The9

According to this we're only 3 upsets (in our favour) from being in Pot 3 - currently in Pot 4 but that's assuming all the top seeds win all the matches in both Champions League qualifiers (good for us) and Europa League qualifiers (bad for us). http://kassiesa.home.xs4all.nl/bert/uefa/seedel2016.html Pot 1 coef. Pot 2 coef. ------------------------ --- ---------------- ------------------------ --- ---------------- Schalke 04 Ger 96.035 Sparta Praha @4 Cze 40.585 Zenit St. Petersburg Rus 93.216 PAOK Thessaloniki @3 Gre 37.440 Manchester United Eng 82.256 Steaua Bucuresti @3 Rom 36.576 Athletic Bilbao Esp 75.142 AS Monaco @3 Fra 36.549 Internazionale Ita 58.087 Racing Genk ** Bel 36.000 Fiorentina Ita 57.087 BATE Borisov @4 Bls 34.000 Anderlecht @4 Bel 54.000 Lille OSC *3 Fra 29.549 AZ Alkmaar *3 Ned 43.612 Legia Warsaw @4 Pol 28.000 Sporting Braga Por 43.116 Standard Liège Bel 27.500 Borussia Mönchengladb @4 Ger 42.035 AS Saint-Étienne *3 Fra 26.049 AS Roma @4 Ita 41.587 Dinamo Zagreb @4 Cro 25.775 Fenerbahçe @4 Tur 40.920 Ludogorets Razgrad @4 Bul 25.625 Pot 3 coef. Pot 4 coef. ------------------------ --- ---------------- ------------------------ --- ---------------- AA Gent *3 Bel 25.000 FSV Mainz 05 Ger 18.035 Young Boys @3 Sui 24.755 FC Zürich Sui 17.755 FC København @4 Den 24.720 [b]Southampton FC Eng 16.756[/b] FK Krasnodar *3 Rus 24.216 West Ham United *3 Eng 16.256 Rapid Wien *3 Aut 23.520 Hertha BSC *3 Ger 16.035 Slovan Liberec *3 Cze 22.085 Panathinaikos *3 Gre 14.940 NK Maribor ** Slo 21.625 FC Midtjylland * Den 14.720 Celta de Vigo Esp 21.142 NK Rijeka *3 Cro 14.275 Maccabi Tel-Aviv * Isr 20.225 Sassuolo *3 Ita 14.087 Spartak Moscow *3 Rus 19.216 OGC Nice Fra 12.049 Feyenoord Ned 19.112 Zorya Luhansk Ukr 11.976 Austria Wien ** Aut 19.020 Konyaspor Tur 6.920 You'll note there are lots of teams in these lists who are currently only in the EL or CL 3QR (*3 teams mostly, with a few remaining ** EL 2nd QR sides and a couple of * EL 1st QR like Midtjylland and Maccabi Tel-Aviv) or due to enter in the PO Round (the @4 teams).

Their coefficient is only 2 points different from us so it's pretty unlikely we'll be in different pots (though not impossible).

Awesome map btw Pamplemousse.

Speaking of 6pm kick offs, ugh, but we'd better get used to them, all group stage matches are either 6pm or 8pm, though I can't remember from my limited Channel 5 and BT Sport Europe watching whether that's local time or 6/8 CET/CEST. Also not sure if it's dictated by UEFA which of the times you can have. I think Liverpool v Man U last season got shifted to 8pm (GMT so that probably answers my other question) at the clubs' request.

When I checked during last year's qualifiers, it took 18 hours via Moscow to get there and a similar time back with the connections, would have necessitated me leaving on Wednesday morning for a 6pm Thursday kick off in Astana, and not getting back until Saturday lunchtime.

I wish. He's a "I think too slowly to pass it and get caught in possession" type of defender. Kicking it out is his best case scenario. Which is a shame because he's good in the air and decent at marking. But he just takes too long when he has the ball, which makes him not suited to our type of game... or at least not suited to any of the ways we've played since he's been with us.

I'm pretty sure it'll be live on YouTube, seeing as this afternoon I received a notification for PEC Zwolle v Saints LIVE on YouTube NOW on my phone and then "this video has been deleted" when I confusedly clicked on it. So I'm guessing someone loaded it accidentally at the wrong time. (Approximately 1:37pm judging by the message above).

Actually I think the lack of emergency loans will hugely work in their favour. Most of the skint clubs in the division got players in on short-term deals when they needed them - to fill a hole from injury or to attempt to improve the team - and they would be much better off with only a short-term commitment compared to the cost involved of committing to a (half-) season long loan. The clubs with more income should benefit because they will have more strength in depth (in theory) and can afford to cover the wages for a longer period. The smaller clubs will face the choice of cutting their squad right back or getting players in for half-seasons at a time, when the nature of the emergency loan meant they could experiment with hopeful short-term signings and then commit if they were beneficial - now everyone's stuck with what they've got for at least 6 months and there's no way of plugging unexpected gaps outside transfer windows (other than signing non-contract players from non-league, for instance). On the bright side, the Skates' recruitment has been pretty bad, and the coaching skills required to do the best with what they have, which seems to be essential on limited budgets, seem to be somewhat limited with Cook.

At least they haven't brought this back: Or this:

Weird fact about that 1993 Norwich kit was that the exact same design was branded as Ribero and Mitre in different seasons.

Here's the home and away:

Based on their UEFA Cup run home shirt from 1993-ish, worst kit in history for their best team - their home and away kits are nice and sensible this season though.

I'd find it vaguely hilarious if Koeman's first two "name" signings for Everton were Saints' back up keeper and back up right back - though it makes a lot of sense for us to sell Martina (or offer him a new contract on slightly improved money).

Interesting to see the "Tadic doesn't fit the formation" stuff doing the rounds at the moment, but he's been too heavily featured in the OS training pics to be going anywhere IMO.

Yeah, I'll keep you all updated on how that works out. Newport's Facebook page was just full of replies saying "HOW old is he?!?". 34, but very grey.

That would be awesome... Have they announced the wifi in the stadium yet? They hit a gas main when digging up to put in the cables yesterday because someone else had moved the gas pipes and not changed the records and traffic ended up getting diverted away from the ground... in rush hour. And frankly having already booked flights to Manchester for the Friday night Man U game if they announce anything other than dirt cheap match tickets or free stuff for people at the game I'm probably going to be annoyed. Cheap trains would REALLY annoy me.

What, the ones that said "he's fallen out with Koeman"? Not sure that's really a concern.

Charity Lifeboat shirt?

Needs a bigger UA logo, but otherwise, yeah.

Yeah, especially as the Youth XL is bigger than the S, and cheaper, and stuff like that.

After hours of investigative journalism*, I can confirm that the shirts in the Megastore are also marked up as £90 under the price Saints have slapped over the top. This leads me to believe one of two things. Either that UA have mispriced a load of replicas, or that they actually sell the £90 "Fitted" replicas to some idiots at full price at other clubs and we're actually getting the expensive replicas at about half price. But as we know these aren't the shirts the players wear anyway, it's all a bit moot. *I peeled the Saints price off and the price underneath was also £90.

Heh, that's a dig.

Gignac had Dugarry and Guivarc'h potential from his performances in the recent Euros. Can't say I've seen much of him other than that. I doubt we'll be signing players now based on Euros performances anyway, we'd either have signed them beforehand or we're not going to.

Feel free not to merge this with the kit thread with 1329 posts literally sat directly below this...

Hopefully none of our pre-season games will go the way of Cardiff's match this evening... http://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/live-updates-cardiff-city-vs-11641040