The9

"Less hoofing" is a factor, as they're more involved in everything, and Schneiderlin developing an attacking presence has raised his profile, but generally I think they've been about as good as they were last year, but just given more opportunity to shine and pick effective and varied passes rather than watching the ball fly past them, or just shovelling it out to Richardson to storm forward as they did last season.

In this context it's just "people who might go to matches but don't all that often".

I guess part of it is the additional sales the club can get from fans on the day - there's probably more benefit to getting daytrippers in than surly, picky, regular attendees like me who never spend money in the stadium once the new kit is done for the season.

I am still of the mindset that it never happened. Like the others, unable to listen to that song until around 2011 - and absolutely furious in 2009/10 when someone decided to play it prior to kick off at St Mary's. Different story now. 4-1 is just the score in admins.

Maybe when I'm bored. Just seen the new Valerenga shirt, I'd love to see this in a silver/black or yellow/blue. Like the socks and they'd look good in red/white too, though I prefer the diagonal 3 stripe flash socks some of the MLS sides have.

What if we have a massively elastic demand amongst our floating fans ? Ok we could only shift 3,000 for Everton (Monday night post-Adkins on tv) but what if we could shift 20,000 "floaters" for Everton on a Saturday 3pm when winning games ?

Isn't your battery dead yet ? Good luck btw.

Was playing for De Graafschap in the Eredivisie last season, is Dutch Prem better than the Championship ? Steve De Ridder may also have an opinion on this.

I always thought they were silver Reeboks, but I have found a pic, and they were Nike Mercurial R9 Ronaldo boots from circa 2000 (I had a black pair which didn't fit ) : We didn't wear that kit at St Mary's, so yes, it was at The Dell (and he also wore them at Portman Road, clearly).

Style. It's also nice to know that's the only thing you could find wrong with it.

Not sure what's irrational about wanting to pay the least amount over the longest time period ? It's a lot easier to pay a debit on pay day than it is to set aside a sum in advance (especially if you're still paying for last year's) and put that towards the cost. Spreading the payments over the longest period is the most rational way of doing it if you're not paying interest.

That'll be a first, we haven't seen anything before July under Cortese.

Least sarcastic thread ever.

With Villa playing Sunderland on the Monday.

I would really like Reading to win, Saints' most popular manager of the past 8 years relegating our least popular manager ever (yes, including Branfoot) in a winner-takes-all-until-we-get-relegated-soon-too classic. I actually think QPR will win but I don't want them to.

Well no, cos I'd want the bloody things back !

The point is that the element of that challenge which makes it a sending off as it is specified in the Laws is still present in an identical challenge where he clears the ball and the players just collide. The Laws don't make any provision at all for "studs up" "two thirds up leg" or "at pace", just "care" and "recklessness". Also, if Halsey "couldn't see the challenge", surely he saw the "pace" involved and that there was a collision, and didn't need to have seen the contact with Haidara to evaluate recklessness if he could see McManaman running into a 50/50 at that speed ? I see to recall Marsden getting sent off for a two footed lunge which landed a foot short of Vieira at St Mary's once... I guess that was the "attempting to kick an opponent intent" days.

Nice somersault sell from Paul London off Snitsky's move. Much better to watch than a duck's jizzy wanger and some freak trying to measure it. What's that aboot ?!

Those people are already not listening to reason and will probably start fretting about points deductions if those results occur. We could be in the same position as we are now one thousand times, and we would get relegated precisely once.

So... you don't want me to bring the spare socks ?

Neither, though I do occasionally like to point out inconsistencies in logical arguments around the Laws. For instance, Rafael stuck his boot out a couple of inches off the floor to cushion a high ball in Man U v Villa, and in doing so, booted Agbonlahor on the foot. Rafael was completely oblivious to the Villa player, was clearly just controlling the ball in a passive and routine manner, but there WAS contact, and Agbonlahor was hopping around in pain for a good few seconds. According to the Laws of the game, Rafael was at the very least careless because he failed to take care that Agbonlahor was injured in the collision (because he didn't know he was there) and a free kick should have been given and Rafael booked. That is obviously an absolute nonsense (especially if you saw the innocuous nature of the piece of control) and it simply isn't possible for players to be in situations where they are able to "take care" in what is still, at the moment, a contact sport. But the yellow card and free kick it is the only possible interpretation as soon as you take intent out and suddenly bring needing to have care for your opponent into the equation. The McManaman situation is an extension of that. If he'd cleanly cleared the ball, not clipped it, and the two had run into each other with a similarly messy collision, legs flailing and serious injury to one player from an accidental collision where the ball was cleanly played, should that also be a red card ? The player(s) have clearly been reckless in going for a challenge knowing there would be a collision, so isn't the right decision according to the laws of the game to send them both off for recklessness ?

What was the lino doing ? Sleeping ?

Just to be clear, using the 769,000,000 possible outcomes here http://www.sportsclubstats.com/England/Southampton.html the worst case scenario was only 43 points BEFORE Villa lost, and the difference in the chance of relegation between 39 and 43 points is only 2.8%, because even 4 defeats only leaves us 2.8% likely to go down. A win will leave us with less than a 0.05% chance of relegation even if Villa beat Sunderland and Wigan beat Spurs. A draw leaves us with basically the same likelihood, a defeat gives us a whole additional 0.2% of worry. There's just no point even considering relegation, we're around 184 times more likely to come 8th than 18th (and we have a tiny chance of coming 7th - winning all 4 in about 5,000 out of 769 million permutations).

Well thanks for sharing all of his posts with all the people who have explicitly decided they don't want to waste their time looking at them because they find him so tedious, anyway.

Hold on, it took a team losing a game they were 14/1 to win in the first place for you to decide Saints were safe ? That actually had a completely negligible impact on Saints' chances of relegation ? Perception is a strange thing.