I dont really get the comments about "abysmal" quality, just seems like a normal stream to me. The commentators are irritating but that is minor. The delay is unavoidable and I am used to delay from having sports through Now TV, thats not ideal but especially with Rovers its just easy to avoid twitter etc for an hour and a half. If my friend watching it seperately messages about the football then his stream tends to be in sync with mine when it isnt with Sky. I do also think that it is a very difficult time for Rovers and all clubs but it doesnt sit right when people imply that we have an obligation to help out, the responsibility shouldnt be on the shoulders of the customers/supporters. And as ever Waggott has failed in my opinion with his policies since the pandemic took hold as much as he had done so prior. The issue with refunds was terribly dealt with and the delays releasing season passes this season was totally avoidable and has led to lower than hoped for sales.

Plus you could argue that playing a third poor centre back and asking them to play out from the back as Dier tried and again failed to do yesterday is very much taking risks! And ones with minimal reward.

Saw that this morning but it seems that all information and interviews through the international break where gathered prior and just staggered out to fill articles. I hope that as you say he has had no setbacks and he can play a game this week.

If Kane isnt international class then there are maybe only one or two strikers in World football that are.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-8816531/amp/Gareth-Southgate-insists-England-stick-3-4-3-formation.html Southgate said previously that we are sticking with the formation and has planned to for a while. Not sure the pandemic can be blamed!

I wouldnt doubt that it is difficult to get the right man for the job to be fair. I have no examples off the top of my head I will concede. I also dont see that as much of a reason to keep Southgate in necessarily otherwise you are essentially accepting that your manager is perhaps not taking you in a forward direction (in my opinion anyway) but are just keeping him out of fear. For me especially with no relegation fear (and thus at times terminal financial reprecussions) theres no point sticking IMO.

It is massively flawed as I suspect you are aware to imply that solely on the basis that he got us to a World Cup Semi Final, that his job is guaranteed as a result. Should Mourinho not have been sacked when Chelsea were 15th the season after winning the title with the squad in disarray, who else would beat winning the title? Not as simple as that. Firstly, things change in football and England do not seem to be displaying promising signs of developing and getting the best from what is a crop of players, many of whom (Kane, Grealish, Sterling, Sancho, Walker, Arnold, James, Henderson, until injury Gomez etc) are performing very well at club level week in and week out. 3 at the back and trying to pass it out only adds to the numbers of centre backs on the pitch and highlights their weaknesses. His loyalty to a poor goalkeeper adds unnecessary jeopardy. His midfield choices lead to us being very rigid and his reliance on less talented players like Rice and Mount is counter productive. One (heavily deflected) goal from 5 Nations League games is piss poor. We really struggle v the better teams. It may also be tempting to refer back to previous failed generations as a comparison as im sure you have done with the likes of Kean and Coyle here but the benchmark should be higher than that, the likes of Capello and Hodgson underperformed too. Southgate undoubtedly deserved massive credit for how we did at the last World Cup but with international tournaments they sometimes perhaps a bit more flexibility in regards to judgement is required because it is not as simple as a club season in which every team plays every other team twice. We only beat some very limited countries and a very favourable draw meant that although the games still warranted overcoming and as a result Southgate would leave with positive thoughts overall, there are plenty of valid doubts over whether he is the man to take us forward.

Harry Winks for Jordan Henderson is the most unnecessarily conservative and pointless sub that could have been made too. Martin Tyler is a nauseating propaganda machine for the Nations League too, a competition that may have a bit of merit as a slight upgrade on friendlies but ultimately one that no one will overly give a shit about, and one that should have been scrapped as collateral damage amidst the excessive strain that the pandemic has put on the fixture schedule.

I hope this jinxes a comeback but England appear at a real crossroads at the moment. Changing from 3 at the back to 4-3-3 and then for no apparent reason back to 3 again recently, the constant changing not only of the 11 but the squad shows that Southgate doesnt really know what he is doing and is just hoping that something falls into place. The team tonight has no balance, absolutely no pace to penetrate in behind aging Belgian centre backs when Kane comes to feet, the love affair with 2 average players in Mount and Rice when we have far better players is very strange, and he is playing more inadequate centre backs than he needs too with Dier a particular liability. Trippier should also not be in the squad, never mind be starting every game. Southgate was very lucky with the draw in the World Cup but I suppose even by only betting Tunisia, Panama, Colombia on penalties and Sweden deserved the credit of how far he had gone but he stumbled into the job to begin with and I think we could do with someone with a bit more nous.

Rovers have been silent on Dacks first week back in full training apart from a 5 second video of him kicking a ball into an empty net on Monday. Wonder if everything has gone to plan?

Pulis was the manager who kick started Adama Traore's career at Boro and also his Stoke side heavily featured Ricardo Fuller. He does play direct but he is certainly not totally against the use of flair players and mavericks.

I dont think that everything is rational on here but lets be honest, he has been in and out, and almost symbolic of the last 7 years in which he has been here. A skeptical attitude is totally understandable.

I dont necessarily know if it is down to his physicality (maybe partially) but his main issue is his ability to really stamp his authority on games. More often than not he doesnt manage to do it, maybe that will come in time though.

Buckley was ok on Saturday, appalling v Forest and found things very easy v a 10 man Wycombe. Hes comfortable on the ball and likes to pass forward but more often than not fails to stamp his authority on games at his young age at the moment. Subjective stats such as "progressive passes" and "successful defensive actions especially when his game time is a much smaller sample size dont really prove anything.

Only 2.17 goals per game this season in the Championship, exactly half of games have finished 0-0,1-0 or 1-1. Falling below its entertaining benchmark.

Im not saying that they should or shouldnt get rid, but you can understand if they feel that they are stagnating, if they are regressing, that they might want a change. Outsiders may argue that we should be content with mid table and Mowbray, but theres nothing wrong with a bit of ambition. I suppose comparatively, Neil has had much less money both in transfer fees and wages compared to Mowbray, but if they feel that they are going further away from main play off contenders, consider the possibility of key players leaving, maybe a reset is something they might crave.

In regards to their first team, like with ours he is very much on the fringes when everyone is available. Sinclair, Barkhuizen etc all play over him there. They perhaps made a mistake not keeping him as a future prospect to loan out.

Exactly, Liverpool had both Wijnaldum and Henderson, both of whom are very responsible and selfless players. Rothwell cant play in a central 2.

I think saying that we even have 3 or 4 Premier League standard players is potentially a bit of a push. Maybe Travis could one day become one but I dont think he is necessarily a stand out Championship midfielder at this stage. Holtby has failed to impact games consistently for us really at Championship level. Dack and Armstrong maybe are the 2 but looking at other teams, even the least effective attacks at Premier League level have forward players like Callum Wilson and Chris Wood who regulary get double figures. Nyambe no chance at this stage, Kaminski its too early to say. The team has more promise this season but until it translates how it appears on paper to on the pitch, minus the reasons/excuses/mitigating circumstances, then I dont see how we can go too overboard. The season doesnt start at Luton, it started at Bournemouth. Using the whole squad is part of the game, you cant write off 11 games.

If they feel that their team has gone backwards or just because they dont have the biggest budget, should they accept mediocrity?

I think a 4-2-3-1 could potentially get our best 2 players in central positions which would be really good. We could then have Elliott on one side, Brereton/Rothwell/Rankin Costello on the other and then 2 from Johnson, Trybull, Holtby and when he returns Travis to sit.

The thing is that Armstrong had just begun scoring but even then, across his absence overall we have not consistently picked up a competitive number of points. When you compare him to the players who might be most at risk ie Holtby, Rothwell and Brereton. None of them are or have ever impacting/impacted games like Dack did for us consistently. When you take Armstrong out of this team there is very little goal threat. The new style of play I think should suit Dack too, he is technically very good and he naturally presses. If teams back off to prevent Armstrong having space then Dack is better than anyone in the increased spaces that will arise. The only real doubt is the injury but there is no reason at this moment to expect him to be the player he was before once he is back up and running again.

Dropping the mandatory testing was always going to cause major problems, presumably it was a financial decision to remove it.

I suspect that there seems to be again that feeling of stagnation, they have dropped from their level from previous seasons. For them, that lack of investment from the owner isnt going to be a problem that changes anytime soon. Everything is relative, issues above the manager doesnt mean that the manager cannot be questioned. When we had Venkys at their destructive worst, it still was correct to be desperate to want Kean out. Man United arent fully functional above Solskjaer but it doesnt change the fact that he is doing a poor job. Therefore I dont necessarily agree with the mindset of "what do they expect" as a general rule. Not sure whether Neil as a specific example is a manager who should be sacked, but I dont think should there be a feeling of stagnation or regression that they should just accept where they are and repress any ambition to go one step further. To allow 4 key players to have 8 months left on their contracts seems a bit strange to me.

The biggest talking point was that there were quite a few claimed that they would have chosen Rovers, but in that position 99% of people (without a vested interest in either club) would choose the Premier League opportunity. I wonder if the seemingly left field signing of Branislav Ivanovic changed things for Kipre.