The9

He's "a League One keeper at best", you chimp.

They either froze or reduced all ticket prices last season. They do seem to have got a bit more Cortese-y with booking fees and ticket posting though which is a hidden cost.

I doubt anything Koeman said at the time would be referenced in a hearing, and the reasons he "couldn't do" that challenge could mean anything rather than the specific interpretation that it was a challenge requiring a red card. Koeman could have meant that he "couldn't do" it because he was in a poor position to win the ball, for instance. Or that he "couldn't" accidentally miss the ball like that without a foul following, which has nothing to do with a red card. Also Ronald has a history of being slightly inaccurate with his English when making comments, talking about Rodriguez's "feet" being injured, for instance.

Franny seems to have made a lot of red card tackles using the entire right side of his body, based on those two clips. Funny to see the applause from the Saints fans in the Fashanu clip.

None of this is correct. He's been banned for 5 matches, which happens to take 6 weeks. If it was Christmas that would have been about a 2 week ban. The second part is completely irrelevant to the ban, and your opinion.

Having watched it God knows how many times now, he didn't "go after the player" at all, he went for the ball, on the ground, completely missed it, and even so barely made contact with Payet, who only even fell over because the bottom half of a by-then prone and near-stationary Wanyama was then stuck between his legs. It was a mistimed lunge, but Payet actually had to run into him for it to even be a foul.

Quite. I'll win £600 if Newport County get relegated this season, but it'll take a lot more money than that to get them back up OR to make me feel better about it.

Only us, Spurs, Stoke, Liverpool and Sunderland in my recent experience.

There's a legitimate overall point about ticket pricing, which is that the clubs basically don't need to charge the prices they do. However, they do, and your choices are lump it or don''t go. I'm not sure where the entitlement to cheap tickets comes from though, you happen to like something very popular, expect to pay more for it. When they start giving tickets away, what makes the same people think they're the ones who deserve them then, anyway? Why on earth would the club give tickets away to people who have proven they're the ones most prepared to pay for them? The Scouse protest wasn't against "general" ticket pricing though, it was specifically about the rise in the price of the most expensive tickets at Anfield - and in that context they were just whining and expecting special treatment as per usual, especially as 64% of the tickets are frozen or cheaper. Although they did well to organise themselves in that timeframe - it's almost like they have experience. In terms of "leaving the ground early", I've only done it once before injury time, when a friend of a friend got themselves chucked out rather than walk out of Saints 0-3 Watford in the Championship. Not sure I'd be there in the first place if the protest was about not attending.

FWIW, Liverpool have won the league twice during Kasper's lifetime.

It was neither two-footed nor from behind, it was a sliding tackle across the player and with his right leg swinging (and missing) the ball. There was also a tackle from behind on a Saints player just as bad which may have been Valencia. And Bertrand did Byram a favour by staying on his feet after the studding onto the top of his foot with the ball nowhere.

It wasn't a dive, Yoshida clearly clipped him.

I think he's a competent squad player for our budget but I'd really rather he never played. What would you consider his position? I'd say where he was today in playing slightly off centre towards the left side is about as close as he's going to get to it.

Fair point that actually the likes of Man U are trying to keep away tickets as few as possible to begin with which insures them against measures like this relative to the amounts they can make from home fans. That comes back to the question I've just asked about the cost of away tickets relative to home ones. Re: Leyton Orient, I don't really think people who are already Orient fans will be affected, and they are likely to be home on alternate weeks anyway - plus surely if the local Prem club wasn't attractive to prospective Orient fans before it still won't be now, no matter how cheap it is?

Isn't the rule that they have to be priced at the same price as equivalent home tickets (e.g. away seats behind the goal can't be priced as if they were half way line tickets for the home team, they have to be the price of behind the goal home tickets)? Didn't think they had to be "the cheapest".

Just watched the red card again, Wanyama clearly swung at and missed the ball before collecting Payet, and Payet's rolly-rolly and Collins and Noble running at Wanyama/Clattenburg plus starting general pushing and shoving clearly influenced the card. For the record, Yoshida also got out of position for the free header Emunike should have scored from, got too close to the ball deliverer without either closing him down or being able to defend the cross, was taken out by the cross and Fonte couldn't get across to cover in time. But anyway, we still won with a bit of luck.

The thing with Yoshida is about 90% of what he does is sound, but he ALWAYS screws up in a way which could easily lead to the opposition scoring. Today it was both a trip in the box, and passing the ball straight to the striker when he intercepted a through ball (by virtue of being out of position in the first place). Great that he scored, but he's not going to do that as often as he offers a chance at the other end. Long bust a gut today and has deserved his run in the side - you get what you expect from him, occasionally dodgy touch when running with the ball, a lot of closing down and surprisingly good in the air. He's not massively creative and you wouldn't want him in a side without creative players around him but he works hard and when you're down to 10 you need plenty of that. Pelle looked off the pace, but made sense to leave him on in those conditions with his ability to hold the ball up and lay it off, though he didn't actually do it as well as he has done before. Interesting to see the reaction to Austin seems to be expectation that he'll score every time he touches the ball, that's going to be a difficult reputation to uphold!

He tripped him in the box (ended up sliding off on all fours I think) when there was no reason to be anywhere near him as the ball was going off the pitch.

I think the 13 wins was for automatic promotion, seems to be in line with some figures on here a few days ago, before their latest defeat. Newport will be visiting Fratton again fairly soon, starting to look forward to it again after 6 months of expecting a humping. In terms of the playoffs, they have two games in hand to catch up the one point behind the team in 6th (who they just lost to at home), and 2 games to reel in the 2 points to the team in 5th (Mansfield), and only one game in hand to overhaul the 2 points to Bristol Rovers in 4th. But then Accrington in 8th have 2 games in hand on them to overhaul only goal difference. Not that finishing 4th makes any difference as it's still the play-offs, and the team in 3rd are 6 points ahead with a game in hand. And of course you have to win your games in hand as well...

Players generally don't seem too bothered by it. I seem to recall Abel Xavier played for Everton for a few years as Ah-bell Zavvi-ay until he signed for Liverpool and told them his name was actually pronounced Ay-bell Ecks-ay-veer. According to Motson on MotD tonight Kieron Trip-ear has become the Frenchman Trippy-ay.

FWIW I think he's one of the most "first-team ready" players we have had recently in the Dev squad. Big and strong with quick feet, tactically adept and has looked comfortable whenever I've seen him.

They used to love 4-3-3.

I think we're keeping Gazza with a view to having developed a cheap Prem keeper in 10 years' time tbh. Fair enough re: Stek - I think he'd have gone elsewhere already if the Dutch had made the Euros but without that he's got no incentive other than playing to get a new deal - and if we match his current money he might be fine to sign a permanent deal with us. He's out of contract, we're already showing we'll pay his wages (to some extent) with both he and Forster AND Gazzaniga and Davis, and he knows the set up, so why not?

Beating all the teams not in the top 6 was good enough to get us challenging the top 6 last season. If we can keep tight defensively and regularly beat the others for the rest of the season we shouldn't be too worried what the top sides are doing.

No choice at all, Targett has been excellent in the LWB position, Yoshida is guaranteed an error a game. The first option is streets ahead of the second.