CB Fry

No doubt this points to a very successful new direction for them.

You have a gigantic misunderstanding of what the likes of Coca-Cola do. They'll sponsor and partner up with successful propositions that drive their brand awareness/equity but they aren't about to start demanding that football clubs or competitions or administrators create leagues for them. There's plenty of opportunities for Coke to get their brand out there and they'll take the opportunities as they arrive. And of course Watford v Swansea isn't particularly interesting but all leagues have ballast and filler and Watford v Swansea is ballast that is logistically easy to deliver and is part of the very successful proposition that is making billions around the world. Shanghai Athletic vs Seoul United is neither of those things. As well as being logistically complicated, there's nothing to suggest that fixture has any appeal in the Premier League's core markets. Plus as I mentioned before I don't understand why Manchester United would sign up to a load of rigmarole of playing Seoul for a league fixture: logistical nightmare, delivers a product of questionable quality and very questionable global appeal and enriches a football club they really don't need to enrich. You're asking Manchester United to schlep around the globe playing league fixtures purely to make other parasite clubs rich. You might live in a fantasy land where Coca Cola will be telling MUFC that they have to do this but sorry they will not get involved. Ditto Barcelona - lord knows why you think they're about to drop their current perfectly workable and profitable arrangement to play league matches in Sydney. Coca Cola will not be forcing this all to happen. They are too busy running a global soft drink multinational to give a monkeys. We shall see indeed.

I think we're a home draw against Swansea away from people planning a protest march or flying a plane over the stadium.

Don't tell me - cousin, or just old school friend?

Maybe we should actually try and make the knockout stage.

Spectacular drivel.

It's a disgrace that the greatest youth coach world football has ever known, Jason Dodd is now plying his trade at, well, at, um, at err, effing nowhere. Must be that every other club in the world just couldn't cope with his supreme talent.

Looks like you're preparing yourself to move seamlessly from moaning about terrible our current owners are to moaning about how terrible our new owners are.

Is the correct answer. We've qualified for the group stages only for people to fanny arse about whining about squad rotation? Give me strength. Go for it, go for it and go for it some more.

I'll tell you what never happened. Me going anywhere near your protest website.

I remember the picture of you proudly holding up the receipt of the red shirt you scuttled off down the club shop to buy.

Please all red kit please all red kit please all red kit.

Kind of destroys the old argument that it is the Remain side talking the country down doesn't it? Liam Fox has been deliciously put down by various people through the course of the day who have, you know, actually had a real job.

Fair enough Charlie.

You're living in cloud cuckoo land if you seriously think VVD is going to be here for at least four years. Ditto Forster - if, say, Arsenal come in for him to be their number one next summer, he's gone. There's no evidence we only sell our players when they have two years left. I've given you a hatful of examples already. Accept it. We've done well on contracts this summer but all it definitely does is buy us one more season regardless of the contract length.

Not like Shane Long to miss a golden opportunity.

Not like Clasie to come off after an hour.

Lovely.

I've not said anything about roots or culture or traditions "as you and I understand it" - you're not reading what I've said at all. The killer, winning product is the Premier League. It's a successful TV product that is being exported around the globe. Even the Champions League isn't as successful as the Premier League as an exported TV product. Like Star Wars or Top Gear or Beyoncé it's an global entertainment product that works very well as it is. People in Beijing want to watch United v Arsenal and people in Chicago want to watch United v Arsenal but do people in Chicago want to watch United v Beijing and do people in Beijing want to watch Arsenal v Chicago. Just like Hollywood don't make movies with, say, Johnny Depp and two Chinese actors because Chinese people would be "dreaming to see that". And with such a compelling and profitable proposition I don't know why Manchester United would throw that away to then enrich Shanghai Rovers, LA Galaxy and Sydney Wildcats. They don't need to let them in to feed off their lucrative brand without actually adding any value. The Premier League are savvy enough to work out a way to maintain their dominant position without making other clubs rich or spreading out their earnings. A series of global touring tournaments I can see, satellite clubs (like New York City already is) also likely, but there's nothing I can see that will stop the Premier League remaining in control of their destiny. Certainly nothing suggests a global league of any significance in the next five years if the Prem have anything to do with it. Nothing to do with ropey old "traditions" everything to do with cold, hard cash.

Okay then. Keep blathering.

There are all the riches on offer in China now - look at what they're paying Pelle. But there's a reason why they've signed Pelle and not Pogba or Bale or Ronaldo at their peak. They could afford to sign all those players right now because they've got "all the riches" on offer. We are a million miles away from a world league - "riches on offer" is not enough. It would be a sh it product. There's a reason Dubai/Abu Dhabi bought into the Premier League and didn't try and create something else locally - the strongest product is the Premier League itself not just the clubs. Manchester United versus Shanghai Rovers is not the Premier League. Same reason why Hollywood blockbusters are still coming out of Hollywood with US movie stars. There are "all the riches" in China or Qatar to make China and Qatar blockbusters but it is not the global product that Hollywood is.

Err, my first post that you've quoted is me showing the inherent contradiction in what you're saying, ie I have no idea what you actually want because you're contradicting yourself. You're not too great at this.

We have chosen our own path so that's all fine. No idea what else you're talking about.

Except I'm not saying you have an agenda, I'm saying I have absolutely no idea what you actually want Southampton Football Club to do. You started the thread saying "what are the consequences, what are the consequences?" as if you want us to just spend regardless but you're also moaning about clubs running up debts like that's a bad thing. So I have no clue what you want the club to do. Is running up debts bad like Sunderland or something we should be doing because there are no consequences? Or I have no idea what you want the authorities to do - a) clamp down harder on clubs spending money so they all spend less, therefore minimal change to what SFC do now as we are within our means b) or relax the rules more so SFC can then spend loads of money like Man City which I thought you were saying is bad. What do you want the club to do differently? What do you want the authorities to do differently? There's something worse than having an agenda, and that's scattergun griping and contradicting yourself. I will now try and recover from your revelation that chatting on this forum doesn't actually affect anything. This will take some getting over.

If it is all about the money why are you saying "of course it would happen"? The English Premier league is the richest league in the world, I remain to be convinced that the biggest English clubs would walk away from that to join something which would be clearly less good and has the risk to generate less money. There's no evidence that Chinese people want to watch MUFC vs New York City significantly more than they want to watch MUFC vs Everton. They just want to watch MUFC. The Premier League is an efficient and very profitable way to deliver lots of that product. The logic frankly doesn't make sense: it's a bit like saying that people like One Direction, they were the biggest act in the world but it's all about money and everyone would make more money if two members of the band was Chinese and one was from LA because that would, like, open up the Asian market. No it wouldn't.