What shape? The manager blew that at about 6.45pm when the team was announced. Absolutely Crackers.

Disasterclass tonight from the manager. Talked before the game about not taking opposition lightly, and sends us out without a recognised holding midfielder. Catastrophe. Big test for this group now vs Boro and Luton

Buckley has played the pass for our two big opportunities, not sure exactly why you've singled him out. Bloody Mowbray has stifled him and Rothwell by making the bizarre decision to play without a defensive midfielder. He's shoehorned Gallagher in and unbalanced us because of it. Change it now, take Gally off and put Davenport on, allow Buckley and Rothwell to take the shackles off a little bit.

Thank God Venky's bought us, eh?

Exclusive 😂 What a story. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/41219627 - Crystal Palace sack De Boer... 7 games in to his tenure. Employ Hodgson to save them. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47195701 - Everton sack Marco Silva 18th in the league. Appoint a world renowned manager, sign James Rodrigues and finish..... 9th https://www.bbc.co.uk/tyne/content/articles/2008/09/05/keegan_resigns_0908_feature.shtml Keegan leaves Newcastle 7 months after replacing Allardyce. Relegated end of that season. https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/39761704 Sunderland relegated 12 months after Allardyce kept them up (quite miraculously). Not sure your argument holds much water....

May 2010 - 10th placed finish in the PL..... December 2010 - Sack Allardyce.... cue great delight of BRFC4EVA and others... Long Live Venkys! May 2011 - Survive on last day of the season after dropping like a stone down the league. May 2012 - Relegated.... cue, 'Well we didn't know they'd appoint Kean... it's not our fault.... VENKYS OUT' But those fans who thought it was shortsighted to sack him are the fools. Amazing stuff. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. You can prattle on all you like about 'who should have been appointed', but whenever you sack a manager there is an element of risk. When you sack a manager less than a month after buying the club, with no prior experience in the sport and against the extremely sound advice of the chairman.... well, it's an accident waiting to happen. But YOU celebrated it. FOOL.

Do you remember the bit with Harry Redknapp where he told an agent that he really liked Andy Todd, and they tried to construe it as 'tapping up'. That was a terrible programme - revealed absolutely nothing. I seem to remember Alex Ferguson took up a 7 or 8 year Boycott of the BBC after the programme also made allegations against Darren.

There's a few reading and regularly posting on this thread!

Chaddy, you seem to make the mistake of thinking that our playing staff or management should share the same blind faith, sentiment and loyalty towards Rovers as the fans. Crikey, you even did it with Obafemi to an extent... berating him for not jumping in to a move with both feet. Allardyce' relationship with Rovers (and probably any of his employers) is purely business. He was brought in to keep the club in the PL and keep the TV money coming in - in exchange he was probably paid well. His final transfer window (Summer 2010), following a 10th placed finish saw him spend not a single penny in transfer fees, having to rely on the signings of Benjani on a free and Mame Biram Diouf on loan. In fact, in 09/10 and 10/11 (Kean January signings apart), Rovers were the third lowest spenders in the PL (and yes, I'm including relegated teams from both seasons). The likes of Burnley, Hull and WBA all spent at least one of those seasons in the Championship and still outspent us. Wigan spent £27m in those two seasons, Stoke £42m, Sunderland £67m, Wolves £35m, Hull and Burnley spent £18m.... we spent £11m - we finished above every single one of them in 09/10. The purse strings were tied shut - none of the Walkers liked football, none of them wanted Rovers, none of them had any ambition for the club and Allardyce was their way of spending nothing and keeping the cash coming in. Excuse him for considering alternative employment that would have meant far less work and far more money to live out in Dubai - a place we know he loves. A lot of his detractors told us that the problem wasn't sacking Allardyce, it was the appointment of Kean.... but I can't think of too many managers that could have outperformed or even matched his performance with no money. Suggestions at the time were O'Neill (spent £92m at Villa the two seasons before his sacking... finished 6th both seasons), Holloway (FFS), Martin Jol (spent £25m in two seasons at Fulham and finished 9th and 12th respectively) and COYLE 😂 Oh and finally, here are the thoughts of two of Rovers' senior players regards Venky's decision to sack him. "I am devastated for Sam, he had an absolutely fantastic relationship with all of the players. Everyone respected him. He took the club out of the doldrums really. We were in massive trouble with no money. He solidified us and put us into a top-10 position, and again he did it on a shoe-string. I'm just getting over the shock of it. We've got to get over it, but at the moment I want to say, and I can speak for nearly all the players I'm sure, that they will be devastated. He was a very likeable character." Ryan Nelsen “I am not going to lie. I was horrified. I was captain and a big figure at the club. When you look at the budget table, we were probably close to the bottom. We were overachieving. Sometimes it was not the prettiest football but I don’t care as long as we win. There had been some whispers at the club about Sam leaving. It was very disappointing for most of the dressing room." Chris Samba

Correct, and therein lies the problem. Wouldn't trust them to find their arse with both hands, never mind a competent manager. They stumbled upon Mowbray and he's been the best of a really poor bunch.

Not withstanding the fact Allardyce is 10 years older than Hughes. In fact, about 10 years ago Allardyce took a fairly similar job... the West Ham one. Got promoted first time of asking and stabilised them as a PL club again.

😂😂😂 11 years and 9 managers later.... seems some still haven't learnt their lesson.

Played a fantastic pass to Nyambe for our first goal?

Clear dive. Watch it again. Played well did Dolan, he always gives 100%, but no excuses he dived. End of.

In defence of Chaddy, I don't think Obafemi will sign for us. I also totally agree with him that it's ludicrous that we are facing the prospect of not replacing Arma's 30 goals a season. Villa lost Grealish and had done their business before they accepted City's offer. Difference being of course, Grealish had at least 3 years left on his contract so the ball was in their court. I'm also not being swept away by this decent start to the season. We will fall away and we will struggle - none of the signings so far have convinced me otherwise. If we don't sign a half decent striker I fear for us a little.

I think you'd be really surprised how many transfers follow a similar process, with the only difference being it isn't widely reported as this has been. We're at best a second rate club now, why on earth do you think a player with absolutely no connection or affiliation to Rovers would come running in to Brockhall with a pen in his hand? Furthermore, Obafemi's agent would have been a complete fool to let him sign for us when at least two wealthier and far more ambitious clubs have expressed their interest. If we only sign players who are desperate to play for us we'll end up with second-rate plodders. I reckon that if we'd taken your approach of forgetting them if they aren't immediately committed to the move, then we wouldn't have seen the following at Ewood. - Cole - McCarthy - RSC - Jansen - Bentley ..... anyone else care to add any? There'll be loads. And all of those signed when we were a Prem club with a fantastic reputation and you can guarantee they would have been weighing up their options before committing. Our reputation is now in tatters, widely ridiculed as a club owned by chicken farmers who tried to sign Ronaldinho and Maradona and ended up relegated and a complete laughing stock.

This quote stood out for me too. Obviously written word doesn't offer much insight in to the delivery of a statement, but it feels like another contemptuous, scornful, belittling, snide, barbed comment towards any journalist daring to bring to his attention the glaringly obvious failure of his role. Facetious insinuations that that there are only two polar opposite methods of running a football club (blindly support the current 'now' failure OR rifle through six managers a season) are not only insane, but also downright disrespectful to anyone daring to question his position. Wonder if they all stayed quiet at that point or pointed out that this was indeed the worst run of results in 43 years.... not "losing three on the bounce".

There's a deafening silence on Rovers' website and social media today, given that it's TMs 4-year anniversary. They've managed to congratulate Nyambe on his engagement, wish Pascal Chimbonda and Phil Jones a happy birthday, but as of yet haven't so much as acknowledged that the manager has been here 4 years.... Fear of a backlash on social media aside, what could be the reason for this? TM advised them not to acknowledge on the back of recent form? OR, could it be that the social media/web team have been advised not to bring this joyous occasion to the attention of the general public?

Dear me... I can still remember some of the comments on here when we’d beaten a really poor Liverpool team in one of Kean’s first Matches at Ewood. Revidge sidled in and admitted to being somewhat ‘smug’ that evening... fucking great is hindsight, isn’t it ?

Both re-writing history if you ask me. The Walker family had long since lost interest in the club and had been looking for a buyer for ages... They were a relatively small fish in an increasingly big pond, financially speaking. Combine that with none of JWs kids having the least bit interest in football, and there’s only one way it’s heading. Allardyce’ last transfer window consisted of Benjani on a free and Mame Diouf on loan. Zero spent. They’d well and truly pulled the purse strings shut. Amazingly enough, a considerable proportion of the fan base still believe it was the right decision to sack him.... even now!! It is the ones who don’t know anything about football and/or are too stubborn to admit they were totally and utterly wrong, but they’re usually the most vocal at any club it would seem. Anyway, it was unsustainable under the Walkers.... their interest was gone. Venky’s stupidity, naivety, Pig-headedness and misplaced trust in a scam artist accelerated the process and let it totally spin out of control, but let’s not pretend the future was particularly rosy for BRFC. Throwing away PL status was unforgivable and extremely expensive. Thinking with a long-head, we should be (for want of a million better words) thankful that as of yet, they haven’t just up and left a carcass..... should we forgive what happened? Not whilst our club remains perilously close to oblivion BECAUSE of the Owners.

Sadly with Dyche solidifying the Dingles in the Prem and thus pocketing another £200m and us only heading one way for 7 years, his statement there is becoming more and more redundant by the season. Burnley have just spent £13m on a player - we've spent 250k in about 4 windows. What determines the size of a club?.... the history, the fanbase? For me, neither - in the modern day it's the finances, and Burnley are streets ahead of us now.

Yet we've never really been battered in a game since about August. Our defeats have been the result of shocking defending and poor individual mistakes (at the risk of sounding like Coyle). We rarely get absolutely outplayed and in recent weeks have stood toe to toe with sides like Leeds and Sheff Wed and should have taken at least a point in both. Mowbray's job for the next 15 games is to win clean sheets. That's the base of any side in a relegation battle - Look at someone like Allardyce or Pulis - their first job is to win clean sheets and then take your opportunities as they come at the other end. We've got players who are capable of scoring goals so that's a great start that many, many relegation threatened sides don't have. I feel like a lot hinges on tomorrow - defeat and all of a sudden Burton are 9 points ahead of us and that almost feels like another that we've let free from the pack. A win means it's absolutely all to play for with Wigan just around the corner. I can't imagine anyone on this message board sat at home on Tuesday night and singled out Mowbray as their first choice, but the more it sinks in and the more the initial shock wears off, the slightly more confident I become that he can just scramble enough points to keep us up this season. It's all we as fans can focus on for now - next season will have it's own obstacles; let's just hope it's in the bloody Championship!

I won't support Coyle as manager of BRFC when there is such a clear connection between him and You Know Who every which way we turn. This feels more and more like a return to the darkest days under Kean et al. The worst thing is, people that don't go on this site and read this very interesting information have absolutely no idea that this goes on. They just think people don't like Coyle because he was at Burnley... it's frightening really. Depressed isn't the word at this point EDIT: http://www.littletonchambers.com/john-mehrzad-acts-for-kean-in-allardyce-v-kean-and-blackburn-rovers-case-398/ His name appears more and more.... EDIT EDIT: He represented BRFC over the Berg settlement http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2298536/Henning-Bergs-High-Court-date-Blackburn-compensation-claim-delayed.html

Strange that Gav hasn't posted in this thread recently! Him and countless others were told and better told to no avail