The9

I can only assume it's in the knock on effect of how Saints get to 45. Even if we beat Spurs we must take 4 points from Sunderland, West Brom, Swansea or Stoke somehow.

Here are the figures anyway : http://www.sportsclubstats.com/England/Premier.html % Chances of us coming every position from 7th downwards (note that 0 means under 0.5% but still possible, outside this range is impossible) : 7th--8th--9th--10th--11th--12th--13th-14th-15th-16th-17th-|-18th-19th 0-----2---- 7----14----19----21---15---10----6----3----1---|--0----0 We already can't come bottom due to QPR and Reading playing each other. Overall chance of coming 8th = 2% Overall chance of coming 10th = 14% Overall chance of coming 10th or above = 23% Overall chance of coming 14th or below = 20% Overall chance of relegation = 0.2% Stoke's chances of relegation are currently 10.9%, by the way.

See above, we can't. I think maybe there are more matches between two teams below us than you've considered, so you've not deducted some more points that one or other of the teams must drop. The link above is the probability calculated on a few hundred million permutations of the possible results for each final points total. Either that or the probability of it happening is so small it results in a "not possible" result, which I don't think is the case as that website shows 0.0% rather than "No" in that case, which it does for Saints from 41-43 points. Also, if we have 45 points, West Brom, Swansea and Fulham also need to get to that total. Who do Saints beat to get us to 45 ? We'd have to get 7 points from West Brom, Sunderland, Swansea, Stoke and Tottenham - even if we beat Spurs that means 2 other teams in that equation also dropping points.

The "someone you know" probably saw it here : http://www.sportsclubstats.com/England/Southampton.html That link shows that having our current total of 38pts at the end of the season is a 14.4% chance of relegation. 39 pts means we are 3.2% likely to get relegated, 40 pts means we are 0.4% likely to get relegated 41 points or 42 points is less than 0.05% likely to be relegated If we get 43 points with 5 draws we cannot be relegated If we get 43 points via 1 win and 2 draws we are still less than 0.05% likely to be relegated 44 points is the all-situations safety total.

I think you should maybe resize your image. We can finish 8th, it's just not as likely as coming 11th or 12th. 29th April (Villa v Sunderland) and 6th May (Sunderland v Stoke) will be the games I think will determine who will go down, plus Wigan v Villa on the last day, three massive 6-pointers.

I'll recap... in order for us to be relegated ALL the following things have to happen : Either QPR or Reading win all of their matches and we fail to pick up another point or they cannot catch us, leaving only one relegation place (and they are playing each other so only one of them can catch us anyway). Wigan have to win 2 games more than us (or 1 win and 2 draws more) in their last 6 games. (They have to play Villa, they can't both win). Villa have to win 2 games more than us (or 1 win and 2 draws more) in their last 5 games - (one of which is against Sunderland, one against Wigan, which they can't both win.) Stoke and Sunderland also have to win 2 games more than us (or 1 win and 2 draws more), both are playing us, (Stoke are playing QPR, Norwich and Sunderland). (Sunderland have us and Stoke). Norwich have to win 1 and draw 1 more than us (and are playing Reading, Stoke and Villa). Newcastle have to win 1 game less than us. West Ham have to at least match our results. Fulham have to at least match our results. Swansea can only afford to lose one match more than us (and are playing us, as well as Chelsea, Man City and Man Utd). West Brom can afford to lose two matches more than us (and are playing us).

So you're saying Havant and Waterlooville are also going to go bust and have to start at around the ninth level of the pyramid ?

Being in Europe before we're ready for it is precisely the kind of thing that leads to spending millions we hadn't planned for... not that I think we'd make the same mistakes (or continue to run up the bills)...

I'm still mildly bewildered when we sing "we are staying up" to be honest, I haven't thought we were going down since we won our first match under Pochettino.

With what ? That a run where the player is offside is a "good run" ? How, when even if he puts it in the back of the net it means nothing ? I'm pretty sure we're agreed that it wasn't a great save, Jaaskelainen knew nothing about it.

We were, as of last Sunday's results, precisely 0.2% likely to get relegated. We also have a less than 40% chance of getting relegated even if we lose every match. I actually wanted Wigan to win because I've predicted Villa to go down for months and aside from the reason given above I have no further interest in it...

Also, Scheiderlin's yellow for simulation isn't going to help in the Positive Play category.

Pretty sure they've changed the European qualification rules since Millwall's adventure in 2004 - for a start they had to deal with the 2005 Liverpool Champions League winning scenario when the holders weren't allowed to defend the trophy - and then they were... plus the Europa League has a different number of entrants to the UEFA Cup/Cup Winners' Cup, and also the Europa League itself has expanded. I also think we're not ready for it, and Wigan will go down next season because of the Europa League (if they stay up this season and make it to the Group Stage).

Why do we want Wigan to lose again ? I'd rather a team with no infrastructure and guaranteed lower income than us stayed in the league at the expense of a vaguely decent sized club with some resources like, say, Villa...

Run was rubbish, he was offside ! And he did hit it straight at Jaaskelainen's standing leg...

How are they in admin if they've been liquidated ? I'm confused now ? As long as they have to play Newport in a league match in the next 2 years (or cease to exist) I'll be happy.

They also don't have relegation playoffs in the Conference South.

Decided to upload my adidas Xerox tribute 2013/14 style Portland Timbers reversed Spain-type massive V-neck thingy. Bit overexposed but it's only a mock-up. The "Swiss colours" thing has been in the back of my mind for a couple of years, but I think it's cobblers.

How's this ?

Excellent views, all seats within decent distance of the pitch, decent facilities (PA aside), city centre location, good transport links. Not sure how lack of information is a stadium fault, or how the screens can be described as "small".

Most of them are probably already dual Italian or Spanish nationality given the dubious practices of some agents...

Heh. I'll give him Cesar. For the lolz, their last starting line up was : QPR J Cesar, J Bosingwa , C Hill, N Onuoha, C Samba, J Jenas, J-S Park (A Taarabt, 63), E Granero (S Diakite, 74), D Hoilett, A Townsend , L Remy Subs not used: J Bothroyd, J Mackie, T Ben-Haim, F Sutherland, R Green So apparently their current manager (not that he knows anything) doesn't even regard FIVE of them as good enough to play in the relegation-bound QPR team, though admittedly Nelsen left for a better offer.

I went on the train from Newport when we lost 3-0 and managed to avoid the shepherding on the way there, only to find the middle of Swansea completely deserted anyway. On the way back, got herded onto a coach and back to the station, despite reaching deep inside for traces of a welsh accent, dropping all my aitches and ts, and calling everyone "butt" loudly in the vicinity of the police for a couple of minutes. I very much doubt the policing will have calmed down, Wales is still in the 80s as far as policing football goes, mainly due to the fact that all of their visitors are from a country lots of them dislike to begin with - and the South Wales derby is even less pleasant. So expect being met at the station, herded to the away cage and on the way back the same via a magical back road to the station which they don't otherwise open. It was not enjoyable, mind you certain moronic Saints fans having a pop at the welsh didn't help my mood much.

No different from St Mary's then ? Even the Northam-Kingsland Barrier was popular enough to have a poster on Saints Forever named after it... It was quite windy at Stoke too, though we were in the non-open home corner.

Yeah, 19 Feb 2011, I just looked it up. We already were in Warwickshire on the M40 when it was called off, and a quick look at the fixtures nearby(ish) showed we had the choice of going to St Andrews' to see Birmingham v Sheff Wed or pushing on to Stoke to see them play Brighton. I hadn't been to the Britannia so angled for that, whilst the wife and the other passenger wanted to go to St Andrews. I won because I was the driver and it was a new ground for all 3 of us rather than just 2, plus we didn't have any sat nav and I didn't fancy parking in Birmingham. That's also probably the last time I got my own way as well. .