Never expected that from that lineup, I didn't want to go down when I saw the team at 2.15 but the clear the air talks must have done the trick, the intensity and desire was better than for quite some time. Having slagged him off before the game Conway produced an excellent performance and if he is capable of that you wonder why he's been so poor for the last two and a half years or more but nevertheless if he can produce that consistently he gives us an extra option we didn't think we had. Graham and Dack linked up better than for some time, Graham will probably never have scored an easier hat trick of tap ins thanks to the brilliance of Dack but returned the favour superbly for Dack's goal and was in the right place at the right time which is all you can ask of a striker. Downing was also excellent. I quite like him and I think he gets a very rough press on here. The thing that pleased me the most today apart from the result was the fact we twice kicked on and scored again after being pegged back to 2-1 and 3-2 respectively. That sort of desire hasn't really been apparent this season and we've been happy to try and scrape one goal wins. Much better all round from both manager, players and in twrms of the general attitude.

1) Both. 2) Yes.

What an appalling line up. Timid Tony retreats further and further into his shell. Sharpe's line up (which was still too conservative would have been far better). What's Conway ever done to deserve a recall? He is so far past it it's untrue.

At first glance that looks an exceptionally dull line up dreamt up with a view to not conceding as opposed to striking fear into the opposition. It might work if Bennett was moved into central midfield, otherwise we've seen time and time and time again that lining up with him and Conway on either flank simply doesn't work. Massive pressure on Dack and Rothwell to produce a flash of inspiration in that set up. Smacks slightly of desperation to me in that TM is falling back on his three old favourites Graham, Conway and Bennett and doesn't know what else to do. Could be worse I suppose. Could be Bennett Smallwood Evans and Conway in midfield at which point I'd be tempted to turn the car round.

Hmmmmm............ football isn't such a simple game when players are being played out of their normal position where they're not particularly comfortable and I wouldn't say Palmer was anywhere near the next most likely player to score up front either. Having spent £9m on two strikers over the summer I'd have thought they'd be the obvious candidates. Still, TM claims the "clear the air" meeting went well so lets see what happens this afternoon.

Agree with the above. We're learning a lot more about the players as the season unfolds. Who's really good enough to kick on at Championship level and hopefully beyond? Probably only definitely Raya, Nyambe, Reed and Dack (when he's up for it) Palmer, Rothwell, Brereton, maybe but we don't really know for sure as yet because TM won't give them the chance. As for the team spirit thing I think it's most likely the players are simply bemused by and not buying into things like the "false 9" bollux, having 8 defensive outfield players on the pitch and no real out ball and seeing your main striker being substituted to make way for a defender when you're one down. It is of course not impossible that something has upset the players over the interational break. Mulgrew not beig allowed to play for Scotland, Dack being told he is moving/can't move in Jan, the squad getting upset about the treatment of certain players on their behalf etc etc. However the team spirit seemed exceptional during the promotion season and at the start of this season up to and including West Brom so you would expect TM would have enough credit in the Bank with the players for them to shrug off a disagreement and take it on the chinand het on with things rather than down tools.

Rotherham wasn't too bad but QPR was an absolute shocker imo notwithstanding the result. This sort of has been coming for a while for me albeit I never expected us to fall off a cliff as badly as we've done over the last six days.

Yes, was speaking to a Celtic fan two nights ago who wasn't TM's biggest fan and who pointed out he is apparently the last Celtic manager not to win the League. Said it all ended with a 4-0 defeat to St. Mirren who they should never be beaten by and certainly not by a margin of 4 goals. Said TM looked clueless on how to try and change it.

Although if you look at his managerial career as a whole I think I'm right in saying he's had good times followed by bad times at a couple of his former Clubs. The fact he took us up last season would be no or little consolation were he to take us down again and whilst last season earns him a bit more leeway than if he'd had no success here, it doesn't (or at least shouldn't) earn him a completely free pass. As the old saying goes "You're only as good as your last game". Hopefully all this type of talk will prove to be academic and by the end of the season we'll be laughing at this 2 game "blip".

But what if we were to lose the next 4? The next 6? The next 8? Depending on performance levels I'd say that could well be a case of "Need to look at it" "You've got 2 games" and "Sorry but it's time for a change" respectively. Hopefully of course nothing remotely approaching that will happen and results and performance levels will stabilise. Starting on Saturday.

Well yes. If we try to be a bit more expansive, it might not work and we might get walloped 3 or 4-1! Oooo errr hang on ..........?

The problem with dropping Dack is that whilst theoretically he might benefit from the kick up the arse of being benched for a couple of games, no - one else has looked particularly capable of scoring in his absence. Whilst he was really poor at Preston I thought his commitment levels were far better at Wigan but he was fighting a losing battle in that side on the night. Massive shake up needed for me, whilst the manager might have caused it with his bizarre selections, the players still need to know that the lack of commitment shown in the last couple of games isn't acceptable. Personally I'd go Raya Nyambe Mulgrew Downing Bell Travis Reed Rothwell Palmer Dack Brereton Maybe go 2 up top with Graham and Brereton together up front after an hour if that isn't working. Doubt TM will do anything like that, I would expect changes to be kept to a minimum with more of the same and a primarily safety first approach again.

Completely disagree about Chapman. Signing him obviously wouldn't solve all our problems, it wouldn't turn Williams into something resembling a ledt back, it wouldn't make Lenihan, Mulgrew and Rodwell into hardened specialist centre backs, it wouldn't turn Evans and Smallwood into creative central midfielders, it wouldn't make Bennett capable of putting a decent cross in and it wouldn't knock five or six years off Danny Graham. it would however go some way to addressing the lack of pace and width in the side and if we signed a really good left back, a hard as nails centre half, a creative midfielder and a quality central striker at the peak of their game we'd look correspondingly better again. Trouble is, TM obviously doesn't think so. As Neal says it's insane to be talking about signing a player only to loan him straight out again. Especially when it's one who in imo should be walking into our side.

or e) "all of the above".

Nail, hammer, head. Normally I'd be full square behind the manager calling out the players after the last 2 performances but I think it's TM who needs to go "back to basics". Stop playing players out of position, stick with a formation and system they can buy into and get your best attacking players out on the pitch and give the opposition something to think about for a change instead of treating every game like we're playing Man City. Also, games last 90 minutes. It would help if occasionally we tried to tear the opposition a new butt hole and win the game in the first 20 minutes instead of coasting through the first half trying to stay in the game and then invariably having to go **** or bust to try and either win the game or retrieve a deficit after about 63 mins.

Wouldn't blame Dack tonight , he was having to come and collect the ball off our two converted midfielders masquerading as centre halves. Hope we've got enough credit in the bank already to limp to safety as we look like relegation fodder at the moment. The players look completely demoralised and demotivated by the manager's constant tinkering and bizarre team selections formations and substitutions. Tony did well for us last season but I'd be keeping a close eye on the situation right now, we don't want to allow the situation to deteriorate to the point where it is too late to get out of it like we did with Coyle.

Seen it all now. Rodwell what an idiot What a terrible signing. Bin the tosser off and get Scott Wharton back.

You may scoff but the season isn't over yet and it'll be one almighty slog to 50 points if the manager persists in treating every opposing side as if they were Man City. Smallwood and Evans are an appalling combination in midfield. Offer nothing either defensively or offensively.

Wow - didn't realise that. On checking it appears he made 18 Championship appearances for Forest in the 2016/17 season and 35 in the 2017/18. Not sure how many of those were starts or off thIe bench but I find it completely bizarre that the lad is apparently good enough to play for Forest regularly n the Championship at ages 17 and 18, but not apparently judged good enough for us at exactly the same level at age 19. Especially when we've agreed to pay £7m for him!

My gut feeling after the end of the transfer window was that it was a poor window but with the benefit of hindsight I'm not sure whether it was a poor window as I initially thought or a decent window but with the manager for some unknown reason refusing to show any faith in the signings he made. For me only Reed so far can be considered an unqualified success. And he isn't our player. Of the rest: Palmer: I like the look of him (in midfield) but seemingly the manager doesn't. Rothwell: As above but with the proviso that the manager seems even less inclined to pick him than Palmer. Davenport: What the hell has happened to him? Rodwell: Somewhat predictably has barely featured Brereton: Paid £7m for him and TM refuses to give the poor lad a start or play him in his natural position. Armstrong: Very disappointing this season but again like Brereton probably needs to be playing down the middle. I do think all of the above players have talent, however at the moment we're not getting much out of any of them bar Reed so unless that changes it has to go down as a poor window for me.

This comes across as a really tacky plea to try and boost disappointing half ST sales to me. It seemed as though there was a really healthy uptake of half ST sales last season but then again we were involved in an exciting promotion battle. This year the likeliehood is that it will be mid table security at best and imo the entertainment levels at Ewood this season have been poor, (Leeds and Brentford apart) so I would imagine that for the neutral or floating fan a half season ticket is a somewhat harder sell than at the same time last year.

We might have lost the game because we were out of it after ten minutes on Saturday, hence why I said the players need to be up for it from the start on Wednesday. However imo the reason we couldn't get back into it on Saturday and the reason we struggled away at West Brom was because we lined up without a natural striker. Not sure why you can't see that most basic of points.

If it is that I'd expect us to get absolutely battered and I wouldn't have thought there would be much point turning up. 8 defensive players plus Dack with Graham completely isolated. You might as well replace Dack for Travis on the basis that playing the former would be too expansive!

Timid Tony doesn't need seem to need much encouragement to err too far on the side of caution so I hope he isn't reading that pile of old guff. If we're going to teams at a similar level to us hoping to park the bus and at best scrape a 0-0 we'll soon start plummeting down the table. I agree with Mercer on this, after a horror show like Saturday the players need to be let off the leash and given the chance to redeem themselves and show what they can do. It shouldn't be too difficult, make sure they're up for it from the start, play players in their correct positions and get our best attacking players out onto the pitch.

Yup, that would be my preference although Id probably go Smallwood over Rodwell. Either way it needs shaking up a bit. I would give Dack one more chance but I wouldn't object if we did start with 2 strikers up front in Graham and Brereton either. I've often wondered why TM won't try that to give the forward men more support, even usually going like for like, replacing one striker for another when we're chasing a game.