Surely the postponement is proof positive of Ewood Park's microclimate. Well, here's a little twist- RFW as good as accusing Bolton of nobbling their own undersoil heating. Hope Big Sam sticks that on the training room door and the Trotters follow in the footsteps of their more illustrious neighbours and turn over the Mancs at OT.

Official site says sell out now.

Over 5,000 tickets sold, less than 200 left according to the official site which has Todd definitely out and unlikely to be back for Pompey but MGP, Neill, Dickov, Bellamy all fit and raring to go. Got a sneaky feeling we are going to miss Tugay's extra class very badly. Not anywhere near as confident now he's not available. This game will come down to who wants it the most. We should prevail on that basis. If it turns into the Graham Poll show, we've had it! Its also worth adding that if we lose, we will reach the halfway point in our season looking at a 13 point gap to Wigan and the possibility of European qualification through our league position will be very faint.

Excellent preview and that table of Lawro's predictions is priceless! I wonder if Sky or the Guardian would carry it? Back to the Pompey game. 'arry is doing a great job of looking after 'arry at Fratton Park. Onto the media he goes and slags off the squad he has inherited (erm, who was the manager at Pompey until very recently and then went on a transfer raid of his old club?) as "unbalanced". Then he unashamedly put a reserve team onto the pitch at Arsenal so he kept his best players booking and injury free for the Everton game. The prediction for the Rovers' game has to be somewhat dependent on whether he sees it as one which can get some points from. With only an FA Cup game coming up after they play us and the January transfer window to play with, he's bound to put his strongest side out which of course with a little help from the ref will have the capability of beating us. Thankfully that capability is unlikely to be realised and I expect Rovers to slog out a hard-fought 2-1 win.

I have Australia as the only non-traditional World Cup nation to survive the Group stage. Croatia are very poor from what I've seen of them and I would guess that Japan and Australia are about the same level but the Aussies will make physical strength tell. It is possible one of the other two will get lucky against Brasil and nick a point changing the second place qualification if its tight but the Aussies should be very disappointed with themselves if they don't make the last sixteen.

The howl will go up about unfair allocation of tickets come Saturday!

Here's an interesting one- Wigan's five defeats on the run were against the top five sides. So if we beat them, does that make us top six? I agree that Wigan looked very dangerous at West Ham. However, I would back our defence over the Hammers' injury-hit back line. All this is adding up to a cracker on the JJB's undersoil heated surface. Here's hoping the failure of such systems in small Lancastrian towns don't run in threes!

Steve Patrick and his team have repeatedly produced a pitch which has been adjudged the best in the Premiership. I think you are stuck in the dark ages with a comment like that!

For what? Visiting clubs don't get any income from the home club any longer.

The temperature at Ewood is -6C at the moment. The Ref is saying nobody is to blame and both Managers have agreed with Phil Dowd's decision. Radio Lancashire are saying there are a few panels of the ground including one goalmouth which are frozen and the rest is fine. Radio Lancashire are also referring to the Bolton ground as the JJB On that basis, other games at Ewood could be at big risk later in the season if the insprection shows undersoil heating is completely broken in places. There is no way the ground can be dug up and the heating system replaced mid-season. My recollection is that Ewood's undersoil heating was claimed to be the best and most-advanced in the country when it was installed and that there was a very long (20 years?) guarrantee on it.

Big Sam has had a big whinge about the postponement tonight. Both Boro and Bolton have UEFA ties to fit in and Bolton were already carrying their postponed Brum game forwards. 13 Div 2, 3 and 4 games are off at the moment.

What was the forecast? I wonder if Rovers and Bolton both economised in switching the heating on and got caught out when the temperatures dropped? I believe the heating has to be on up to a week before a game and it costs something astronomical- thousands of pounds a day- to run. Pure speculation on my part. If other Prem games get hit tonight, I'll be proved wrong (or they all did it). Wonder whether the late kick off of the pompey game is going to put that at risk?

Apart from Toogs missing the Wigan game, the disappointment of what would have been a big crowd, and a potential fixture pile up if we keep going well in the Cups... could be worse. Sunderland were certainly going to Ewood to scrap after Boxing Day's fighting performance and this could have been an icy banana skin.

Something odd has happened. The temperature in Blackburn is supposed to be -3C at the moment and the undersoil heating is supposed to handle -8C temperatures.

Notlob v Boro is off because the Breezeblock undersoil heating failed!

The opinion that matters- Mark Hughes' Incidentally, I was perhaps a bit early in withdrawing my prediction of a good season for Liverpool!

Stead talking about his return to Ewood. Sounds like he preferred the relaxed training regime of Souness. Hmm, finding a few predictions for a draw and even a guy in the Far East taking the odds on a Sunderland victory.

We had exactly this same argument about a year ago and I posted the details then. Enjoy the rest of your Christmas break, give the lads a shout for me and don't let it get to you. PS If you start chanting for United or come on Lancy you might get some strange looks.

Let's just say the Boro Radio commentary were saying the five man Boro midfield had no answer to Savage and Tugay. By all accounts Emo had the the Boro right side in his pocket all game, Thommo was utterly anonymous so by my reckoning Sav and Toogs not only neutralised four players (including Mendietta) between them but increasingly gave Rovers the platform from which they controlled and won the game. Definitely sub-par if you are using a golfing analogy!

It's all right folks, those nasty Mackems won't ruin our Christmas.... Blackburn v Sunderland Blackburn have had a good week with those league and cup wins over Middlesbrough but I think they'll find it difficult against Sunderland. Mick McCarthy's side have struggled this season but against Bolton on Boxing Day they scrapped and fought for absolutely everything, which I expect them to repeat on Wednesday. Full match preview Verdict: 1-1 Phew! I really really thought even Lawrenson would have gone for a home win on this one....

From the Guardian this morning: "QUOTE OF THE DAY "If our supporters were offended, then I apologise. It was not a slight on them or our club. It was an instinctive thing. I thought to myself: 'I shouldn't really have done that'. If people want to hang me for this, then that's up to them" - Bernard Cribbins says sorry to Bongo fans after applauding MU Rowdy supporters last night. No sign of a mea culpa about leading the Blues to 19th in the Premiership, however." More in the same vein here- the Mancs get a rough ride...aahh.

Great preview. This should be one of the best games of the year. Wigan are certainly entertaining and if Bellamy plays 90 minutes he should get change from a defence which is good but also a bit slow and square. The 5,000 Rovers supporters create a fantastic atmosphere and should turn this into a bit of a home game for the lads. High scoring draw on the cards: 3-3, but this could go in any direction. The only risk to the entertainment value will be if we have a rubbish ref.

The Boro commentators credited Emerton for wrecking the Boro wing back system yesterday. His work rate and speed up and down the flank meant that they could not overlap and effectively nullified McLaren's game plan. Nice move by Sparky and well done Bert. Now keep it up!!!

Just reacting to the doom and gloom on Christmas Eve! The club and supporters are caught in a cleft stick- the more cup games we win, the more we play until we eventually draw hard-up opponents like the Mancs who need every penny to save the Glazers from a disaster of their own making and have to charge higher (but not highest prices). JBN got it right when he talked of rich men's support. If the Rovers Trust continue to support the club with £6m a year on average (equivalent to about 50% of Burnley's turn over), of which £3m is discretionary and £3m is automatic, plus favourable loans, then Rovers can survive in the top flight on crowds averaging a bit over 20,000 but getting back the people who went AWOL over the last three seasons is what we need if we are consistently to do better than survive. Perhaps two Manc semis and (fingers crossed), a trip to Cardiff might provide the spark which brings the missing people back. Drog, I know its impossible arguing with you as your ideas are fixed in concrete. But you also ignore facts such as my sponsorship support of Rovers down the years pre-Jack. It obviously might not have occured to you that I am somewhere sunny less out of choice but for health reasons.

Sounds like Sunderland matched Notlob for effort and attacking invention today so this is not the walk-over we expect unless we can get an early goal or two.