I’ll probably (like most sensible people) ‘give up’ on Mowbray when he stops finishing a bit higher in the league? Makes sense right? Considering it’s a ‘results’ business. ? I think you’re REALLY struggling to tell anyone that there’s been no progression since he took over from Coyle. Sure everyone has opinions for and against but the stats pretty much do the job. Im also very sure that the vast majority of people (fans and neutrals) would say we had progressed during that time too. Im not saying you cannot have your personal opinion. That’s up to you. I was just addressing this recurring narrative where people (such as yourself) are absolutely aghast that other fans wouldn’t want to replace him immediately.

I wouldn’t disagree with much of that, though I do think you may have omitted the job he’s done of turning a pretty poisonous club into one which is now at least pointing in the right direction? Maybe some credit for the introduction of youth? I also think the criticism of him taking us down is harsh considering he took over from Coyle and a total mess and went at top 6 form to go down on the highest Points total in history. Im not saying that we shouldn’t eventually replace him when he stops progressing. But if we do, indeed finish in or just outside the top 6 especially with the injuries we’ve endured then surely even the die hard ‘Mowbray out’ brigade can accept that there has been progress? What I’m saying is that as a fan, whilst we are making some forward progress then I’m happy to stick rather than twist and risk Sol Campbell turning up next!

No, I pretty much just said that: a) I’d give him until the very point where I could no longer see him taking us on. b) that I believe med/long term that we may need fresh blood to get us to our goals. My point was in relation to those who, in spite of the manager doing a a decent enough job, want him simply removed and then cannot understand why some are worried at what we might get next?

I don’t understand why there are people who cannot understand why fans may want to hang onto Mowbray in fear of the alternatives....anyone who has followed our club for the last decade should see how terrible the club has been at appointing good managers. Even Mowbray, who has been a relative success, should not have got the job when he did. It’s pure luck that that one worked out. Which brings me back to the point that most fans make which is that they don’t believe for one second that TM is doing a bad job. Of course there’s some of us who think we may need a better manager med/long term in order to achieve our goals but the utter dread of what could turn up at the club after him is REAL! Im as far from risk averse as anyone out there but my god, I’ll take Mowbray for as long as it takes to say 100% he cannot take us any further. Because history tells me that the next manager of Venkys reign is likely to be more Coyle or Kean than, errrrm well Tony Mowbray.

I can’t make it today because of family commitments fellas. Can’t call the game either. Think we will go same again and try to overload their 3 at the back by inverting the wide men into more central attacking areas and allowing our fullbacks to deal with their wingbacks. 1-2

Wishful thinking mate. Tony doesn’t often play with wingers. When he does, he inverts them so that they drift into the middle and let’s the fullbacks push on and create the width.

That’s ballsy but I like it! Though I think he’d swap Downing and Arma as he likes them drifting in.

Where has this come from? Aren’t we statistically the team who score the most goals inside the first 15 minutes in the Championship? Doesn’t seem like a team going out to ‘contain’ others. I’m fact I’d suggest it infers that we usually go out to press high and get an early goal. The games are being massively over thought here. We are currently decimated by injuries to creative players which limits our ability to open teams up. On Saturday we played a team who’ve spent £120m in the last 18 months and are on a good run so we set up to contain and try to nick one rather than go toe to toe and likely get beaten 3 or 4. (We employed the same tactic vs Brentford and won the game btw). On Tuesday we played a team who have just sold their two best players and have more injuries than us. So we went after them from the first second and should have beaten them 5 or 6. Why on earth are people comparing the two games which are obviously so different? You don’t go unbeaten since September with a mid table budget by going all out to beat every team 5-0 at home!

I was frustrated but content with the performance at 70 mins. We have a lot of quality missing and that plus a bit of luck were the only reason we weren’t already winning comfortably. Had we finished the game at 0-0 with 70 odd % possession and 26 shots then sure I would’ve been frustrated but we didn’t and the pressure we applied for 70 minutes caused their collapse. The neediness and entitlement of some football fans these days astounds me. I’m a winner too. I hate losing but I don’t feel entitled to anything. We won 3-0 because we were by far the better team! Don’t over think it lads!

I don’t think there’s a lot of clubs outside of the PL with strong foreign links to recruitment other than those already mentioned. It’s also important to understand that there wasn’t a scouting network of ANY note set up when he came in. This had been decimated long before. From the meeting the picture was painted that they had planned to buy on potential out of the Championship and develop as well as finding nuggets in the lower division. From what was said the last 12 months have proven that their are no cheap league one players (Quoted £2.5m for Curtis) and most Chamionship players are already on better wages than ours. Tbf they set up the European scouting network a year ago and it hasn’t had a great impact yet other than Holtby (who was identified in terms of availability from the analysis). In the summer they doubled the recruitment budget and a lot of that went into the European network. As I said before it seems more like evolution. Not sure about the legislation in relation to Brexit.

Completely different models and by and large the exceptions to the rule. But I do think we need to ‘do’ a Norwich to get up. IE overachieve on a moderate budget. This is why I worry about us and Mowbray medium to long term.

Yes, of course you can. But in the context of this conversation regarding our current budget against the rest of the championship we are talking about combined.

@Mercer You optimise the resource you have - that is good management. Sheff U and Brentford have shown the way probably with budgets less than ours. IMO, Mowbray has failed and we need someone who knows the market and can work it. I couldn’t agree more.

I don’t think it was pitched in a blasé way tbf. He is working with a budget and they decided to spend big-ish money on young players who they think will develop into top players. I thought this was him accepting that if they could buy a player further into their development from Europe for half the price and stay within the wage structure then they would potentially be able to buy “a couple” and therefore benefit more in the short term. Seemed more like evolution. Whether it works or not remains to be seen.

It is odd, I agree. They obviously decided to spend the money on fees and keep our seemingly low wage structure in tact. That seems the common theme and I’m in no rush to advocate blowing the structure up. Interestingly, Mowbray told me to my face that they wouldn’t be spending big fees again like that though he stopped short of saying those big transfers were mistakes. Seeming confident that SG and BB would work out eventually. Referred to BB still being a 20yr old boy but accepted the external (fans) focus on him was due to the price tag. What he also boldly said was that they wouldn’t be spending that type of money on one player again and would instead be looking to spend £2-3m on “one or two” players with a focus on the European market.

Higher NET transfer spend? Net being £14m minus the £3.5m we got for Raya and Nuttall? £10.5m isn’t really high in that league over 18 months and added to that the indications (from the meeting) were that we haven’t got anyone on £20k and lots are well under that. In comparison, they talked about calling Championship clubs in January and asking for permission to speak with players who were not featuring For their respective clubs and were on wages double to our highest paid players. The numbers are pretty well documented in terms of our overall budget.

I think Chapman was the one he openly took a risk on. I seem to remember TM saying so at the time. Even if he didn’t then people can change and the point is that his integrity is seemingly intact because when any issues like this do raise their heads he’s not prepared to accept them.

It’s not a myth mate because ‘budget’ refers to fees plus wages. It’s everything combined. And our ‘budget’ is mid to lower table.

You make a fantastic point Rev. I agree with all the similarities too. The difference you raised re the signings are interesting. I remember Bowyer getting slaughtered for some of his signings and not often lauded until he left. I wonder whether one day there will be fans saying “I wish we could find another Dack!” Or “Remember when we had Dack, Armstrong, Rothwell, Holtby, Downing, Travis, Lenihan and Nyambe in one team!? I wish we had that now!”. I wouldn’t be surprised to see 3 of those playing in the Premiership soon. To add to your point about the similarities the coaches and lads talk about TM now just like Shorty etc used to talk about GB. I know that they love him and respect him and I think he TM (as was GB) is a very solid manager with the right work ethics and morals. People on here saying he’s sly and trying to keep himself in a job are so far wide of the mark. But, I share your concerns about whether TM (like GB) has the magic dust to galvanise a mid table team on a mid table budget and do what Alex Neil has done, what Chris Wilder has done, what Ollie did with Blackpool or dare I say it Dyche with Burnley. There’s nothing about TM which says he will. The foreign market is his last chance for us imo. The whole thing is at risk of getting stale. Let him have the summer to bring in affordable, better quality foreign players and hopefully fully integrate a Buckley, JRC, Butterworth etc. If that doesn’t work then for me Mowbray is all out of ideas working within the budget he has. You won’t find me whining or kicking and screaming about a thoroughly good manager but sooner or later his time will run out!

We also finished on the highest total ever for a Championship club to get relegated in spite of the mess Coyle left us in.

I’m not sure what he’ll do. But that’s what I’d do! ??

I’d play 442. Back 5 picks itself, then... Bennett Travis Downing JRC Gallagher Armstrong Leut, Williams, Davenport, Buckley, Chapman, Brereton, Graham

I for one am weirdly curious and excited for the rest of the season. Not because I think I’m going to be blinded by Tika taka style entertainment or because I think we’ll go roaring into the playoffs (those hopes were all but gone when Dack collapsed against Wigan and confirmed with the subsequent injuries to Evans, Holtby and Rothwell). No, I’m excited to see the development of our young players over the next 16 games or whatever. Our position in the league and injuries have inadvertently created an almost perfect climate for them. We aren’t going down and will potentially be out of the playoff race by March. Nyambe, Lenihan, Travis and Arma are flying. The improvement in those four grows week on week. I want to see JRC, Buckley and Davenport play 10 games before the end of the season. I wouldn’t even be adverse to Hilton playing a couple back end or Butterworth if he can get fit. They will be so much better for it in the long run. Let them get upto speed and let’s see what they’ve got to offer. To get one or two of these playing well and fully integrated into the first team would be brilliant for the club and reduce the volume of transfers needed in the summer. Also grows our assets and provides potential for sustainability. Get the young lads played I say. We’ll never have a better chance to have a look at them!

I’ve said all the way through that SG and BB have not impacted our team enough for the outlay. I actually made that point to Mowbray at the meeting. He agreed that they had not (pretty obvious) and claimed that they wouldn’t be doing that again and would be looking at making “a couple of £2-3m signings” in the future. Primarily in the European market. The BB, SG thing is made even worse because in spite of £11m being a moderate/good expenditure on fees (in the champ) we can not afford to have them fail when in truth, we have to over achieve in order to get to the PL. SG was reportedly on £24k at Southampton and took a wage drop to come to us. Neither him or BB will be on anywhere near as much as many in the Champ imo. I back Mowbray because he has been a good manager for us. But I do worry if he has what it takes to make us overachieve enough to get out of that league.

Hallelujah ??