The9

Oh, and let's not underestimate Stoke - this sort of sums it up: "Substitution, Stoke City. Xherdan Shaqiri replaces Ibrahim Afellay."

Just out of interest, is Diego Costa also injured or did he get the hook after 33 minutes for tangibly not giving a toss?

Newport have just taken two Cardiff U21s on loan and they are making a significant difference at the ar5e-end of League 2 (just beat Bristol Rovers 4-1 away after only winning one other game all season), so if they want match experience...

Currently Norwich leading at Everton; Sheffield Wednesday 3 up against Arsenal and Stoke leading Chelsea. Brick walls every one.

Incidentally, it's on Sky but I'm not watching, I see Sheff Weds are leading 1-0 but Oxlade-Chamberlain went off for Walcott on 5 minutes, and Walcott then went off on 19 minutes. So presumably that was two injuries to two of their first team squad?

Well, he can't pick all of them all of the time.

I think the argument would be that if it wasn't for FFP we wouldn't need to get his wages off the budget in order to be able to spend them on someone else, so there would be more chance of him getting more chances or a new deal.

Yeahhhh, you're not seeing 8 of that team start, and there is absolutely no point picking both Pelle and Seager anyway.

Clearly this "8 changes" Arsenal side: Cech, Debuchy, Chambers, Mertesacker, Gibbs, Flamini, Kamara, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Campbell, Iwobi, Giroud. or this "3 changes" Chelsea one: Begovic, Zouma, Cahill, Terry, Baba, Ramires, Mikel, Willian, Oscar, Hazard, Diego Costa

When you have a 240-mile round trip and the last train you can get on leaves 2½ hours before kick off, you tend to want to confirm you will definitely get in before you commit to travelling - as this occasionally happened on a Saturday morning after a local postponement so I wasn't playing, it could sometimes be a little bit touch and go. I seem to recall my "contact" knew someone with a non-existent younger brothers with a kid's season ticket, and occasionally it involved going through a particular turnstile two at a time, or hoping someone wasn't able to make it.

I think the absences of the usually rotated in forward players (Long and Rodriguez) means we'll probably still rotate, but as we can't use Mane either we'll want to keep the rest of the side (the defensive half) as unchanged as possible. The team to face Bournemouth will also be a factor.

I'm so glad it happened.

As someone who could only get in if a mate had a spare ticket for the best part of 10 years I can confirm that it makes it less appealing to follow a side when you can't get in... my last match at The Dell was the 1-0 win against Leicester in January 2001 - there were 7 more homes after that but I had no chance of getting a ticket. I was an ST holder at St Mary's the following season. Future attendance must be a big worry for football authorities by now, the average age is increasing and a lot of the kids who go get priced out once they're not teenagers, often never to return.

Replace the word "Sherwood" with the word "Redknapp" here, it's hardly a surprise given one of his later managers: "When Sherwood won, he was lauded for simplifying tactics and rejuvenating under-performing players, but when he lost or was out-thought, he portrayed himself as purely a victim of inherited difficulties."

It's an interesting one, because Wiki says he slipped down the pecking order with van Nistelrooij taking his place in 2011, and he replaced Diego Costa in the Spanish squad when he got called up - but he's certainly not been signed to play in the Pelle role, and we've converted strikers like Long and Rodriguez into supporting attacking midfielders, so that's where I expect he's going to play for us. The videos I've seen pretty much all showed him as flat out sprinting when attacking on the counter rather than as part of build up, but only the later ones (Malaga #11) show him as in the front line rather than breaking from deep in the way, say, Rodriguez does.

It's my favourite ever picture of anything - without context.

Impressive, given that we'd announced we'd sold it out before he even guessed.

I think we'd be ok against Everton with our first choice midfield and defence playing. It's not as good an opportunity yet, but it's sure as hell better than the opportunity we had after losing to Sheff U and Sunderland. There's every possibility there will be upsets with the top clubs involved in Europe and needing to rest players, and the draw could throw us up against beatable opponents up to the semi-final, and beyond that with a bit of luck. I'd also absolutely argue that the 13/14 squad was NOT stronger than we have now - the starting side isn't as good as 2014/15, but the squad has improved from last season, and last season improved on the season before. We have more depth in more positions and are much better equipped to challenge on more than one front. So we should try and win it until we don't.

Incidentally, I didn't know that that rugby ref was gay before I read this thread. The only way it has impacted on me is to be more aware that people might misinterpret me being critical of his rugby refereeing (with the piousness around the respect towards rugby officials a huge part of my general rugby dislike) as being a criticism of him as a person for other reasons.

I seem to recall various Saints forum friends of mine have taken to using "ghey" when written so it is clearly a different word with a different meaning to a perjorative use of a word which means homosexual. Sorted?

And then reinstate it, after loads of people complained that it just drew attention to it.

If fit I'm hopeful he might get a game on Wednesday, to me he plays just like Pelle and would be an asset to the first team. Seager's subbing might mean he makes the bench but I doubt he'd have played at all if he was in starting plans.

If nothing else it gives them a chance to find their level so their next contract is a chance to establish themselves rather than another chance to find they're not good enough. But generally, if you're good enough you make yourself impossible to leave out - examples like Harry Kane, who had a couple of years out on loan at lower leagues and then graduated with Europa League appearances, are few and far between nowadays. Lallana and Surman had a loan of loans but Lallana benefited from regular games at a lower level gradually increasing in standard, and Surman found his level pretty quickly also from regular first team appearances. Obviously players are more likely to come through if 1) at their parent club AND 2) getting regular games - but they have to be good enough to justify that - I'm sure Isgrove, Gallagher etc would be playing a lot more if we were in L1, but how to make them top 10 Prem players without them playing in Prem games I'm not sure. Reed seems to be the one who'd really benefit from a loan to a top half Championship side at the moment but judging by his first team games he'd spend a lot of it suspended.

Just something I'd heard from a couple of sources, he's terrible at actually doing what he's told tactically. That's why, despite his obvious physical attributes, he doesn't get called up for England any more (when taking basic instruction in a short space of time and executing it is particularly important) and couldn't get near the City team after they signed Zabaleta. A loan to Fiorentina rather than somewhere domestic last season suggests it's a well-known thing in English coaching circles, and he only got 10 starts for Fiorentina as well as Montella changed to a 3-5-2 - of course this could all be based on hearsay and speculation.

No, I have, I just tend not to post on it, and especially not about football.