Spurs are talking to Ranieri - poor man!

This is Chelsea's current squad: Goalkeepers Carlo Cudicini Neil Sullivan Yves Makaba Makalamby Marco Ambrosio Jurgen Macho Defenders Winston Bogarde Glen Johnson Celestine Babayaro Marcel Desailly William Gallas Mario Melchiot Wayne Bridge John Terry Robert Huth Midfielders Alexei Smertin Claude Makelele Frank Lampard Joe Cole Damien Duff Mario Stanic Geremi Emmanuel Petit Scott Parker Juan Sebastian Veron Alexis Nicolas Filipe Oliveira Jesper Gronkjaer Boudewijn Zenden Strikers Adrian Mutu Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink Hernan Crespo Eidur Gudjohnsen So next season, Zendon, Veron, Gronkjaer and Petit will have moved on but it is highly likely Beckham and three members of Porto's midfield will have arrived. Parker and Cole will not get a kick whilst Bridge will be sub to Roberto Carlos at the back.

Rovers smarter than Hughesy I for one hope this is successful.

Chelsea are apparently back in with a mega offer for Ronaldinho. If Abramovich's millions are to benefit the English game, surely it is to bring the game's megastars to the Bridge. How SGE copes with half of his squad playing Premiership Reserve League South football then becomes an interesting question.

Ranieri has been sacked.

Two pointers: - evedryone knows he has a £10m war chest yet he has managed to keep Charlton out of the gossip headlines - he has quietly moved to take Earnshaw from Cardiff and Carrick from West Ham. On that basis, so far so good. I wonder what the odds are on Parker being back at the Valley on a loan deal are? Back to MGP, I will be happy if he arrives but will not be convinced until he puts in some strong performances for Rovers. More a case of hope than expectation. The move for the Olomuc winger is probably smart negotiating to show Tromso we are not desperate but could be indicative of Souness concluding MGP will not do a better job than the older player and therefore keeping his transfer budget back for other purposes.

Millwall are reported by the People as preparing a bid for Todd.

Pedersen hit the post and went close again just before half time.

These 8 pages are a cypher for the Duff and Shearer experiences at Rovers. Apart from winning things and dominating the league/Europe (unrealistic), the next big dream is that "one of us" becomes a super star but stays his career at our club (seemingly more possible but in reality just as unrealistic). Unless you are a member of the big boys club which for three heady seasons the Rovers were and for two heady seasons Leeds sold their club for. I have never met Alan Smith so what I am about to write might come over as very unfair. From what I have seen of his personality/character, I am not in the least bit surprised that he has moved to Man U. After all, even on his past season's performance (and certainly on his showing as an England u-21 international), he would have got to go to Portugal ahead of Vassell. Perhaps having his particular personality in the squad was not an appealing proposition. The guy has a football talent, great energy, a thoroughly unpleasant character and is seemingly not the brightest. The only surprises are that anyone other than Leeds fans should react with shock/horror and that how little he was sold for. Did NOBODY else want him? Looking at it from Smith's standpoint: 1) He was undoubtedly sold the Ridsdale dream so was encouraged by Leeds to expect perpetual Champs League and all that pertained. 2) Had he said "no, I am staying at Leeds" then Krasner and co would be handing the keys to Elland Road over to the administrators this morning. There was no possibilty on earth that he could stay at Leeds. Either the club sold him or the break-up specialists would have got rid. Smith is simply guilty of being stupid enough to have allowed himself to have become the fall guy for the Leeds' fans' anger. Krasner has played a blinder in getting his hands on the best part of £7m of cash or near cash and force-sold an iconic player without getting any abuse for doing so. In doing that, he has done at least twice as well as McKenzie did when he offloaded Kewell in not dissimilar circunstances last summer.

Exiled, its all this waiting around for Gamst Pedersen to sign....

In 2012 (earlier if Bush gets re-elected) China will overtake the USA as the world's largest economy. About the same time the number of hispanics in Texan schools will exceed the number of English-speakers. OK I agree, English is THE international language and the growth in its domination shows little sign of weakening, but nothing is forever. After all at the end of the fifteenth century, by far the largest and most powerful nation in Europe was.... Lithuania (it even had a Black Sea coast)

Looking forwards, it is interesting to see how the papers are dividing on Houllier's successor. The Telegraph are arguing there is a renaissance in British managers, that foreigners do not understand how to manage in our peculiar game and are saying Curbishley was approached by Liverpool a month ago. The Guardian are doing a good job in convincing themselves that Mourinho will be sufficiently wary of Abramovich's dealings to shun the hundred millions transfer budget to be spent by his new boss to tens of millions he can spend himself. Meanwhilst the Times are arguing up the case for Martin O'Neill. The most peculiar twist is coming from the Thai press who understandably are less interested in who the manager will be than the fate of the current "make or break" negotiations involving their PM. Apparently 49% of the cash injection will come from Thai Government funds and 51% from a public offering of shares made in Thailand. The Thais are making it a pre-condition that Owen and Gerard be given shares in the football club (I wonder if they would pick up the tax bill their generosity would create?) The Thai relationship has all the hallmarks of a disaster waiting to happen. Their PM presumably expects there to be a PR bonus from this move but all that has happened is that the rapidly deteorating human rights situation in Thailand is being brought sharply into focus in the UK press. Besides which, the morality of a third world government splashing the best part of £30m of tax payers' money on European football transfers is dubious to say the least. There may well be a backlash for Liverpool FC seeing there was a local man willing to underwrite an even bigger investment.

Just read this thread through from the beginning and it is a sheer joy! Prompted me to look at the BBC Big Read top 200 which I found fascinating-I had read my way through just over half of them. Was surprised by the absence of Graham Greene and Anthony Trollope and amazed that there was no Kafka on the list but perhaps I skimmed it too quickly. Delighted to see Bulgakov, Nobokov, Kundura, Marques, Eco all there. The absence of travel books surprised (Bryson excepted)- Newby, Fermore and the inevitable Theroux are all cracking good reads. A book for blowing the cobwebs away from the mind is Thomas Pynchon V. The descriptions of Germany in the aftermath of the War are shattering in bringing home the realities of those times.

Well you are the one writing the tripe- none of those you name are languages

Souness not even in the betting?

The problem about the changes in management at Liverpool and Spurs is that two of the twenty richest clubs in the world are going to get new management. Perhaps even Liverpool and Spurs are going to break the cycle of appointing managerial duds in which case the prospect of honours and European football returning to Ewood in the near future has just become a lot more remote.

Totally agree RB! Tugay has the ability to hurt the opposition with brilliant perceptive passing. Fulham is the case in point. More often than not from the footage I have seen, Tugay's balls to invisible friend have happened when the Rovers players around him have been hiding- not running into space or channels to create passing options. Against Liverpool there was a classic situation- Flitcroft played a poor ball out of defence, Tugay tackled back and ended up in possession facing his own goal. Looked for a Rovers player breaking forwards, waited, finally spotted Neill, hit a pass which a Liverpool player got a toe on, deflected and a Liverpool player had a clear run on goal which was scored from. Without Tugay, we are going to be a very uninteresting workaday side.

Agreed, I would far rather keep Cole than sell him. He seems to have been a positive influence on Stead and Gally and he has really shown a lot of determination towards the end of the season. However, he must be on a basic of at least £2m a year plus the rumoured £1m loyalty bonus next year. Were we to receive £1m for him, the Rovers' budget would look £4m better off. My big problem with this is that Andy is the type of player who could enjoy an Indian summer to his career. He is looking sharp, supremely fit, is self-centered enough to look after himself properly and who knows, might cut out many of those misses he is infamous for.

I am gutted that yesterday's result cost us over £1 million!!! I know everyone is in 'oh well we stayed up' mode, but I cant forget how poor this season has been. I am not going to start 'Souness Out' rants, but there are still questions I have about his managerial technique and team selections. Case in point again yesterday - we finally have a left winger fit and starting a match, so Souness plays him at right-back!! Reid did ok, and Douglas has played on the left a lot, but I'd rather have only one player out of position instead of two. I am very worried about next season already. My feelings exactly.

Both Todd and Babbel in the squad of 18 for tomorrow but no youngsters drafted in. Seems odd.

£3m in prize money at stake in this game. The Rovers cannot do better than 13th after Southampton collected a point last night but with Pompey and Spurs having easy games on Saturday (Boro home and Wolves away), we can expect to slip one or two places if we fail to win and throw away £1m. Brum could slip two places if they lose but gain two places if they win so the game is worth £2m to them. With all that cash at stake, it will be a true mark of managerial ability to see if either or both managers can motivate their players to provide sufficient commitment to avoid the sad end of season, nothing to play for, sort of match I expect it will be. After Newcastle failing to win at Southampton, the game at Anfield will not be the £10m shoot out that Chelsea v Liverpool was last season end (in fact £200m for Chelsea as Abramovich might not have invested had they not come fourth). The biggest money game this Saturday is Charlton v Southampton with both sides having four places at stake or £2m each.

An Independent article on how important Premiership club brands are becoming globally. It doesn't draw the conclusion but it rather draws the distinction between big clubs and the others. The message to the Rovers is that having another successful season next year is going to be very important. Meantime, Abramovich is reported to be selling Veron to Inter for £8m and has asked Bayern about the availability of Hargreaves. The prospect of most of the England midfield residing at Stamford Bridge is getting closer.

His dad is Colin Todd, wthout doubt one of the greatest players to have played for England in my lifetime. I am glad that Todd junior produced some decent performances which helped to save us from Div 1 oblivion this season and that he confounded me and many others in terms of the quality of his play. It was quite an embarassment to have signed him in the first place and I guess the outcome of his time at Ewood is sordidly predictable. Apart from Dugary's sore rectum, at least nobody got hurt this time.

Interesting management style from Sam Allardyce. Since they started on their run of five consquetive victories, Big Sam has been giving the players four days off whilst he jets round Europe coming back to supervise training on Thursday and Friday. If Newcastle continue their current wretched run, Notlob could well end up 6th come next Saturday tea time. Sam has a £5m transfer budget this summer by the way.

Bambi v Steadinho will be interesting. I am sure that Martin Taylor will have sussed he was forced out of Ewood to pay for the young Stead.