At least we have Premiership matches in Blackburn....

Its an away game for England and Geneva has Easyjet and is a bit closer than Buenos Aries so there's not a lot to complain about. It is also pretty well plumb centre if you look at where the Argentine players themselves now live- Italy, Spain, England. Probably helps the Argentines being close to a Swiss bank or two and the Uefa and Fifa HQs. Quite why the Argentines are going to a French speaking city to learn about Germany as somebody suggested....

Not having any need to know the price of this stuff, I simply go by what I read in the papers.

That's true- they deliberately chose that dirty shade of green so you cannot see the snot round the edges.

So much cocaine is being used in London that traces of the white powdered narcotic can be detected in the River Thames, the Sunday Telegraph newspaper said. Citing scientific research which it had commissioned, it said an estimated two kilogrammes of cocaine, or 80,000 lines, spill into the river every day after it has passed through users' bodies and sewage treatment plants. It extrapolated that 150,000 lines of the illegal drug are snorted in the British capital every day, or 15 times higher than the official figure given by the Home Office. I am not posting this because I approve of cocaine usage- far from it. But if a line costs £20 on the black market, that is £1bn a year getting into the hands of criminals just on cocaine alone. Ending drugs prohibition is the only solution.

Even in a fortnight without club football, it seems that Brum cannot keep themselves out of the media's eye. Must be because they are a BIG CLUB.

Just turn out at Hackney Marshes or Wormwood Scrubs for the Rovers' London branch and show them your fancy stuff, Eddie- that will quieten them down. I even scored a goal in the blue and white halves once! (and it was not an o.g.)

Must say I am impressed at how easilly the Manc supporters have adjusted to their new station in life. They made an impressive amount of noise supporting the underdogs. Soon they might even realise it is fun to be a real football supporter.

If we had knocked Chelsea out in the last round, we'd be approaching this match like supermen. Yesterday will be no guide to the game at the Valley where we have had a horrible record ever since the famous 4-3 win in the late '50s.

No Incidentally, I feel a bit sorry for Brett- that was a fantastic strike with great swerve to bring it inside the post. Andersen waving at it after it had gone into the net was pathetic and diminishes a great goal.

Read the press reports- most have a churlish little dig one way or another but this Observer report is a delight.

Bruce is a poor manager, full stop.

Fair point- but Whelan would have spent £25m this summer had there been anybody willing to go there. As it is, I think their net spending was over £10m. The big difference is that Jack had junked Mackay (who wasn't performing) and appointed King Kenny- a manager who could attract the big names. Paul Jewel has quietly gone about doing his job at Wigan exceptionally well and it will be interesting to see how much transfer money Whelan will release to him now that he has established Wigan as a top flight club so quickly and whether he will find it any easier to attract players. The Fayed experience at Fulham could be instructive in that regard. Wigan could keep the challenge going- I deliberately didn't put the home and away fixtures on that list of games because although they now face a run of challenging games, they start off with two home fixtures including Arsenal who have yet to win on their travels. However, all it needs is for Arsenal to "click" and the Wigan show could be derailed as there are no "easy" games for them to regroup in.

Well they haven't been top of the League for two runs like we had done by the start of November. And Wigan have an extremely lop-sided fixture list. They've played the bottom sides except Bolton and Chelsea and now have a nightmare run of games. Chances are that someone will rumble them and that their defence which is currently playing out of their skins will come back to a more normal level. Filan's form is great news for the Aussies ahead of the WC knock-out though. Doubt Wigan will finish in the top four like we did in '92 and I make that prediction more than half expecting that two out of Man U, Arsenal and Liverpool will not make the top four either. That said, if Wigan are still in the top four after their next nine fixtures (when they play all the top sides except Bolton), they are probably going to stay there.

Six wins out of the last eight games now with our only defeats coming against the European Champions and the Premiership Champions. ...Or three points out of six from this difficult patch. What is also highly encouraging is the way the Rovers are beginning to play consistently playing high quality, slick entertaining football. Wouldn't like to predict results away at Citeh and (beginning to pick up the pace now) Arsenal but they should be cracking games. Incidentally, Wigan are winning at Pampey and are on course to go five points clear in second place tonight and just six behind Chelski. They probably needed to get a good run under their belt as the fixture computer has given them this interesting sequence of games between now and 31 December: Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool, Chelsea, Man U, Charlton, Man City, West Ham, Rovers.

A departed player, Neill Danns, scored Colchester's 8th and 9th goals against Leamington in the FA Cup today.

Sounds like the ref dropped two clangers as well as failing to book Charlton players for persistent fouling- Bellamy called offside for a clear run on goal in the first half and a blatant hand ball in the penalty area in the second half. "Blackburn belied their popular image as a mainly physical threat as they played some delightful football."- BBC.

Fantastic win- how sweet to be so wrong with that prediction!!! Radio 5 guy said it was the best Prem game he'd seen all season so far. Still down in 11th but gap of 10 points above BIG CLUB in the relegation slots. Now got two weeks to get our lads fit again after the dirty London team kicked us all round the pitch.

Rovers won 1-0 according to the BBC videoprinter.

We might match 4-5-1 (MGP, Tugay, Bentley, Axe, Bert) with 4-5-1 today and a Hughes explosive in whatever orifice MGP and Bert use to receive instructions to make it 4-3-3 when we attack.

No Savage, no Nelsen. This is a certain defeat now.

I was sure we had an Academy thread somewhere but cannot find it. Anyway good luck to the youngsters on Saturday morning- they play Liverpool who will take over top spot if they beat the Rovers under-18s.

I'd forgotten about us losing 2-5 at home in the early days of the Prem and was reminded it was Coventry who rolled us over. Seem to be a few will he won't he mind games going on over team availabilities from both sides.

Drugs use in Ilkeston or any small town in Britain. Professor Parker estimates that the Police estimate of 240,000 who have used crack cocaine to be an under-estimate by 50%. To the lock 'em up brigade, there are around 100,000 places in British jails. If just one type of Class A substance has five times that number of abusers, what are you going to do?

Yet another ex-Rover to make a debut for BIG CLUB. When Damien Johnson pulled up with a hamstring earlier this week, Bruce moaned that he had lost his best player this season. Says it all really.