Wrong. I subscribed to the "consider Souness's future after the end of this (03-04) season". I do and did believe Souness made mistakes. I think the biggest being falling into the trap of excessive transfer activity. But I thought it would be suicide to sack him at the stage it was muted last season. Thankfully, he wasn't and Rovers didn't... drop into the championship. But surely it doesn't cause you personal turmoil to agree with me that Souness was tight-fisted over many transfers, at least as many (really more) than the costly ones? Let's get it right. Yes, I agree he was tight-fisted and signed us some bargains (Stead, Thompson, Friedel). He also cocked up big-time on at least a couple of transfers (Grabbi, Ferguson, Amoruso), in that he paid over the odds. Unfortunately, even though the number of disasters was far fewer, the amount of overpayment was sufficient to negate the good work he did on the (greater) number of bargains he signed. In retrospect he gave us three great years, then completely lost the plot. I was slow to see this as I was weighing it against his three good years of work. But I am very glad he's gone now and Hughes for Souness looks a pretty good swap right now.

Deary me, to have a pop at Brad when we have so many genuinely crap players more worthy of a salvo is bizarre to say the least. Poor bugger's had to watch shots salvoing past him like they're going out of fashion for two years, now he's getting it the neck.

I heard a rumour MGP split a nail in training and grazed a knee quite badly after being tackled in training (lot of mud on the knee apparetly). Can someone please confirm he will be OK? I hope there was a nurse on hand to look after him.

We live in hope, Waggy! Personally I don't think he's shown he's worth 7.5, what do you think? He's not a bad player, but not a 7.5 mill one. In hindsight it was a poor transfer, we could've restructured the team a lot better than we did after Duff went. Buying Amoruso for 2 mill was even worse though. Has anyone ever lost the plot as badly as Souness did in his last 15 months or so?

Would ratehr keep Brad and sell Ferguson. A 7.5 mill move to Newcastle sounds just dandy.

When will you shut you you maddening muppet! Go and screw a reindeer or something.

It's a hindsight/ foresight problem. Hughes has better foresight than anyone on here because he see Pedersen in training every day. But once he's been tried, everyone has equal hindsight. What would happen if Pedersen was a flop? Everyone would be quiet, or be saying that it's Hughes' fault he was a flop, because he didn't try him earlier. We're all (apart from Queer Daddo) eager for Rovers to do well, and we know that we lack creative influence up front, but it all strikes me as wish-fulfillment to say: "Try MGP". Does anyone seriously think that Hughes has a vendetta against MGP which precludes him from being selected even if he was dazzling as Victor Kiam's smile in training? Or perhaps Hughes doesn't know how to spell his name, so just doesn't pick him because it's easier than embarrassing himself by asking how it's spelt? Why let the simple explanation that he's not trying hard enough or cannot show the right attributes in training get in the way? OK, fair enough you need first team games to get first team fit, but if he hasn't got this then surely he would get a game from the bench if he was good enough in training? But he's not. I defy anyone of you to disprove that. Because none of you see what he's like in training. Of course the responses will be:"Yeah, but ..." and all that jive, but playing well for Norway guarantees nothing. He either pulls his spuds out in training or he doesn't play, anything else is compost.

That wasn't Kenny, that was Jimmy Sirrell, ex-Notts County manager. Let's get our facts right!

It may be optimism, but let's qualify it as cautious optimism for teh avoidance of doubt.

Not jokingly in trouble, then? Of course we are in trouble. I do recognise that, even a blind man wearing blinkers sat the wrong way round on a galloping horse going down a tunnel at night can see that. But so are 7-or-so other clubs, they're not all going to go down are they? Forget who we're playing, it's largely irrelevant. We have been making improvements, and we just need to sustain that general trend and we will escape. Even if we are in the bottom-three at Christmas, as long as we're not bottom, that simple truth stands. We could be fourth-bottom at Christmas and get relegated or third-bottom and not, or any other permutation, that doesn't matter so much as the general trend in form (as well as getting some decent players in Jan!) Relegation places are decided in May, not December. To panic about being third-bottom at Christmas is drama queen hysterics of the first-order.

Keane's going to Everton I think.

Eh? The only thing to avoid is being bottom on New Year's Day, being in the bottom three but not actually bottom is nowt to be worried about.

Another clean sheet and a point away - not too bad. Defensively we have tightened up. but we need to do better, and with teh window coming up, I'm confident we can, and will.

I'm still confused about this "Hughes decides whether fringe players should play for the reserves" Quite apart from the fact that since Hughes has brought his own team in no fringe players have appeared, what is the point of having a reserve team coach if he doesn't pick the side? Maybe I'm wrong in that, but I don't pretend to have inside knowledge on the club, unlike some ...

and what makes you think that?

Balde is a clumsoid and Sutton disrepspected teh club, wouldn't either of those two. Hartson maybe.

Or even a Norwegian Bimmers site?

Personally I think he is gay, especially with that hairdo!

Positions which need strengthening: all of them, really apart from goalie.

Have to say I couldn't really give a monkeys about the FA Cup, I hope we go out at Cardiff as it will be one less distraction. And I wouldn't worry about your defending bb, because our attacking doesn't seem to be up to much.

Yeah, was thinking of subs, would be guaranteed a greater representation from days gone by that way I think.

Which 5 players are most-voted for without actually having made the team?

Oooooooooooh, put your handbag down sweetie! He would've been a big hit for us if only we'd passed to him properly! Not his fault at all!

absolute dribble!

I thought he was rubbish going forward, his attacking passing was very poor and always narraw. Reid had loads of space on the right, but Lucas always passed the ball centre. He was solid defensivly though. Helllllllllllllllllllllllllllooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo?! He's a defendaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! Lucas Neill was pretty good tonight I thought, he seems to really have grasped the nettle again. It wasn't all a disaster, we didn't look a relegation team, but at the same time we looked toothless up front. The goal we conceded was pretty bad as well from our point of view, but Brown did take it forward well. But we need to be more assured in our final ball, Tottenham were cutting it out far too easy. It seems to have been a case of Fulham making us look good, rather than us suddenly being great.