The9

And the fact that by the time they are able to sign people under the FL's watchful eye now there won't be many worth having who are still unattached and affordable... and there's no reason to think they'll suddenly have free reign come January's window either. They've got to stay up in L1 in order to get 3 seasons of L1 to begin with. We got ourselves out of the -10 by having 4 or 5 decent young players and signing quality from the same league and the one above, it STILL took 2 months to get out of the bottom 3 with the spine of a decent squad, and they're nowhere near having that kind of investment.

But only because they know there won't be any situation when the loan will be required. It's dependent on Chainrai (owed £18m by PFC) not wanting to take over and get his money back, which he can only do gradually through renting Fratton to the subsequent owners. If there are any other possible buyers the loan won't be offered as the club's future isn't regarded as in doubt. Now the £300m the club supposedly brings their local economy, that's insane, by any measure. Especially considering the £180m they've taken out of circulation in the past few years. I'll also be interested to see if the council's decision - displaying their political will without actually costing them anything - works for political gain or, in this financial environment, as a stick to beat them with.

For all the comparisons with Holt (who I think is more mobile, faster and sharper), Holt only finished 8th top scorer last season.

Ok, let's take it in a different direction. Two Saints players have previously made their way into the top 4 Prem scorers in a season : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Premier_League_goal_scorers_by_season Matt Le Tiss in 1993/4 (25) and James Beattie in 2002/3 (23). A reasonable comparison with the extraordinary talent of Le Tiss seems unfair, so how about we run a comparison with Beattie's "golden" season and look at the relative merits of Lambert now and Beattie at his peak ? Beattie was 24-ish at the time, fairly similar to Lambert in build and style, also took free-kicks and penalties, and seemed to get much of his new-found ability (compared to his previous seasons) from the superb fitness levels Strachan had for all of our players and ability to be in the box at the right time as well as winning the ball in the air and bringing teammates into the game with his link play. In short, his improvement over previous years was because he was able to link, create AND finish moves, and he was ALWAYS in and around to finish chances, in a side which was in the top half of the Prem for most of the season. How do they compare ?

Not in the OP you didn't though. So why ?

I did say the same thing, and his previously unattained levels of fitness helped him to the success he had - but he's a year older, starting to go past his peak, his strengths at Prem level are more likely to be in creating and not scoring goals and unlike last season, he doesn't look really lean and relatively mobile. Plus I'm pretty sure most people would agree that "standing the ball up at the back stick for the big man" probably isn't going to get us as many goals as it did in League One and the Championship, not to mention that the places where they've decided we're a one man team will be all over him like a rash. For all of those reasons, plus the fact that we've signed 3 strikers in the last 8 months, I'm inclined to think he'll be a lot more of a peripheral figure by the end of the season, and it's very difficult to score goals when you're not on the pitch. I don't even think 20/1 to finish in the top 4 scorers is good value for Lambert.

As I edited above, either way we don't "concede too many long range goals", from what you've posted we're in the middle somewhere. So why did you think we had ?

Not to mention we had 2 players running to block the shot which literally bent around the back of one of them and missed the other by inches. EDIT: It was from a header which popped up into the air, Richardson and Fonte both read it and (with Fonte having jumped for the initial header) both ran to close the ball down but they were a few yards away and just couldn't get there in time.

It would be nice to see some of the middle and bottom teams for comparison. You've said we're "around the middle" and only listed 6 of the top Championship teams. Are we around the middle of the top 6, or are we around the middle for the entire division ? Also, there's a variation of 33% between top and bottom side listed there, with Brum conceding 5 goals more than Saints but 12 (20%) more long shots, and West Ham conceding 2 more than Brum but a similar percentage as Saints. I'd say those conclusions weren't really in line with the figures. Oh, and of course either way if we're in the middle we don't concede too many long range goals.

You have to defend against ALL methods of scoring goals. A bunch of charges to block long shots would just increase the number of goals conceded from inside the box from through balls into the huge holes in the back line left by charging CBs.

Not much to talk about if everyone agrees, is there ? For instance, the complete lack of debate about this season's ticket prices (other than people who had to move from Block 4) suggests that people are generally happy with ticket prices.

And even then, you might only do one big deal in which an agent gets a huge cut, and you end up forking out loads on one occasion, when as a rule you don't like to pay agents.

All moanworthy other than the away tickets being posted and Dell club membership (and the PA, which you'd expect to be crap), IMHO. I don't see why there's a problem with people having a problem with something when there's clearly room for improvement ? I'm also not quite sure how adding to the moaning by moaning about it helps ? This is not a moan, by the way, it's a genuine question about why you've decided to appoint yourself as the person who decides what people get to talk about.

I care, a poorly trained / poorly managed ticket office can be a right pain in the jacksie when it comes to buying tickets and our customer service is bad enough. What I'm starting to wonder is why you've appointed yourself as the King of Meh. You hardly ever post other than to tell people there's no reason to be bothered about things that people are clearly bothered about ? Why bother ?

There is nothing whatsoever to support this basic premise. Especially not from the OP.

"Worldy" means "world class", as stated earlier in the thread. It's hyperbole, and about as legitimate as the modern use of "legend". This was supported by the eyewitness account of the same goal earlier in the thread which described the use of "worldy" as "a bit of an exaggeration" and the goal as merely "decent".

It's "official" in the sense that it has Prem numbers on it and a bloke who works in the megastore has told me that's what they plan to use as a third kit (and why they sold it off cheap, being "they didn't think anyone would buy last season's kit as a third kit"). Having forsaken the (alternate 2011/12 away) blue socks worn at Exeter for the (2011/12 away) white ones at Bristol City, that does now mean we have two sets of white socks out of the 4 colours we could have available, which seems a bit silly... stick with yellow/blue/blue for a nice, solid 3 sets of kit.

I'm a season ticket holder, and I have an opinion which I'm actually able to support with examples rather than just empty insults, if that's ok with you. Er, "I think you're mental" aside.

I just don't think he's suited to the Prem, and has gone as far as he can go. I can see how his skillset could prosper in the Championship but I just think the Prem is a step too far. You have to be mobile and able to create things for yourself to succeed as a striker in the Prem, and I don't think he will be able to. The defending against headers is better, the opportunity to build attacks which end in eventual balls to the far post are much more restricted. He might be better suited to a role in the hole to use his longer range passing to link with midfield and his long range shooting to threaten from deep, but I don't see him on the end of many rapidly-built tap-ins next season - which I can see for both Sharp and Rodriguez, who are more mobile and sharper in the box. As for LoW, he'd have been about 14 at the time. .

I think you're mental.

Fixed it for you.

Newport County got liquidated for a £400k debt with a player who was transferred for £2m within 3 years on their books... I'm hopeful the Portsmouth saga will conclude after at least ONE "lock-out" of the ground, it's not a liquidation without one of those when the council buys the ground and they don't pay the rent - but I'm impatient, I don't wait to wait the 6 months it'll take that to happen with the current proposals.

From everything I've seen (on this thread) there is no contingency whatsoever, and even if they didn't get the golden share they'd be extremely lucky to get membership of anything above county level at a week's notice before fixtures begin. So that'll be funny, because they'll be angling for a start in the Conference, which took AFC Wimbledon 7 years to get back to, and Newport County AFC 21 years. They'll then have a whole year to badger and pillory and try and bully their way into a league higher than they should be in due to their support, even though they mostly had comparable Prem crowds to Wimbledon. The point is that if they had any kind of shame they'd have done all this irrespective of the current club's existence. You can't blame them for wanting to cling onto the highest level they can in the state they're in, I suppose. It's not like any of their other decisions have been based on anything other than self interest, after all.

I think Fulham and Norwich might be in a bit of a spot too.

I didn't say you did.