The9

I agree, a discus will burst a bubble.

Next 12 hours ?

Actually, when he came back from his loan and started scoring goals for Saints he was "Ohh Ricky Fuller, used to be a Skate but he's alright now" in a Crouch-stylee, as opposed to "Fuller-sh111t Fuller-sh1111t Fuller-sh111t" which is what he was getting before he went on loan. He completely won the fans over with his form when returning from loan and it was quite a surprise to hear that he'd been sold at the start of the following season.

Higginbotham played in the Prem FIVE SEASONS before he even signed for Saints, and made more Prem appearances before he signed for Saints than he did for us. He was always a borderline case though, which is why he initially signed for Stoke and then Sunderland at a time when both were newly promoted, and played for Derby and Saints who got relegated. A better left back than centre-back, but nevertheless tended to pass the ball to the opposing right midfielder more often than not.

For some reason we started this weird time-wasting short goal kick routine pre-season - it only seems to serve to put the keeper under pressure, although it might be a response to not having the tallest centre-midfielders, thus creating space in the middle of the park for Cork / Hammond to win it without being outjumped by players who instead have pushed forward to press the short kick. Other than that it looks like insanity, forcing the keeper to kick a moving ball in play as opposed to doing the same thing from a dead ball which can't be closed down.

Had our defence actually fouled him in that match as opposed to him just diving every time the ball went near him you'd probably be hearing quite a few different opinions of him on here. But based on his one appearance at St Mary's he was a worthless primadonna with ideas above his station who looked like he couldn't be bothered.

That's not only random but probably a bit of an insult to Forte...

If we sign a left back when we already have about 5 of them I'm not sure anything's going to stop us adding elsewhere. Fox is a LB who also covers LM, we have RB cover as you say with Cork, so that's why we're not seeing Butterfield on the bench, as using a midfielder on the bench (and having Guly, Lallana and Cork on the pitch) gives us the flexibility to replace plenty of positions. We don't have any flexible centre-backs cover (other than possibly Cork) so one CB has to be on the bench.

I still prefer "why is it called the Champions' League when all these runners up are in it?" personally. Along with "honestly, why would anyone care about this competition?".

The main problem I've noticed with them is that the Umbro "Tailored By" label on the inside is stitched through to the back, and as the two shoulder pieces are also stitched together in the middle of the back of the shoulders you can see that the Umbro label is usually stitched on wonky through the back of the shirt. I went through about 5 of them to find one where the centre seam dissected the label stitching evenly, OCD Monkey that I am... Haven't noticed any issue with the Saints badge, but I should think there's no consistency from one to the next.

The fact that I was born in Monmouthshire and don't even care about the England v Wales match next week (when I have a claim on being from both or either) pretty much sums up how interesting International Football is nowadays. The whole thing needs a revamp, and I don't mean a Champions League style ruining either. At some point they're going to have to realise that most football fans only really care about major championship finals, and turn the off-years into similarly-designed qualification competitions with a few locations providing multiple matches. Compact the entire international calendar into one or two blocks of competition football and get rid of all this friendly and international week rubbish - much better for everyone to get it all out of the way in one or two hits. E.g. January 2013 hosts the first half of the 2014 World Cup qualifying competition - the 50-odd European Teams are split into basically the groups they're in at the moment, everyone plays 3 or 4 group matches (one every 6-ish days) from one of about 8 neutral locations around Europe. Due to the neutral locations, every team only plays each other once. There are NO matches in any European Leagues in January - this coincides with the African Cup of Nations and the usual European winter breaks already. Pitches shouldn't be an issue, in fact the only problem I can see is low attendances - which could be addressed in part by (maybe) not making the venues quite as neutral... though that has the problem of bias. The same happens in June 2013, with the last group games (could be 2 or 3 games depending on group size) held at the start of the month, then the Playoffs for those who haven't qualified yet to sort out the final qualification places. The whole thing is pulled together by a pre-planned schedule World Cup style, so everyone knows who's playing where and when, and the matches aren't overlapping (you can fit 3 matches in per evening from different countries and time zones) so tv can cover the whole thing if it wants. 2014 has the World Cup itself, 2015 would be UEFA 2016 qualification on a similar model. There, fixed.

It isn't for me. HTH.

Will be interesting to see if Reading's new signing gets any matches for them, if anyone was going to take the gamble it would be the side that signed a couple of strikers from Irish League clubs.

As I wasn't there I have absolutely no clue what caused us to concede 3 goals, so I'll be reserving judgement until I've at least seen the highlights. Sounded like Fonte slipping over is about all that can be identified as a definite contributor so far.

LOLz, well that's 3 of us...

Home to Preston or Charlton if we beat Swindon.

Yay, 4-2 win, looked impressive too.

We were all over them in the first half when 1-0 down as well.

....aaaand to no surprise Sinclair goes off, replaced by Sam McQueen. Ooh 4-2

Sinclair looked surprisingly strong there but that was the finish of a knackered player.

LOL at the quick shot of the smashed window!

Huuuuuuge deflection puts Man U kids back in it. 3-2.

His own half, anyway... I'm enjoying them celebrating every goal like they've won the World Cup.

To be fair, the number of people who aren't at Staplewood already but are watching this is pretty limited...

Also, I want one of those unsponsored shirts.