£214m issue looming as Steve Waggot set for face-to-face Blackburn Rovers manager talks

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Who in their right mind buys a football club and why, after plunging £260m into Blackburn Rovers and getting precisely zilch in return, have Venky’s not cut their losses in their vein football experiment?

It’s been 12 years since the husband of Venky’s chief Anuradha Desai was hit by a snowball while stepping out of a Roll’s Royce before entering Ewood Park ahead of a 2-1 defeat to Charlton Athletic.

The owners left that match after 65 minutes and Blackburn Rovers fans have barely heard a cluck from the multi-billionaire chicken tycoons ever since.

The snowball was a relatively tame act of rebellion in the context of the time, when the white-hot fury inside Ewood could have melted the very steel that Jack Walker supplied to build the stadium.

Since then, anger has been largely replaced by fatigue. Sustaining anger for over a decade, especially while mourning the club the Uncle Jack built, is exhausting.

Every now and then, however, the rage returns. Despite sitting 5th in the Championship with a four-point gap on 7th-place Coventry City, now is one of those moments.

Position	Team	Played MP	Won W	Drawn D	Lost L	For GF	Against GA	Diff GD	Points Pts
1	LeedsLeeds	33	21	9	3	68	20	48	72
2	Sheff UtdSheffield Utd	33	22	6	5	47	23	24	70
3	BurnleyBurnley	33	17	14	2	39	9	30	65
4	SunderlandSunderland	33	17	11	5	50	30	20	62
5	BlackburnBlackburn	33	15	6	12	39	31	8	51
6	West BromWest Brom	33	11	15	7	42	31	11	48
7	CoventryCoventry	33	13	8	12	44	41	3	47
8	Bristol CityBristol City	33	11	13	9	41	37	4	46

As well as being seen as an act of betrayal, John Eustace’s departure to Derby County has brought all the painful memories of Rovers’ riches-to-rags story under the Venky’s flooding back.

True, the Indian poultry firm has sustained the club financially for years and, after last weekend’s 2-0 win over Plymouth Argyle, Blackburn have a respectable chance of promotion this term.

But the club has one of the Championship’s smallest budgets and anything that has been achieved on the pitch under the Venky’s has been in spite of, not because of, their ownership.

With club chairman Steve Waggott, who is viewed as an enabler for the owners among the support, preparing to hold talks with managerial candidates, whoever is next up will have their work cut out.

Rovers to stage in-person interviews for John Eustace successor

As reported by EFL Analysis, Rovers could make a decision on their new manager as soon as this weekend depending on the outcome of Saturday’s meeting with Swansea City.

David Lowe, who joined the club during Tony Mowbray’s time, is in temporary charge following Eustace’s shock departure and a win tomorrow would stake his claim for the position until the end of 2024-25.

“They are assessing,” said EFL Analysis’s transfer correspondent Graeme Bailey

“However, I am told that if Blackburn play well and/or win at the weekend then there is a good to realistic chance that David Lowe could get the job until the end of the season at least.”

Local media meanwhile are reporting that Waggott is preparing to interview candidates for the position

Former Middlesbrough and Birmingham City boss Aitor Karanka is believed to be due to hold further talks with the club. Valerian Ismael and Jurgen Klopp’s former assistant Pep Lijnders have also been linked.

Even with the club’s history and current league position, the job could be a tough sell for their top targets given the financial limitations and absentee landlordism of the Venky’s

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Blackburn Rovers have lost £214m under the Venky’s – and things could get much worse

Research conducted by EFL Analysis shows that Blackburn have posted combined losses of £214m during the Venky’s era.

They turned a modest £1.8m profit in their last set of accounts, although that was only due to the sale of Adam Wharton to Crystal Palace.

That deal, which because of Wharton’s status as a Rovers-produced player generated ‘pure profit’ for the club in accountancy terms, can be traced back the the academy which Jack Walker built.

Rovers’ wages-to-turnover ratio meanwhile was around 115 per cent, which even by Championship standards is high.

That said, Blackburn are comfortable in terms of the EFL’s Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR).

Although an ongoing funding court case in India means they can’t take advantage of their headroom in the transfer market.

When could the Venky’s sell Blackburn?

It’s financially and psychologically draining to run a football club, but Venky’s thought it would be worth it to crack the UK commercial market with their fried chicken brand in 2010.

Owning a former Premier League champions brings with it a certain cache and can bolster a company’s reputation, potentially greasing the wheels in a geographic market.

However, that validating effect obviously never materialised for the Venky’s, despite early promises to bring David Beckham and Ronaldinho to the club and stage free Akon and Kelly Rowland gigs at Ewood.

Some have suggested that they are waiting for promotion back to the Premier League in order to finally sell the club.

But while Blackburn’s enterprise value would increase in the top flight, it wouldn’t get close to matching the some £260m they have invested via equity and loans to keep the lights on.

In any case, the ongoing court case in India – which means the owners have to get a license and pay a premium for every pound they send to Rovers – will make the recruitment and retention needed to get there exceedingly difficult.