The9

I'd say that if a team wins a match and still loses out on their intended goal, that intended goal must have been a pretty long shot. And actually for Portsmouth to have got an automatic place the following results were needed before the start of today: Portsmouth to win 2 matches PLUS (because they only had to finish above 3 of the 4 teams they could still catch to get automatic promotion) Three of the following: Plymouth to not win at least one of their last two matches Bristol Rovers to not win either of their last two matches Oxford to lose one and at best draw their other match Accrington to lose both matches So a minimum of 7 results all going their way, involving teams who have all had an above average likelihood of winning their matches all season long. Portsmouth WON their match and it STILL left them unable to catch three of the four above them, hardly a surprise, because it was very unlikely to begin with. So was Leicester winning the title - but they still might not... Portsmouth definitely can't go up automatically now.

Got a mate in Norwich who put us up all over New Year, so want them to stay up. Would also like one of Newcastle or Sunderland to stay up too, as I like going up there. Obviously that can't happen, and Boro coming up isn't really the same. My only real interest in the Championship is which teams' grounds the wife hasn't been to, so she'll want to see Derby or Sheffield Wednesday come up. Unless Rotherham get given 50 points from somewhere I won't be going there any time soon and that's the only ground in the top two divisions I haven't done ( until West Ham move). Brighton I have mixed feelings about, like the place and the transport links, can't stand the team or fans. I'd rather they stayed in their box.

As I mentioned on the last page, they needed a minimum of 9 results to go their way to get automatic before today's games. As far as "they will play Plymouth", that's been fairly obvious for a couple of weeks too, the important bit is who finishes highest and gets to play the second leg at home, because the Skates' single-faceted counter-attacking and running with the ball game is completely unsuited to having to play the first leg at home, and if Plymouth go to Fratton first, they're likely to come away with the advantage and not need to chase the game at home either, and the Skates will be left needing to break down an organised defence in a way they've failed to do for months. Incidentally, since hammering Portsmouth 3-0 at Fratton on 12th March, Newport have won 0 drawn 3 and lost 7.

I haven't seen it, but if Ayala is behind the defence when the ball is played, as of this season he should be flagged offside if he's in a position that means the defenders have to react to defend him. If he's not beyond the defence, then obviously he's not offside, but he doesn't have to be near the path of the ball, etc. any more.

I'm amazed that any club thinks there's anything he can offer them. Self-professed that he can't use a computer or texting, has openly slated the kind of player tracking technology and sports science that every professional club in England now has, doesn't do any of the coaching so can't offer any suggestions there, and has no knowledge of the players or teams in the local area which is the only field other than dubious financial management that he might have been able to help (and recruitment is much more tech and metric-based now anyway).

I hate that you can't quote other people's quotes. As a once outsider I can confirm that "what everyone else thinks about the two clubs" is as follows: Pre-1950: Portsmouth big crowds, navy town, successful because of the War. Southampton - Do they have a team? Pre-1980: Portsmouth and Southampton lower league sides, similar sized grounds, basically irrelevant. Early 80s: Southampton relatively successful underdog with small ground, Kevin Keegan, Portsmouth in the 4th division or thereabouts. Mid-80s-2003: Southampton top tier side with small ground mostly fighting relegation, Matt Le Tissier! Portsmouth up for a season, 2nd tier stalwarts, FA Cup semi-final. 2003-2005: Southampton - nice new boring ground, James Beattie, Cup Final. Portsmouth - Premier League, crappy ground. 2006-2011: Southampton - whatever happened to them? Portsmouth - how can they afford those players? FA Cup winners?!?! 2011-2016: Southampton - decent and relatively successful, well run. Portsmouth - shambolic, feel sorry for the fans.

Teams can only recall players on emergency loans (max 93 days), and they're the ones who can't play in the Play-Offs anyway. The "season-long" loanees can't be recalled outside transfer windows (and in practice they're "half-season" loans between transfer windows) .

That is absolutely correct. The transfer window opens when the season finishes, so after the play-offs and they can't send anyone back until the window is open even if they want to, but the "emergency" loans had a max 93 day limit and couldn't be extended beyond that. The emergency loan window closed in the third week of March just like the old transfer deadline. The L2 Play Off Final is 30th May and 93 days before that is 27th February, so anyone signed before then but not on a season long loan can't play in the PO Final. The 12th,14th,15th,18th May are the semis, which prevents anyone signed before 9th, 11th, 13th or 16th February respectively playing in those games too. Now the emergency loan window has closed... forever. Frankly without the emergency loan window I don't know how three-quarters of League Two are going to operate, it completely plays into the Skates' hands as a team with a bigger turnover and (theoretically) the ability to lay out more money up front, so if they don't go up this season it's absolutely on a plate for them next year. Every team in that division has used emergency loans to plug short term gaps for years, some of the less affluent sides use them on a rolling basis just to be able to operate. Getting stuck with the rubbish in the squad at the end of August for a 4 month period and only being able to sign non-contract players to plug the gaps is going to catch some sides out hugely next year, not least because it takes the closure of the transfer window to activate the trickle-down effect of loan player availability to clubs in lower divisions. Newport this season would have been absolutely doomed without the ability to take players in for a month or two to show their stuff to their parent clubs without a long term wage commitment, stuck with the dross that they cobbled together having released all but 4 players whilst paying Conference money to the replacements.

TBH their first choice keeper is nothing special. I'm fairly sure "the injuries are piling up" is Cook-speak for 1) we're going to be resting players for the next 2 matches in preparation for the playoffs and 2) ar5e-covering in case they don't go up in the play-offs. Plymouth are inconsistent as hell at the moment, I'm not sure whether that's better or worse than being incredibly predictable like the Skates, though if Plymouth keep it up they might end up as low as 7th rather than 5th, which would leave them playing away second to whoever drops out of the automatic positions rather than finishing at home against 6th or 7th, which has to be preferable. Then again, Plymouth can still come 2nd at the moment (as can Portsmouth, albeit from 2 points further back and needing 9 results to go their way).

The fault for the existence of the fences lies with hooligans and those who decided fences were required to control crowds (though it's difficult to see how else control could have been achieved at the time without some kind of physical barrier, pitch invasions were a frequently-repeated feature of the period immediately prior to the installation of fences and segregation). The fault in terms of the design of the stadium at Hillsborough (and the specifics of not having enough gates to escape the pens, and not managing the numbers in the pens) lies with the process of issuing a safety certificate to a ground which didn't meet safety criteria, and the FA for not insisting on counting people into each area. The fault for not meeting the safety criteria to begin with lies with the ownership of Sheffield Wednesday FC. The fault of giving a big game to a venue without a valid safety certificate lies with the FA. The fault for not managing the crowd outside the turnstiles, and for opening a gate and not ensuring fans were channelled away from the overcrowded pen lies with Wright and Duckenfield. The fault for not allowing people to exit the front of the terrace onto the pitch earlier lies with the mindset of the South Yorkshire police of quelling trouble not managing crowd safety. It's difficult to apportion blame to the specific set of fans who were acting like pretty much any crowd would in that circumstance, although the "completely blameless" angle required for the Families to accept a verdict is also not a realistic reflection of the situation, as there would have been the usual levels of misbehaviour and drunkenness - but within the parameters of being "normal at football", which the police should have been able to manage, and was certainly not the thing that caused the disaster. Part of the problem at the time was that the lie was so easy to believe. The passage of time has left us with a different football-following experience, and millions of current, younger fans with no the understanding of why the policing mindset was how it was, along with 25 years of far improved crowd behaviour, has moved society to a place where the majority of people with an interest in football can't even fathom why these conditions were in place, and see the only possible explanation being terrible policing. In some ways, the gentrification of football post-Hillsborough, caused by Hillsborough (and Italia '90) is the thing which has finally led to the widespread acceptance of police culpability.

The Taylor Report said lots of nice things about all-seaters, but didn't suggest that standing was inherently unsafe. If anything, it just pointed out that crowds are easier to manage when it is known how many people are in an area, and that that should be more closely monitored. It didn't stop the football authorities running with all-seaters once the chairmen worked out they could charge more per head to cover the fewer heads they could get in, get their grounds upgraded at the same time, and encourage some of those cash-rich middle classes who'd discovered football was all lovely and that during England's run to the World Cup semis in 1990 to spend some of their money at grounds too. The awkwardness of the whole "Families" thing has always been the stigma about standing that persists which has never been the reason their relatives died to begin with.

As has been repeatedly stated, the question is what happens if they DON'T qualify for the Europa League through Premier League position but win the Europa League and qualify for the Champions League. It's clear if they come in a Europa position in the League it becomes 4+1CL and 2EL. And if City win the CL as well it's basically 3+2CL and 2EL - as long as Man City and Liverpool both qualify for the EL (which City already have via the League Cup anyway). But if they don't... UEFA also has a regulation clarification saying only ONE additional EL place can be added - so I guess that gives us the 5+3 situation. Also, Man U winning the FA Cup pushes a place down if they also come top 4...

Isn't that a problem with people's perception of Pelle rather than anything about Long though?

Vardy scored 5 goals last season in the Premier League. 16 in the Championship the year before. 5 in the Championship the year before that. I think it's fair to say that JAMIE VARDY had never in his career scored even A QUARTER as many goals in a Premier League season as Jamie Vardy has in this one as well. So there's no particular reason to think either that Vardy will continue to do this, or that Long won't start to. The sample size is meaningless. I would also point out that Vardy wasn't "very very average" last season when Saints played at Leicester, he was the best player on the park by a mile, doing exactly what he has this season, just more out wide and therefore a greater distance from the goal.

We signed him on August 14th, which was a full 2½ months after Lambert left and just before the season started, not sure what "panic" that was meant to be by then. It was all played out by August, Chambers left on 28th July and Ralph's statement about no-one else leaving was made. 3 days after we signed Long, Schneiderlin played against Liverpool so the entire Schneiderlin strop played out in the interim. Also the reason he cost £12m was purely because he was only 6 months into a 4 year deal when we signed him, Hull had paid £7m for him in the January when he was about to be out of contract at West Brom, and if we'd paid that at the time there wouldn't be this endless tedious debate about his fee. Hardly anyone signs players with nearly their entire contract left precisely because it's not usually good business. It was that "sign the player you want if they're available" approach as mentioned in Soccernomics along with our remarkable ability to make a profit off signings that prompted all the Moneyball discussion.

The Sun was one of a pile of outlets which refused to report on Saints or use photos from our matches when Cortese played his ridiculous photography rights card at the start of 2010/11. Remember "South Coast Club?". So apart from it being 5 years ago, and having been fixed just under 5 years ago there's no particular reason to think it's a thing other than paranoia.

They'd literally have to have points deducted to miss out now (not that it hasn't happened before of course), the only way they can miss the playoffs is by getting automatic promotion instead - to do that they'll have to win 2 games more than Accrington or Oxford and one more than both Bristol Rovers and Plymouth. In two games. And they definitely won't see a fall in STs if they go up, fans are always interested in new opponents. I'm hoping the new teams they play will be Cheltenham and Colchester, as opposed to Sheffield United and Charlton. They're in the playoffs and most likely they'll lose to Plymouth. I've been saying they'll go up this season for 3 years, but tbh now I'm more interested in them losing without getting to Wembley.

It was a very strange piece of reporting to go to people with a tangible anti-Saints bias to ask their opinion. Anyone would think their model was to be deliberately antagonistic to drive controversy and gain clicks or something. I'm not sure how Saints "don't fit the media perception of a Premier League club" though, I'd say outside the top 6 and Leicester we're straight down the middle of what the rest of the Premier League is about.

2015/16 Players in PLAYER FROM FEE DATE Shinji Okazaki Mainz £7,000,000 01 Jul, 2015 N'Golo Kante Caen £5,600,000 03 Aug, 2015 Yohan Benalouane Atalanta Signed 03 Aug, 2015 Goekhan Inler Napoli £5,000,000 19 Aug, 2015 Demarai Gray Birmingham £3,500,000 04 Jan, 2016 Daniel Amartey FC Copenhagen £5,000,000 22 Jan, 2016 Total: £26,100,000 They certainly haven't got to worry about them leaving in the first 12 months of their contracts whilst leading the Premier League, but only 2 of those players are actually regular starters. The season before they spent slightly less money on a lot more players. 3 regular starters and regular sub Ulloa came in then. Players in PLAYER FROM FEE DATE Jack Barmby Man Utd Free 01 Jul, 2014 Matthew Upson Brighton Free 01 Jul, 2014 Louis Rowley Man Utd Free 19 Jul, 2014 Leonardo Ulloa Brighton £8,000,000 22 Jul, 2014 Esteban Cambiasso Inter Free 28 Aug, 2014 Danny Simpson QPR Signed 30 Aug, 2014 Tom Lawrence Man Utd Signed 01 Sep, 2014 Mark Schwarzer Chelsea Free 03 Jan, 2015 Andrej Kramaric Rijeka £9,000,000 16 Jan, 2015 Christian Fuchs Schalke Free 03 Jun, 2015 Robert Huth Stoke £3,000,000 24 Jun, 2015 Total: £20,000,000 The year before that, 2 other starters: 2013/14 Players in PLAYER FROM FEE DATE Zoumana Bakayogo Tranmere Free 22 Jul, 2013 Dean Hammond Southampton Free 13 Sep, 2013 Riyad Mahrez Le Havre £560,000 11 Jan, 2014 Kevin Phillips C Palace Free 15 Jan, 2014 Ben Hamer Charlton Free 22 May, 2014 Marc Albrighton Aston Villa Free 23 May, 2014 Total: £560,000 Amazingly they signed all of Schmeichel, Morgan, Drinkwater and Vardy in 2011/12, they've been there for over 4 years already. Schlupp is a youth product with 6 years first team under his belt. I think it's fair to say that only Schmeichel would have attracted much interest before this season.

I look forward to the season when we have as few injuries and suspensions as Leicester have and get to pick basically our first XI for 38 games. We'd have just as much chance of winning the league as Leicester.

Sounds like paper talk based on a complete misunderstanding of how Saints recruit players. Though he's Dutch so there may be a "Koeman Clause". He might be a decent player somewhere in there and we might be able to get him back to the level he was at a few years back, but we don't generally recruit "trouble(d)" players and I'm sure we'd rather flog Mane for a big profit and sign his replacement for a pittance from some random Europa League side. Sisto seems like a more likely signing without any of the baggage.

When I was watching him at the start of the season I noticed that Clasie tended to try to play a forward pass towards the attacking midfielders/striker(s) when he got the ball. Can't say I've been watching him much recently, but I'd be surprised if we'd coached that out of him when it was probably one of the things that made him stand out compared to our other midfielders. I think you're right that he's not a creative (e.g. number 10-style) assisting passer, but he does help transition the ball from back to front more quickly.

The WhoScored? stats also say: Jordy Clasie Characteristics + Strengths Passing Strong Taking set-pieces Strong Tackling Strong Ball interception Strong - Weaknesses Aerial Duels Weak Jordy Clasie's Style of Play Likes to shoot from distance Plays the ball off the ground often Likes to play long balls - this will be the reason for his lower pass completion rate. Victor Wanyama Characteristics + Strengths Aerial Duels Strong Tackling Strong - Weaknesses Discipline Weak Victor Wanyama's Style of Play Commits fouls often Nothing about passing in Wanyama's skillset at all.

Clasie plays FAR more high-risk forward passes than Wanyama, who spends most of the game knocking simple short passes. Those stats prove nothing in isolation.

I suspect our tactics against Newcastle and Everton might have been different if Ronald thought we were able to defend at that point. It wasn't just Van Dijk, it was not having Romeu as an option until we were 2-0 down to Everton as well when we'd been so used to relying on a solid defensive midfield partnership the previous season.