If the board is backing Dickov for next season

[godlike1]

Then they need to invest in BOTH the youth and new players to come in.

We chanced our luck the year before last and it paid off. I don't think it will happen 2 years in a row. Wolves invested and see how it has paid off for them.

I think keeping Dickov and relegation is going to give a massive hit to season ticket sales though. Not what the club needs when trying to build a fan base

[PDX_Rover]

I think most will feel we have a decent chance next season, tbh.

[Bristol Red Rover]

Then they need to invest in BOTH the youth and new players to come in.

We chanced our luck the year before last and it paid off. I don't think it will happen 2 years in a row. Wolves invested and see how it has paid off for them.

I think keeping Dickov and relegation is going to give a massive hit to season ticket sales though. Not what the club needs when trying to build a fan base

Wolves were woeful the season before last and on a massive slide. How much did they invest I wonder? I'd guess ALOT more than we could afford.  You're comparing two totally different clubs.

The side we already have is looking good. I'm sure we'll have some good additions. Youth - Finnegan is one coming through, hope he gets a contract, Wakefield too deserves a renewal.

Your comment on season tickets may well be wrong on both counts. League 1 means almost certainly more wins - fans like that, surprisingly enough. And I can't see that keeping or getting rid of Dickov will affect sales. If we had scooped a HUGE name as manager, that could benefit but ain't gonna happen... mainly becuase Dickov is in. Not saying that debate isn't a good thing, but basically it's time to get behind him 

[DonnyRed1992]

It'll take time before we see any return on the youth investment unfortunately

These guys need experience to grow as players and if they're not getting it in the first team then they need to be sent out on loan.

Unfortunately when the only people coming in for your youngsters are teams at the bottom of conference who have only won once all season it hardly infuses you with confidence.

[bedale rover]

We need root and branch review of the youth set up
Just not getting the players through considering the investment
Can't keep buying players the youth set up needs to make a contribution

[pib]

In all seriousness, we don't seem to have learned that much from last time.

Okay, no Willie McKay this time, but once again we've been reliant on players on six-month contracts and loans to keep us up.

If we're going to come back up into this league, we need to have a proper plan in place next time rather than this scattergun approach of just throwing money at 30-something players and doing everything on the fly.

Last summer was bad news. The delay to appointing a manager after last season finished, losing Spurr and others, not having a goalkeeper or back four until the eve of the season. It was a recipe for disaster really and didn't seem to indicate that we had a proper strategy in place. I accept that the takeover talk made things difficult, but we can't blame everything on that as it was always unlikely that it would a) go through and b) be as effective as it was being talked up to be.

[DonnyOsmond]

We've had the youth system in place a while now and it needs to be judged on what we have coming through to the actual first team and we've not had a single player. Husband was signed at 16 from Leeds so doesn't count. It need reviewing and seeing if we could be doing better.


We should build a young team from released Premier League players and our own youth team. We're not going to do much long term with a bunch of 30 year olds such as Jones, McCombe, Coppinger, Keegan, Quinn. We'll just be another yo-yo club.

[RobTheRover]

We had a plan.  What you cannot plan for is the horrendous injury situation we've had.

[pib]

We had a plan.  What you cannot plan for is the horrendous injury situation we've had.

Oh come on. What was the plan then?

Last summer was chaotic. You're telling me it was all planned out? You're telling me we wanted to lose Spurr and have no GK the week before the season?

If there was a clear plan being carried out (a la Peterborough - pick out young players from the lower leagues & non league, and hope some of them will sell on for millions) I would accept relegation. I would be happy if I could clearly see the direction we were trying to go in. We don't have anything like that. Nobody seems to be thinking a year or two into the future. We've been continuously plugging gaps for years now.

[Bristol Red Rover]

We had a plan.  What you cannot plan for is the horrendous injury situation we've had.

In Dickov, we had a plan with injuries and the need for loans, and didn't do too badly given what happened.

I agree the youth system needs reviewing. I'm not qualified to suggest, but something in the area of building our reputation to make sure we don't miss out on local lads, and making big efforts to grab ones with potential from the prem youth systems. I think that means having quality scouts working very hard.

[wilts rover]

In all seriousness, we don't seem to have learned that much from last time.

Okay, no Willie McKay this time, but once again we've been reliant on players on six-month contracts and loans to keep us up.

If we're going to come back up into this league, we need to have a proper plan in place next time rather than this scattergun approach of just throwing money at 30-something players and doing everything on the fly.

Last summer was bad news. The delay to appointing a manager after last season finished, losing Spurr and others, not having a goalkeeper or back four until the eve of the season. It was a recipe for disaster really and didn't seem to indicate that we had a proper strategy in place. I accept that the takeover talk made things difficult, but we can't blame everything on that as it was always unlikely that it would a) go through and b) be as effective as it was being talked up to be.

Why can we not blame everything on the takeover? Were the three owners going to spend £millions if they were selling the the club? The proposed new owners were supposed to be doing this, buying Billy Sharp and others, it was chaos, how could Dickov plan?

But that is not the reason we cant compete. Someone put figures up here recently showing our average crowds, there was only 1k or so difference in home fans last season in League 1 to this in the Championship. We have round about 5k empty seats in the home end most games - thats why we cant compete. We are at out level bouncing up and down, enjoy the highs when you can and let others worry about the lows.

[Akinfenwa]

The plan is basically just to throw players together into a team as close to the season start as possible, hope for the best and if it goes wrong then bemoan injuries, decisions and 'bad luck'. Rinse and repeat. That's what it seems like.

Last time we went down the board made everyone confident that they had learnt from their mistakes and had a plan. Turns out that f**k all has changed since then other than being a bit more careful with money. We're still making excuses. Still allowing good players' contracts to run down. Still plugging gaps with short term solutions. Still failing to develop any young players and sell them on for profit. Then we wonder why we can't compete.

It's always going to be difficult for us but the lack of plan makes things a lot more difficult and basically relies upon whether the manager can pull a rabbit out of his arse or not. This season that didn't happen.

[idler]

In all seriousness, we don't seem to have learned that much from last time.


Okay, no Willie McKay this time, but once again we've been reliant on players on six-month contracts and loans to keep us up.

If we're going to come back up into this league, we need to have a proper plan in place next time rather than this scattergun approach of just throwing money at 30-something players and doing everything on the fly.

Last summer was bad news. The delay to appointing a manager after last season finished, losing Spurr and others, not having a goalkeeper or back four until the eve of the season. It was a recipe for disaster really and didn't seem to indicate that we had a proper strategy in place. I accept that the takeover talk made things difficult, but we can't blame everything on that as it was always unlikely that it would a) go through and b) be as effective as it was being talked up to be.

Why can we not blame everything on the takeover? Were the three owners going to spend £millions if they were selling the the club? The proposed new owners were supposed to be doing this, buying Billy Sharp and others, it was chaos, how could Dickov plan?

But that is not the reason we cant compete. Someone put figures up here recently showing our average crowds, there was only 1k or so difference in home fans last season in League 1 to this in the Championship. We have round about 5k empty seats in the home end most games - thats why we cant compete. We are at out level bouncing up and down, enjoy the highs when you can and let others worry about the lows.

A Lot of people can be bothered to moan but not attend. We have have had far better football this year but gone down. I'll be there next year and be optimistic. Too many would rather be right than see the team do well. Don't post when we win but straight in when we lose.
At least I can enjoy a home game when we play Bradford City in another promotion season. 

[pib]

In all seriousness, we don't seem to have learned that much from last time.


Okay, no Willie McKay this time, but once again we've been reliant on players on six-month contracts and loans to keep us up.

If we're going to come back up into this league, we need to have a proper plan in place next time rather than this scattergun approach of just throwing money at 30-something players and doing everything on the fly.

Last summer was bad news. The delay to appointing a manager after last season finished, losing Spurr and others, not having a goalkeeper or back four until the eve of the season. It was a recipe for disaster really and didn't seem to indicate that we had a proper strategy in place. I accept that the takeover talk made things difficult, but we can't blame everything on that as it was always unlikely that it would a) go through and b) be as effective as it was being talked up to be.

Why can we not blame everything on the takeover? Were the three owners going to spend £millions if they were selling the the club? The proposed new owners were supposed to be doing this, buying Billy Sharp and others, it was chaos, how could Dickov plan?

But that is not the reason we cant compete. Someone put figures up here recently showing our average crowds, there was only 1k or so difference in home fans last season in League 1 to this in the Championship. We have round about 5k empty seats in the home end most games - thats why we cant compete. We are at out level bouncing up and down, enjoy the highs when you can and let others worry about the lows.

A Lot of people can be bothered to moan but not attend. We have have had far better football this year but gone down. I'll be there next year and be optimistic. Too many would rather be right than see the team do well. Don't post when we win but straight in when we lose.
At least I can enjoy a home game when we play Bradford City in another promotion season. 

I do attend. I've had a season ticket every year for the last 10, so I'm not sure that has anything to do with anything.

[BillyStubbsTears]

We did alright for the first quarter of the season before the injuries started. We looked like a comfortable mid-lower table side.

If someone had told me last summer that we would have no player making 40 appearances, and a whole string of medium-long term injury problems meaning that we rarely played the same XI twice in a row after early October, I'd have been delighted to think that we'd go into the final match of the season with our destiny in our hands.

Sometimes you get a bum deal. It happens. That is far more of a reason for our failure than the state we were in back in August.

[idler]

 

In all seriousness, we don't seem to have learned that much from last time.


Okay, no Willie McKay this time, but once again we've been reliant on players on six-month contracts and loans to keep us up.

If we're going to come back up into this league, we need to have a proper plan in place next time rather than this scattergun approach of just throwing money at 30-something players and doing everything on the fly.

Last summer was bad news. The delay to appointing a manager after last season finished, losing Spurr and others, not having a goalkeeper or back four until the eve of the season. It was a recipe for disaster really and didn't seem to indicate that we had a proper strategy in place. I accept that the takeover talk made things difficult, but we can't blame everything on that as it was always unlikely that it would a) go through and b) be as effective as it was being talked up to be.

Why can we not blame everything on the takeover? Were the three owners going to spend £millions if they were selling the the club? The proposed new owners were supposed to be doing this, buying Billy Sharp and others, it was chaos, how could Dickov plan?

But that is not the reason we cant compete. Someone put figures up here recently showing our average crowds, there was only 1k or so difference in home fans last season in League 1 to this in the Championship. We have round about 5k empty seats in the home end most games - thats why we cant compete. We are at out level bouncing up and down, enjoy the highs when you can and let others worry about the lows.

A Lot of people can be bothered to moan but not attend. We have have had far better football this year but gone down. I'll be there next year and be optimistic. Too many would rather be right than see the team do well. Don't post when we win but straight in when we lose.
At least I can enjoy a home game when we play Bradford City in another promotion season. 

I do attend. I've had a season ticket every year for the last 10, so I'm not sure that has anything to do with anything.

In your case ok then although most of your posts seem negative.
I travel a hundred miles round trip per home game and get p""""""""d off with the negativity of some on here by certain posters that don't attend.
I'm as disappointed as anybody but in over 50 years this is the closest relegation that I've known. We almost did it and should have done really but we go again next year. I've already had genuine texts from Leeds, Huddersfield and Everton supporters in sympathy and wishing us all the best for next season. Apologies if I've upset you, we are all Rovers supporters but I'm on my third beer in quick succession.

[pib]

Define 'negative.' Do we not have any other way of looking at things than just shoving everything under the crude headings 'positive' or 'negative'?

Even so, we've just been relegated, haven't we? If you insist on this meaningless pigeon-holing, that's a negative development, isn't it?

And no, I'm not upset. Say whatever you like. It's difficult to take you seriously when you write people's views off on the basis that they don't go to games. Especially when they do.

[idler]

There have been many negatives in my 50 odd years of following the Rovers.
We do not have a Devine right to success. Relegation is obviously a negative but could result in a positive in the future.
We are far better set than last time we left the Championship in disarray . Certain posters only look at the downsides even before a ball is kicked.
After what I've been through today is a disappointment not the disaster certain other events were. We have lost our status today by losing by a single goal away to the champions that amassed over 100 points. I know a season is 46 games long but we only just missed out, we weren't disgraced. That is a comfort to me if not a 100% positive.