s literally zero chance that someone watched any of those three last season and could’ve walked away thinking they were any good. I feel genuinely sorry for you.

FFP is based on revenue, hence why we’re in profit for the year. But the challenge is purely Cashflow…let’s say we’re getting £15m per year for the sales + Raya payment, for the next 2.5years…that’s great, as long as the owners keep pumping in the necessary to make sure we don’t lose more than £13m per season (allowed £39m over three years, right?) to keep us under FFP. Them not pumping cash in has a double effect. Firstly it means we have less room to manoeuvre in the transfer market, but bearing in mind we’re currently £10m up at least, we’ve effectively got £23m head room. The main issue is Cashflow because we have no option but to use the £15m of transfer cash to pay the bills. It’s such a shame they’re not stumping the cash up now. We’d be in an outstanding position to buy 2/3 £5m players to really push on!

Iversen, Lb loan, CM loan, S.Dembele and Ryo Germain as a replacement for SS. 🤞🏽🤞🏽

SS medical in the morning. Fee agreed.

Not one to get unnecessarily worried, but that passage in the interview is worrying as it’s the first time JE has accepted that there might not be another fullback or keeper signed. The first time he’s said “and if we don’t get one, then we’ll make do” gulp….

Ipswich now in talks with Broja from Chelsea…have they moved on? 🤞🏽

I was sure after 15 minutes in a preseason game vs Stockport that he was better than Gally. Im not saying he’s better than JR. I actually rated him and think he made the very best out of what he had. He was effective and had a good career. But he didn’t have that instinct that strikers have, he relied on hustle and bustle to make an impact. Gueye is a big lad but he’s not a battering ram and I can tell you that In the three games I’ve watched him play, he’s been in more goal scoring positions when the balls in the final third than Gally was in 5yrs. Ok, that’s vs Stockport twice and Derby County, but I’d bet everything I own, that had Gally been playing, he would’ve been lucky to have been in those positions even once in the same three games, and at best he’d have one goal to his name. Gueye could flop spectacularly, but im very sure it won’t be because he’s not there to put them in, just maybe he contrives to miss the chances he does get!

Hmmm…I think the difference between Gueye and Roberts is that instinct / ‘Right place, right time’ thing that Gueye has.. I agree that they share much of the same attributes in terms of physicality, speed, hold up play etc, but in my opinion, Roberts lacked finishing AND the instinct to be a top striker whilst Gueye, just lacks the finishing bit…Roberts, positionally in attacks was much closer to Gally than Gueye.

If Mak had elite level finishing to add to his strikers instinct, speed, strength, height, technical ability to link the play up and desire to score a goal - he would be Didier Drogba! He’ll definitely miss a few, but the main thing is that he’s always ‘there’ to miss them. That said, the keepers save down low save his shot last night was class. He also set up Yuki with a header at the back post and the keeper saved again. Could’ve easily been two goals and an assist. IF / When SS goes, I’d love to see us sign an extra winger and a striker (on top of the reported x4 that JE wants), and play Ohashi behind Big Mak. I have a feeling it would be a brilliant combo!

Yeah, looking like Vale might go back out, based on the injury to Leonard and JE’s interview post match last night. I don’t think Fleck will be the choice unless it gets to the last day. Whatever has been levelled at JE, I reckon he knows his football. Interesting that Sky are linking him with the Preston job this morning.

GK, LB, CM and a Winger minimum. Looks like anyone young who isn’t direct cover / going to play less than half the games is going on loan. Anyone who fits the above profile and is older is sold. We’ll be something like this in terms of cover. With the 4x players JE said he wants, we’ll be adequate, on paper. But the likes of JRC and Ohashi are covering more than one position. GK - Pears, new, Hilton RB - Brittain, Duru, JRC CB - Carter, Hyam, Batth, Mcfadz LB - Pickering, New CM - Trav, Sonny, Bucko, JRC, New AM / Wingers - Weimann, JRC, Dolan, Ohashi, *SS, Siggy, Vale, Hedges, New (For three spots) St - Gueye, Ohashi, Vale, Leonard, Tyjon FWIW - I reckon we’ll cover the 4x positions the manager wants to, plus another couple of loans to further bolster CM plus a forward.

Professional performance…standouts, Bucko, Trondstadt, Ohashi and Siggy’s best performance in over a year. Big Mak was a real threat when he came on and the keepers save to stop him getting another was top class. First time I’ve seen Duru and jeez, he can motor. He was hampered by Batth being on his side and who never opened his body up to look for Duru. I commented before his goal that Vale actually looked more comfortable on the right wing than he does up top…maybe JE has found a home for him? Maybe not.. I didn’t read anything into SS body language. He always looks huffy on the pitch. Did his job. Fantastic result.

Easily.

Mate, they’re signing kids who’ve done nothing for £20m+ and paying them £50k a week. £9m and £40k a week in the PL is chump change. SS is always fit, absolutely runs his heart out, is a good egg…he might go in, absolutely bomb and never do a thing, or he might get 10 goals and be the difference for a lower end PL team.

Let me put it this way, if we tell Ipswich to fuck off with their £8.5m bid , then in two weeks, I’d put my house on someone else, like Bournemouth (who’ve just sold Solanki) or Everton (looking to sell DCL) etc etc putting down £9m and £40k a week on an extremely low risk, potentially high return signing. Ive no doubt SS will go, and if the fee is the reported £9m, rising to £12m then it might just be Ipswich left with egg on their face as a more established PL team snaps him up for what is literally chump change!

I’m pretty sure we have one spot left…but I guess what we (the fans) don’t know is how many esc type signings we have lined up. Based on the credible rumours we’ve heard, I think we’re probably lining up a foreign winger that would take one spot and then Ryo if / when we sell SS. Which means we would have to move one out, like Siggy? Either way, looks like we’re in for a busy three weeks.

Makes sense mate. I think a couple will get done (Keeper, winger…etc) regardless of 20th. In Rudy’s interview he looked ‘smug’ about a couple getting done… Completely agree that the replacements for SS, Bucko, Siggy etc may be held back until after 20th. 👍🏼