Linvoy's Afro

What you see is what you get. For the whole tedious journey. Fortunately him and his coterie of giggling nerds were so conspicuous that our coach got bricked on the way out of town, perhaps unsurprisingly/deservedly.

Personally I was delighted when, bleary eyed outside Fratton at 10 yesterday morning, I discovered I was on the same coach as John Westwood.

I haven't posted on here in about three years but off the back of the derby it seems as good a time as ever; I thought a draw was a fair result on the balance of play, though clearly you had much better chances than us and were it not for the fact that Ashdown inexplicably started pulling out wonder saves (he's usually garbage) you would've won comfortably. We could've had a couple more as well though (Maguire should've buried that chance at the start of the second half) but overall, as Appleton said, we would've been gutted to have come away with nothing. Attacking-wise, from your point of view, obviously there was a dangerous mixture of us being utterly rubbish at defending set pieces and you being rather handy at them which meant pretty much every corner or free kick nearly resulted in a goal. To my untrained eye though you only seemed to have two attacking tactics built on the same principle - knock in long to Lambert to flick on, or knock it long and try and run in behind us. Unfortunately for us it nearly worked every time hence our reliance on panicky last second deflections/shirt tugging/bundles. Regarding people's comments about Adkins and Appleton, Adkins is clearly a decent manager though an unbearably smug tw*t. Though I suppose if you're a one-time physiotherapist who has managed to become a successful manager, you're entitled to be pleased with yourself. I wish he'd stop saying 'football club' so much though. Regarding Appleton, I was ready to mock him mercilessly (especially when we went 1-0 down after about twenty seconds in his first game in charge) but he's actually turned out to be half-decent, considering what he's had to work with, and unlike Cotterill before him isn't a whiney excuse making wurzel, which helps. From his point of view he can't lose either since if we go down it's not his fault and if we stay up he's a hero. I've read elsewhere people commenting on the poor atmosphere; whilst in general (in the second half especially) it was pretty quiet, the three or four minutes after you went 2-1 up were incredibly loud and, given how I was sat about two feet from the home fans, horrendously unpleasant. Particularly after mocking them for the fact Sharp's goal was offside and then, er, it wasn't (rightly, of course). Bottom line - you'll still go up, we'll still go down, but at least we still somehow keep managing to come up with comical and inventive ways for you not to beat us.

Adams is a ****ing clown.

Right back at you.

Who were you playing today?

Quite. I've got a couple of mates who follow Fulham (one's a season ticket holder) and although he's decent enough they both think he's overrated on the basis of his cheeky lad persona (even if this is the second club he's walked out on for wanting more money).

We'll do well to last that long IMO!

I hope we **** them 5-0 and someone bites Redknapp's teeth out.

I'm so sick to death of hearing people whinge about 'that money could go on hospitals'. Last I checked it wasn't up to the board of Man City to support the NHS.

Why would Botham want it? He's got a pretty cushy job at Sky Sports where he gets to turn up, say his piece and get his money. The pressure of suddenly diving into a coaching job - and not just a coaching job, but the England job - seems like a massive gamble for all involved.

They 'slashed' prices to a mere £25 to see a game which was undoubtedly (and turned out to be) ****e. Still, better than the West Ham game on Boxing Day which cost a mere £37 and which they also helpfully tied in with the Wigan game. So only £74 to see two titanic massive Premier League games...

Oddly enough a journalist called Joe Lovejoy broke this story, who happens to be a good mate of... go on, guess who. A certain manager in North London, believe it or not, and I think I'm right in saying he's the same journalist who started the story that Portsmouth fans were threatening Nigel Quashie's wife and child shortly before he moved from here to another team managed by Bagpuss. Definitely not the same Nigel Quashie who was actually divorced and used to beat his wife, of course. Allegedly.

No real surprise if a substantial offer has come in. I'm just glad that Real haven't taken the **** - they could easily have offered £10m or so and known that straight away Diarra would've wanted to leave and left us in a sticky position. Instead it seems, fortunately, that the offer is a rather generous one.