I HAVE not previously been an advocate for the removal of Steve Kean as Blackburn Rovers manager.

However, after the terrible scenes at Ewood on Saturday, I’m afraid my position must change.

I still maintain that I’m not sure Venky’s will be able to persuade anyone fantastic to take the Rovers hotseat were they to finally pull the trigger on Kean, but the situation has become untenable.

Everyone could see on Saturday a real atmosphere of discontent has surfaced at the club.

The fans are not happy. The media is not happy. The team cannot be happy, and surely Steve Kean is miserable right now.

A colleague who was at Ewood on Saturday said to me: “If a 10-year-old kid is shouting ‘Kean out’ at you, you have to walk.” I am inclined to agree.

A couple of weeks ago I made reference to an exchange with my Blackburn End neighbour, where we agreed it had not felt this bad in our times watching Rovers.

And not since the back end of Don Mackay’s reign has one manager been so roundly disliked by the Rovers faithful.

The truth, as Andy Cryer said in yesterday’s match report, goes beyond Kean and up to Venky’s. But the owners are not as easily interchangeable as the manager.

Mrs Desai and the two Rao brothers have a lot of work to do to save this football club. They took it over dreaming of the millions that Premier League football could bring into their business.

Releg-ation is not an option for anyone.

One massive question is who is in charge?

We hear a lot of rumours.

Everyone knows someone, whose uncle’s best friend’s dog’s afternoon walker has a cousin who works at the club, and they are all experts.

But the one that keeps being uttered is that there is no real leadership. John Williams and Tom Finn walked. Paul Hunt was brought in, but he’s not the boss.

Someone in Blackburn needs to be running the show. You simply cannot run a business in East Lancashire when you’re in Pune.

And certainly not one that means so very much to so many people.

Kean is the scapegoat for now.

But Venky’s, I implore you, if you do not sort this out fast, it will escalate quickly and you will find yourself with very few friends in the stands at Ewood Park.

Read the Jason Wilcox column only in today’s Lancashire Telegraph newspaper.