The9

I used to like the Fulham-based "Ormondroyd" stick man Premier League recaps too, worth a Google, I think they're stashed in the Guardian archives now. Had a look at the HTFC-World site the weekend just gone. Amusing Saints-baiting from October... Ah, there we go : http://football.guardian.co.uk/Games/Cartoon/Index/0,6243,,00.html Plenty of Saints-in-Prem stuff in there.

Just to add, given the number of rearranged matches Saints now have between Jan 1 and April. I think the 10 caution problem will be far more of an issue than the 5-yellow one, because we played fewer League matches before Dec 31 than usual, and will be playing more than usual very soon. So another centre midfielder would be handy. As a total aside, I noticed Jacob Mellis was on the bench for Chelsea the other day. Strange.

You are correct as far as 5 cautions goes. They now need to avoid getting 10 yellow cards before the second Sunday in April. http://www.thefa.com/TheFA/~/media/Files/PDF/TheFA/Disciplinary/DHandbook201011.ashx/DHandbook201011.pdf 5 Cautions If a player receives 5 cautions between the first day of the season and 31st December they will be suspended for a period of 1 match and be fined £15. If a player receives a 5th caution after the 31st December they will be warned as to their future conduct. 10 Cautions If a player receives 10 cautions between the first day of the season and the second Sunday in April they will be suspended for a period of 2 matches and be fined £15. If a player receives a 10th caution after the second Sunday in April they will be severely censured and warned as to their future conduct. 15 Cautions If a player receives 15 cautions playing between the first and last day of the season they will be suspended for a period of 3 matches and be fined £15 20+ Cautions If a player is cautioned 20 times between the first and last day of the season they will be charged with continuing misconduct. For every 5 cautions they receive thereafter they will be charged with continuing misconduct. The suspension received is from ALL football and is cleared by the qualifying matches that he received the cautions for. For example, if a player receives 15 first team cautions they will be suspended from all football until the first team have completed the relevant number of qualifying fixtures If a player receives 2 cautions for the First Team and 3 cautions whilst playing for the Reserves side whey will not be suspended as they have not received 5 cautions at the same level of football. This is for "match based disciplinary procedures" as used in All Divisions where Leagues are steps 5/6/7, Women's Premier League County Representative Football and FA Pilot Leagues, including all divisions of Leagues that operate within the National League System, including Reserve divisons (Steps 5-7) As opposed to "time-based" as used in all other Leagues Premiership - Conference National Non-first teams other than open aged male Saturday, U21, U19 and Academy Conference North/South, Northern Premier, Isthmian and Southern Leagues, Non-first teams unless they play at steps 5/6/7

And if we don't it's because we've got better players already. Assuming all the rhetoric about having money to spend is true I'd expect us to be mostly adding players from the CCC, as we did last season at this point. Though it should also be noted that last season our December form was good and by the time we'd integrated the new players (and played a bunch of Cup matches) and got to March we'd slipped away from the playoffs. I'd hope this time the changes would be tweaks rather than chucking in 3/4 of a new back line in one go, and we've already added Chaplow and potentially Guly without affecting the balance because they're already here. FWIW if Puncheon's problem is surmountable I don't have a problem with getting him back either.

To be fair, with Oxlade-Chamberlain playing as well as he is, and at the age he is, and with Puncheon already seemingly on the way out, that's quite an assumption to make. We're already short of wide midfielders due to Holmes' season-long injury and Puncheon's loan. I happened to catch a bit of conversation with an Exeter fan on the way back from the match the other day and he was blaming their use of Harley on the same side as some other bloke (yeah, vague, I know) for their failings - though of course that could be for any number of reasons. Can't say I'd be too worried by Brighton signing him.

Can someone just put this in Golden Posts..? Called BHA, with more than 3 posts a day but "hasn't paid to be a member" (can you let us all know how that one's done?), starts a thread about Saints being arrogant and then claims to be a Man U fan when things get a bit tricky, contradicts himself every other post, and claims to be disabled for no apparent reason (just like every other troll who gets back into the "I'm a thickie" corner). Top entertainment. I say we ask Baj or Steve to geo-locate his IP address...

Fair enough, can't really argue with that !

Do you mean "best league in the world" is rubbish, the information about Saints fans being distant is rubbish (it's true) or the 10k drop off being (partially) due to people not being bothered to travel ? If there's a level of demand that's dependent on decent opposition I can't imagine that having a more distant fanbase would HELP with loyalty.

Well, that would depend on how far they're travelling to home matches and how many times they do it, I'd say. Cos I was super-zowie in 2001/2, me, had a Saints season ticket and living in south Wales. Also went to loads of aways in the Prem relegation season, mainly because it was easier than going to the home matches. But we were in the Prem, so minus several thousand for that. Not sure I really believe that the distant fans who DON'T go to matches would get any credit at all, and they're the only ones I'm remotely bothered about. I also support my local team, both where I was born and in Southampton now I've moved here.

Yeesh, you two got gipped if you're not talking about (Kevin Toms') Football Manager.

Just out of interest, what's the edit mode like ? The PS3 version can import shirts, badges, images to use on the grandstands, backgrounds etc. Can you do any of that on the 360 version ?

His best game for some time, carried on where his first 20 minutes in the Brentford game left off.

Presumably so he can play as an attacking midfielder behind Lambert, which is what he does 90% of the time when the two of them are in the same team.

He played pretty well except for his finishing, always moving and created loads of space for Lambert, Chamberlain, Lallana and late on, Chaplow to have chances.

You don't think education is important then ?

We're playing Huddersfield on Boxing Day, you mongs. 25th Christmas Day 26th Christmas Sunday, aka St Stephen's Day. 27th Christmas Bank Holiday 28th Boxing Day Bank Holiday http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http://www.dti.gov.uk/employment/bank-public-holidays/index.html

Either that or a lesson to let exactly that happen if the money is good enough for long enough... there's a balancing point somewhere in the freedom of contract/transfer market trade-off, to protect teams from losing assets for nothing that they've invested in, and also to prevent players becoming mercenary on a 6 monthly basis, but who knows exactly where it is ? I'm thinking of younger players though, if a player is a "free" squad member if they've been there long enough then all they'll do is sign all of them. It has already changed the nature of the transfer market.

I think the example of Prutton is rather different to the other 3, he was already an England U-21 international captain by the time we signed him, the others hadn't kicked a ball in competitive football and were all under 16 when Saints signed them, with varying degrees of potential. Walcott was eleven when he left Swindon (at least according to Wikipedia) to join Saints and he'd not been there 6 months anyway, that's hardly comparable to a lower league club selling a player with league experience to a top level side. Blackstock was about 16 and we paid Oxford a decent transfer fee, so his case is different again. You can't just say "big club signs player from little club" as if every situation is the same - we had a LOT more input into the development of Walcott than Blackstock (and Oxford were rewarded for that development), and practically none in the case of Prutton, which was just another transfer.

Let's face it, with the Premier League's economic situation over the past 5-10 years anyone who was worth having got hoovered up by the BorInG 4 anyway. They can only play 11 at a time but they can have endless underutilised talents who'd be better off playing elsewhere. Thankfully the 25 player squad regulations are giving everyone a couple of seasons of interest before the era of big clubs having already signed up anyone half decent under the age of 17 to protect themselves kicks in. I doubt the new UEFA finance regulations will be too damaging to the idea of just signing shedloads of youth prospects on the cheap to stop others having those players.

I roundly mock your ignorance of professional football teams' scouting and intelligence networks. Do you seriously think that "because he's in The Sun" suddenly all the Prem teams, who've probably been monitoring him since he was 6 - if not before, are suddenly going to think they should sign him ? Most clubs have huge databases of players (even the rubbish cheapskate ones can use Football Manager) and this kid is the son of a former England international, FFS. You'll be telling me the son of Diego Maradona's daughter and Sergio Aguero is "a prospect" - but only when it's been in the News of the World - next.

I've had access to a Wii in my house and then flat since launch day, can't say I've used it more than 20 times in the 2-3 years I've had it.

I strongly suspect he would "have" enjoyed it.

This might have been useful for the credibility of the post : http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/page/NewsDetail/0,,10280~2246589,00.html That and not ignoring the sticky about Walsall Weather Watch...

You obviously didn't read the rest of the original post. Like I said, "a cynic would point to...". I then went on to make a case for Adkins being perfectly competent. Still plenty of knee-jerking cynics out there by the looks of it. I wasn't much impressed with Adkins' failure to make significant changes on Saturday v Brentford, but having spotted him try something by swapping Guly and Chamberlain over, you only had to look at the bench to see his options beyond that would have involved taking a punt on a kid with little experience to turn things around, or Connolly, who is barely fit and probably an injury risk. There wasn't much he could do, because Schneiderlin was having a mare and there was an enormous hole in the middle of the park every time we went forward. FWIW, I thought Lambert looked pretty motivated and effective for the first 20-25 minutes, more than in any other match I've seen this season. He was on a par with the rest for the remaining 70 ( until taken off). I MIGHT have liked to see Gobern for Schneiderlin - because he couldn't have been much worse, and I'd have liked to see Doble get a run - totally as a nothing to lose gamble - though not sure who I'd have taken off, and I'm sure Adkins knows what he can do better than I can, having only seen him play for 45 minutes 18 months ago. Chaplow's a huge miss, and not having Fonte to rely on for a safe backwards ball and defensively was a big loss too. But mostly we missed Barnard's movement creating uncertainty in their defence and creating space for others with his movement and pressurising the ball high up the pitch, meaning we always had to build from the back - and most goals come from turnovers of possession in the opposition's half.

I hope justice is served.