Blackburn Rovers: Tony Mowbray admits Championship high-fliers may have to sell stars in January
- Published
Tony Mowbray lifted the Championship title as manager of West Bromwich Albion in 2007-08
Blackburn boss Tony Mowbray says Rovers will not risk "mortgaging" the club as they dream of returning to the Premier League for the first time in a decade.
Saturday's 4-0 thrashing of Birmingham lifted Blackburn to third place in the Championship, a point off the top two.
But Mowbray expects January transfer window approaches for stars including 19-goal top scorer Ben Brereton Diaz.
"January is coming and if the phone rings and we have these decisions to make, what are we doing?" he said.
"Are we keeping them, hoping we can get over the line and then they will have a bigger decision to make if we did get to the Premier League?
"Or if that's their ambition now, are they going to jump in January if somebody offers the right amount of money?"
"The owners have put a lot of money in and, I'm not sure it's the right word, but you have to be careful about mortgaging the club, of taking your wage bill from X to X-times-one-and-a-half.
"At some stage it becomes unsustainable. There's a balance to be had," added Mowbray, 58, who is approaching five years in charge at Ewood Park, come February.
Venky's have been "amazing" and "immense"
Rovers, who won the Premier League title in 1995 under the ownership of Jack Walker and management of Kenny Dalglish, were relegated from the top flight in 2012 and even dropped into League One for one season before Mowbray took them straight back up.
Alan Shearer's goals led Blackburn Rovers, then owned by Jack Walker, to the Premier League title in 1995
That slide in fortunes has coincided with the tenure of Indian food conglomerate Venky's, who bought the club in 2010, and while the owners cannot exactly boast unanimous popularity among the Blackburn fanbase, Mowbray believes they deserve credit for the club's revival.
"The owners have been amazing to me - they have supported me when we have needed support. I don't feel there's a conflict between the owners and supporters," said the former West Bromwich Albion, Celtic and Middlesbrough manager.
"I think they will say early on in their tenure they probably made some decisions that they might look back on but the financial support from the owners has been immense really.
"And yet, do we want to push on from this point? We are in danger of some of these players running out of contract very, very soon. We would like to keep them together because they are so young and dynamic and full of energy."
Rovers have won eight of their past 10 matches, including the last five in a row, all with clean sheets, but Mowbray highlighted the sole defeat in that run - a 7-0 home thrashing by leaders Fulham - as key.
"I tried to use a little bit of the negativity around that result to try to galvanise the team. This whole team has reacted magnificently well on the back of that result," he told BBC Radio Lancashire.
"The combination of the defensive stability and the goal threat we carry is pretty potent at the moment. The biggest test is coming - the next 20-odd games."
Brereton Diaz's remarkable rise
At the beginning of the season, Rovers striker Brereton Diaz was 1,000-1 with one bookmaker to score 20 league goals this season - but he's already on 19 and the campaign has only reached its halfway point.
His remarkable upturn in scoring form has coincided with being called up by Chile earlier this summer after La Roja found out he was eligible to represent them through his South American mother.
Since adding Diaz to his surname, he has more than doubled his previous tally of 17 in 133 appearances in the division for Rovers and previous club Nottingham Forest.
Ben Brereton Diaz has scored three goals in nine international appearances for Chile since making his debut in May
But, with his contract up next summer, those exploits have seen the forward - who had never scored twice in a game before this season but has a hat-trick and four doubles this term - linked with a move away from Ewood Park.
"After that taste of international football with Chile, Ben Brereton Diaz will be thinking of playing in the Premier League," said former Rochdale and Tranmere midfielder Joe Thompson, on BBC Squad Goals.
"Blackburn Rovers fans will be hoping that he'll be playing in the Premier League for them. The upturn in his goalscoring form since being called up by Chile is genuinely astounding."
Goalkeeper Thomas Kaminski, defenders Darragh Lenihan, Jan Paul van Hecke and Ryan Nyambe and midfielder Joe Rothwell are among other first-team regulars also with deals expiring next year.
"There's a real opportunity for us with some really talented young players who are driven and motivated, yet they are on the cusp of suitors taking them and giving them more money," added Mowbray.
"If that money is more than we can afford then we should just do the deal, move on but reinvest some money and try to find the next really talented young player to keep this club going. That would be sad of course but if we can't afford them, that's life and we have to get on with it."