The9

Interesting insight on how some US fans view MLS, thanks. Without knowing too much about the way US tv works, I suspect network syndication and regional variations in tv markets make it difficult to see everything - I know here we had games on ESPN/BT Sport last season and now Sky have taken it over, ESPN tended to be less "big team" based but even they tended to gravitate to LA Galaxy and NY Red Bulls more often than not.

It's already signed. UA will give us some decent bespoke stuff, which is more than adidas ever have. It'll still be loosely a template, but there are far fewer sides wearing their stuff to make that obvious. As for the plastic badges thing, Chelsea and Bayern had exactly the same. I'm already missing the opportunity to get more Saints adidas training kit next season as the 2015/16 designs are already leaked and they've got a bit of 1980s retro design going on.

This is the other issue - which is a similar one to the "minute's silence" thing which I'm glad Saints took control of with All Saints Day.

This does underline the disjointed thinking at the Premier League just for suggesting it. Hopefully we'll hear nothing else of it and can assume it went on the "who the hell thought of that" pile. But I'm by no means sure logic is involved in this. I could completely understand it in Ligue 1, to show French solidarity under their own anthem at the first public gatherings since. But not in the UK, it'll just look crass now.

Classic case of mates with the right people if you look at his career, almost always been a deputy to a former Forest teammate.

No-one said any different.

I always put that down to the players who'd agitated for Sturrock to leave pretty quickly not being happy with the replacement either once he got into post, despite him presumably being who they'd wanted, and "extending their unavailability" to help ensure he didn't last long either.

I'd be shocked if there wasn't some direct financial incentive for him - of course there was his usual modus operandi of pitching up and spending on at least 2 or 3 of a particular agent's players of questionable ability to sit in the reserves, with him getting a percentage of all transfers in and out. I doubt there was any of that at Saints, but I also doubt Lowe would have specifically mentioned that when trying to get him on board. I was also very keen for us to get rid of him after relegation the second he said "I'll think about it", because it was obvious he wasn't going to be committed to it and once we weren't definitely bouncing straight back and preserving his reputation as a top top triffic manager f'sure his interest was clearly going to be in his own career and mind was somewhere else.

The suggestion has been discussed, we're just getting our opinions in before the decision is made. As everyone so far has said it's a bad idea, I'm hoping that's what the decision reflects.

Everyone else in the thread apart from you, it seems. And it's not "only a song", it's a national anthem which has a lot more symbolism, especially at the moment, and should be kept for appropriate reasons. It's a Premier League initiative, it's been reported in numerous places that "The idea was discussed at a meeting of club officials on Wednesday and a decision was expected later on Thursday.". I'm hoping the decision is "we won't do it". Nothing on PremierLeague.com yet, so presumably the decision hasn't yet been made.

Yeah, but the point is that you may have the chance to bid on a second one of the others (assuming the players haven't kept them), but you can only bid on one of these so it's going to go for more as there's no suggestion that any of the other private owners will put them up for sale. I am, for the right offer, which will almost certainly be 4 digits and not include a decimal point.

Rarest modern ones for outfielders, yes. FWIW there are probably fewer grey keeper shirts which also weren't on sale, even though they wore them in a couple of other games. I've got one of those, too. The sense in which I mean that the market is "daft" is in relation to the price fluctuations across the squad, but the "only one Steven Davis... shirt" explains why his was the most expensive so far. PS If you fancy your luck, you can make me an offer for the one I've got (XL, pictured above), but I reckon you'll be better off bidding on what's there compared to how much I'd let it go for!

Ah yeah, of course - that's why it's gone for more.

As was done on Monday in my office and on Tuesday at Wembley.

Completely unnecessary. There's been a very public Anglo-French football-based expression of support, anyone who wants to will have already done at least one minute's silence and probably two, and the anthem stuff is just... not needed. This is purely the Premier League trying to make sure everyone knows they're a caring organisation and probably trying to ensure no-one compares them unfavourably to the FA, and frankly it's an embarrassing piece of politicking by the Premier League. Unfortunately there's no public way of dumping on this without it looking like you're dumping on France or seeming insensitive, so there are unlikely to be any "We've Already Done This And There's No Need To Do It Again" banners... I'll be in the concourse.

Oh, and their half season-tickets are on sale for £185: http://www.portsmouthfc.co.uk/news/article/pompey-half-season-tickets-are-on-sale-now-2806467.aspx "You will also guarantee your place for Fratton clashes with Oxford, Leyton Orient, Bristol Rovers, Cambridge, Newport, Notts County, Carlisle, Plymouth, Wycombe and Northampton." Because hell, you wouldn't want to risk getting locked out of those 11 matches with only 5000 empty seats every match. I may be going to one of them of course...

Link isn't currently working, but on the bright side I got to see their web provider's "amusing" message: "We are sorry to say that you have found our 'sorry' page while visiting www.portsmouth.co.uk"

Not to mention that they only lost to Championship Reading in their first 6 home games of the season, with the same group of players who've only beaten a non-League side at home in the 6 home games since. Somewhat suggests the "not being able to win at home" issue isn't related to either the location or the people there - though I suppose you could make a case that after getting booed off in only their second home defeat of the season the players might not be as keen to impress as they were.

He was a regular in Hedge End Sainsbury's for a while, though last time I saw him he was in Fulham gear, he's been Forest assistant manager and back to Fulham since then. Looking at his career, knowing Stuart Pearce seems to have been very useful for him. Excellent tan all year round. Worth noting of course that he's a Skate who played in their FA Cup run in '92.

Obviously I'm speculating as we've only got hearsay and rumour from over 10 years ago to go on, but it's the sort of thing where you have to be exceptionally good to get away with not conforming to the norm, and he wasn't that.

Fair question, MLS is on, I guess the issue is that there are a lot of other channels and sports competing for attention whilst football is clearly the top sport in the UK. There's also no tradition for support in the US, which is the real sticking point for building longer term bonds. My dad took me to football when I was a kid and I was hooked, but the relationship between kids and football in the US doesn't usually have that bond to build on. Soccer moms take kids to the games they play in in the same way they go to the soft play facility as something good to do, but they're not that likely to support a team to watch live or on tv.

I was hopeful he'd be something special too, I was even defending him after he was subbed at half time in the opening match of the relegation season when Villa murdered us 2-0, but hindsight and all that. Stephen Crainey didn't get another look in at a Prem side until getting a full season with relegated Blackpool 6 years later, the very definition of a Championship player having played around 250 of his 300 total English games in that division over the past 10 years, has just dropped into L1 with Fleetwood. Trouble was when we signed him he'd only had a season with Celtic, which isn't much to go on.

FWIW I thought the Redknapp appointment was an awful idea from the start because it was obvious he was a chequebook manager and Lowe wasn't going to allow him to do that with Saints. On here (well, Saints Forever) the prevailing attitude seemed to be that it was a good appointment because he'd got teams out of trouble before and it was going to "annoy the Skates". I was reluctantly accepting of it, rather than particularly pleased. But the method of scatterbomb signings he'd used previously to save teams wasn't available to him, the transfer window was a new thing which limited him further, and he was proven to be anachronistic even then by slating Prozone, Blackstock's dad slating his training "regime" of playing 5 a side, and his refusal to accommodate Woodward's ideas on preparation and sports science. The "annoy the Skates" bit, well, who the f'ck was laughing then?

Played in a UEFA Cup Final as a player (as well as winning the Scottish League with Dundee United, which is amazing in hindsight) and won Manager of the YEAR in the lower leagues 2 of the 3 years before Saints appointed him, so at the time he was well worth a look. I'm fairly sure if he'd still been the skinny athletic bloke he was in the 1980s the players might not have been so difficult to try and win over as well, but he didn't carry himself like a Premier League manager and that made things more difficult for him when results didn't go well. The tail end of 2004/5 we were as good as anyone but the direct attacking football which took Man City apart at their new ground was probably too limited to have longer term success - plus Crainey and Folly were nowhere near as good as the players they replaced.

There have been numerous attacks worldwide over the years and terrorists generally seem to have deliberately not chosen sporting and music events so far. That appears to have changed.