GrahamC

It’s Liverpool, so don’t rule it out. Absolutely embarrassing- a club that benefits from loads of favourable decisions from referees suddenly has to deal with a couple of poor ones & bleats on endlessly about it, supported by their many friends in the media.

Read Clarke’s post match comments. Very honest, basically says they look to be miles adrift of the standard they’re playing at. Seem to have packed out their squad with loans from U21 sides who aren’t ready, it already looks like a damage limitation job & to build for when they’re in L2.

Martin is a clever footballer, the question those morons can’t bring themselves to ask is why we let him go & QPR didn’t offer him a longer contract.

In the league (4 as opposed to 3) yes, but he got 3 goals in the cup last season too, so not overall yet. For a side that appears to rely heavily on the front three for the majority of our goals, if he could get 10 & Sykes around 7 that would help a lot.

Yeah but it was a bit chilly & there was Champions League on TV. Tinpot club.

This is by Temple Meads. Bristol’s traffic is notoriously bad but they aren’t even likely to cause delays in BS7.

Looks like Tanner & Sykes are very doubtful so presumably that means starts for TGH & Weimann but also reduces the capacity for changes elsewhere as I cannot see for instance King starting in place of Williams. Excellent result there last season, could do with a repeat tomorrow after Saturday’s disappointment.

Yes & with the greatest of respect to their excellent achievements, a club who plays in a ground similar to Rovers, average under 7000 & consider League One stability is a decent effort isn’t really a valid comparison. Even minnows at our level like Rotherham are spending millions on players. If we are going to compete for top six, let alone strongly challenge then sustainability is not a realistic concept, no one has ever done this since Sky got involved in football.

Definitely not Johnson, as he’d been subbed off by then. Apart from stopping us take free kicks he was completely anonymous, he did nothing.

I think the one late on (2-2) was a decent shout for them as Max got there fractionally late, but having had two really strong shouts turned down it would have been remarkable if they had then been awarded one. As for Neil & his brand of football I noticed on Saturday that we are back to Daniel Johnson standing in front of our free kicks to stop them being take quickly, we were told pre season that was now a yellow card offence, that rule has apparently lasted barely two months.. Would really like to see someone hammer the ball at his face, he’d get back by the required distance then.

Yep- the “one player” thing is simplistic dreamland. We are a mid table side with a small squad & an owner who is unwilling to spend money from player sales, a bit like the post yesterday about “another manager” to get us into the top six, our issues are structural & systemic rather than signing this mythical one player.

What does that mean though? Ian used to bang on about us paying a couple of players huge money & they would make the difference. Never once considering how that would go down in the dressing room & what if they didn’t work out. We have paid players big wages (Kalas, Wells, Palmer!) in the past to exactly what effect? I’m actually between both camps, we do need to give Pearson more funds but the REAL go for promotion idea is madness & after flirting with failing FFP recently, it would be far more likely to see us get a points deduction than go up.

Got a lot of Josh Brownhill about him, which is a very good thing.

Why does it have to be Reading? As @headhunter says, what about Brighton, Brentford or Luton? Or Watford? Fulham? Hull? I’m personally really not all that bothered about getting to the Prem but presumably most supporters are, so picking the latest club in strife and saying that it could be us if we didn’t have a risk averse owner with a poor track record of managerial appointments is becoming such a massive cliche.

Sadly lots of people are just rubbish. No manners, no willingness to show any courtesy at all to people doing minimum wage jobs. First game of the season there was understandably a massive queue trying to work out the new entry system so what really helped were a couple of ***** swearing at the steward who was trying to help & shouting “this club is shit”. I mean these were obviously the people in power who made these type of decisions, not the poor sods who took the brunt of morons’ anger. Pond life.

Hard to escape the conclusion far more fuss is being made of this because it was Liverpool than if it had been any of Wolves, Burnley or Bournemouth. About half the media seem to have played for them & it is being reported to almost the same level as the Queen dying. They have benefited from a significant number of baffling decisions since VAR came in but no one appears to want to mention that.

Realistically though Blackburn are a pretty small club at this level, bottom third gates & with a great history behind them. People ridicule them presumably because they are Indian & involved in the chicken business but they have done nothing less than SL has. I’m really bored now of the “we are so lucky SL is our owner, we could have Vincent Tan or the Venky’s”, I can’t see the difference & in the case of the bloke who doesn’t appear to know how to wear a pair of trousers, he’s got Cardiff into the Prem (twice).

Good luck to them, can’t make today but will try & get along to a few games this season.

As usual completely fair. Also despite the “injury crisis” rhetoric on here, we are only Vyner short of the players available that we started the season off with now. That means we will have to persist with a Dickie & Naismith CB pairing & as TGH is the most likely midfielder to come in, with Tanner at RB if he’s fit. Logic of that is we need to accept we are shorter of pace in the central defensive area & set up accordingly. Wednesday’s team will be interesting, we play again very soon afterwards & do have (the defence aside) more options than in some while. We also don’t know if Sykes will be fit enough to be involved. Certainly can see the logic in TGH & Cornick both starting, Weimann too if Sykes is ruled out, but that would be enough changes for me.

Looks inside? Its miles inside, dear oh dear, you wouldn’t accept the BBC or official feed’s word, it isn’t remotely close.

What sort of evidence is that? Someone on here wants to “see it again” because he “isn’t sure” it was inside box. That’s the BBC report & our match day feed both saying it was, hardly conclusive, is it?

Swansea one looks a penalty to me, the Sunderland one is definitely more marginal. Having finally ended that record breaking run without one by getting the clear one at Sunderland & then getting a much more arguable one the week afterwards against Hull, I do worry we are back to a situation where we just aren’t going to be awarded them. I’m sure the foul on Sykes was one, I have seen the nudge on Pring given to other sides too, so despite the “it all evens itself out” bollocks we seem to be back to what is sadly normal for us.

That linesman on the Dolman side was embarrassing, the same one who missed the clear foul on Sykes at 1-0. I don’t think they do wave their flag to attract the ref these days but he gave us absolutely nothing, abysmal.

I thought Rob Dickie played well today but what is obvious is that without Zak we lack the pace he has at CB to get recovery tackles in. Thought Wesley (their 18) got away with absolute murder with the number of times he jumped at the man but we just didn’t look as secure as a unit & watching the winner again we get into a right pickle at the back.

First goal in open play in just six games actually, unless you think the one at Hull was disallowed or something? You might be right about Tommy (not Nakhi’s fault TC has been injured) but he’s been good for us this season, in my opinion.