CB Fry

Polling card says the stations close at 10pm. So closing them at 10pm sounds fair enough.

Correct. Sounds like a load of div students bumbling down there from the pub with no polling cards which slows everything down for everyone else. Frigging stations opened at 7am FFS.

Roeder led WHU to seventh the following season, and they only went down on the last day the season after that. So if you are blaming Redknapp for a relegation two years after he left then yes, it was all his fault.

Spurs have spent absolutely cr ap loads of money. And "money is a guarantee of success" was pretty much your catchphrase on this forum and its predecessors FOR YEARS when you would blather on about "why don't we just buy Michael Owen" and rant about "if only we'd invest in the team etc etc etc etc" But of course this was when we were skint and it was a comfortable theory. Now we are by a country mile the richest club in the division you've retreated into the familar surroundings of money doesn't mean anything etc etc etc etc etc etc. The only money that guarantees success is unspent money. As soon as it is spent it becomes "irrelevent" and everyone just moves on to something else we haven't got instead. Hence the unbelievable hyping up of the lack of pre-season this time round*.

Damn, I knew someone would quote me. Forget it, I agree with the OP - the terminology of "brave work of genius" led me to believe he was taking the ****. It was the right decision to nationalise but "brave work of genius" is pushing it.

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The usual garbage about population and potential from delusional Plymouth fans. 10,000 gates in the Championship is not much potential and crowing about how their city is bigger than Derby, Leicester or Southampton is pretty meaningless, as those three clubs have double the core support as all three commanded 20,000 gates in L1. Presumably PAFC will be down to 8,000 odd in L1. You can't just wait for promotion to the Prem and suddenly expect 30,000 to come streaming through the turnstiles. The same thing has been said about Bristol for time immemorial. Maybe, if one of them got into the Prem and stayed there for a half a decade, they might have a sustainable Saints-Derby-Forest-Leicester-Wolves sized fan base. But it's a long road.

That doesn't look anything like Neil Shipperley. It does, however, look like someone who has eaten Neil Shipperley.

Sorry, how is what I posted before trolling? Especially as I am right. You go on about the agents being circumspect, but surely in the current climate, where clubs know they have to pay every single penny of every single contract the clubs would be far more circumspect wouldn't they? But they're not, just like agents wouldn't be in your reverse situation. Since when are the football agents the ultra cautious ones? Footballers and football agents don't enter contract negotiations thinking about the club going under, just like Peter Storrie and his ilk entered his negotiations not thinking about the club going under. You could easily apply your logic to imposing the current "pay 100% back" with exactly the same rationale: the clubs would be more circumspect, they wouldn't be so risky commiting to contracts they can't possibly get out of etc etc etc. Your theory that a normal creditors rule would solve football's problems is just that. A theory. In practice, it would make the clubs even more risk-happy because they know they can waltz out of it. Punting left right and centre knowing the worst that can happen is paying back a fraction of it. And are you seriously suggesting agents will tell their clients - "nahhh, don't take £60k a week, not sure they can afford it two years in. Take £30k a week instead". "Don't sign for that club offering £50k a week. Sign for that club for half the amount". "I'm very circumspect about that club, I think they might be run by unsavoury characters. Under no circumstances accept their offer of £80k a week plus image rights". This is FOOTBALL AGENTS you are talking about. FOOTBALL AGENTS. Clubs don't go under two minutes after these contracts are signed, they go under two years later. I'd take £60k a week for two years and risk 25% for the last year rather than £30k a week for three years. Not least because you can get yourself transferred in the third year anyway. You're in a fantasy, fantasy, fantasy land of "circumspect" football agents. There's more vegetarian butchers around. Don't come up with theories as fact and then accuse me of trolling. I'm not trolling, I just think that Portsmouth should not get off scott free, paying 25% of what they owe and back in the game next season thank you very much. Think, think, think about the implications of your theories before you accuse me of trolling. Says the person who wants Pompey off scott free quicker than anyone else but cutting their obligations down by 75%, and encourages every other football club to massively increase their short term risk but bringing in a safety net where they can write off their major debts by 75% at a stroke two years down the line. But who cares, that club have cheated another out of the Prem, or to the cup final in that time. But who cares, we'll be back next season to do it all again because we only had to find 25%. Welcome to the new age of cheating.

That's definitely not the design the chief steward's brother's mate's brother showed my brother's mate's brother. And he'd know.

Are you resigning, or are you someone whose departure would have an impact? Only asking because it's pretty easy to be fantasy axeman in any company. Easier in the public sector, granted.

You've already made that point on this thread and quoted the same bit from me twice. Have a banana. We won the cup tie, the game was drawn. If I was doing the program, I'd put W too. Who cares anyway. My contribution to this debate is over.

That's a pretty long post with a link to the history books or something - and I'm overcomplicating things. 2-2 is a draw, as is 1-1 as is 0-0. It's not about "league and cup rules". It's a draw. That isn't complicated. And a goal is not a goal in a penalty shoot out. If they were they'd be added onto the score as they went in and they'd be included in the players goal tallies for the season. Scored penalties are not "goals". Not complicated. And how many times do you divs need to go on about the fact we WON the cup ties on penalties. You're pretending I don't know that. Using CAPITALS doesn't make you more right. I know we WON. We were the WINNERS. We WON on the WINNING front. When it comes to being WINNERS we WON. We WONdiddly WONWONWON WON. The match finished in a draw though. What we WON was the cup tie. Thanks for reminding me. Again, not complicated. Good luck in getting penalties included in the history books on strikers tally for the season. After all, a goal is a goal and it's not complicated

I'd agree - cup games are "runs" in themselves so to chuck them into "winning (or losing) streaks is a bit pointless. But then we wouldn't have this argument every few weeks with opinions slightly more entrenched than in the debate on whether Ireland should be united or not.

5p/20p/30p whatever is still a let off for the club.I don't want to see Pompey walking away from three quarters of their footballing debt scott-free and ready to go again next season. I want to see them pay back every penny they said they could pay. That's fair on all the other clubs. Pompey have cheated and you want them off the hook. I don't think clubs should be given an even blanker* cheque than they already have now and the chance to splash out even more safe in the knowledge that if it all goes pop they can squirm out of it anyway. Players and clubs being "circumspect"? Do me a favour. The rule that Storrie would have to pay every single penny of every single contract he signed with players didn't make him "circumspect", so how would the knowledge that he (or any chairman) would only have to pay a quarter of it make them more circumspect? Bonkers logic I'm afraid. And football players and agents don't waste time being circumspect from what I can see. I can see them just asking for lots more in anticipation of getting 25% of it down the line. I can see them asking for more money up front so it's in the bank nice and early. It's unfortunate for the other creditors - in an ideal world they should pay everyone back in full - but you can't have everything. The rule as it is is better than the alternatives, which would make a free-for-all even worse. What you have to remember is that Pompey would bite your hand off to pay the Pie-man and the players all 25% and say no more about it. They'd be laughing all the way to the bank and back up the CCC in no time scott free with pretty much no lessons learnt and no real punishment. If that's what you really want just to get one over "greedy footballers" then fine.

I love this debate. Who's saying we didn't win? Of course we won. We won on penalties. Not sure why the counter argument is always this. No one is ever saying we didn't win. No one is saying Man U didn't win the Champion's League or whatever example you want to wheel out. And no one is saying the games didn't go to complettion either. I don't bet so have no idea what bookies say or not. But the match was drawn and when you look at records of W/D/L, those games go in the D column. Look at the scores. The scores say 1-1. Or 2-2. Or 0-0. They don't say 9-7 or 7-5 with the penalties added on. Drawn football match. Tie won on penalties. Penalties are not "goals".

The rule hasn't encouraged clubs to act more recklessly, the climate around the football bubble has. A rule that would encourage more reckless spending would be to treat football creditors the same as the others. Massively overspend, whoops, admin, 5p in the pound all round, ten point deduction, back in the game. Not sure how you work out that a rule saying you must honour every single penny of every football contract encourages more reckless spending. The reckless spending is a beast of it's own making, not created by that rule.

It is bizarre that after all that has happened all Cameron has acheived is to just about get the Tories to where Labour were in 1992. Not a complete embarrassment, but just not enough to get the casual voter to fully back them. Not enough for people to think "I'll stick with the incumbents, even though I don't really like them either". And Brown is more hated than Major was. The Tories will win, but it won't feel like a win if all they can muster is, at best, a majority of ten seats.

And both these rules can coexist. PL/FL says - pay all your football debts or you're out of the league. Taxman says - pay your tax bill or we wind you up. Both of these can coexist. It's not one or the other, it's both. Taxman doesn't really need to challenge the league's rules, it's easier for them to just drag individual clubs through the courts as they have been doing with regularity. As you say, the Taxman doesn't care about League rules, and doesn't need to care. Not their problem. Pay your bill.

As in Sidthesquid's post above, the football debts rule is one of the rules "set up by the governing bodies of the game" that you refer to in your second paragraph. It's not a legal thing - this isn't government legislation that treats football differently to other businesses. Legally, clubs could pay players 5p in the pound or whatever, but they'd probably find themselves kicked out of the league. And at the end of the day, what you seem to be suggesting is "everyone gets treated the same" which would still mean St John Ambulance and the Pie Supplier still getting 5p in the pound, and the players the same. Mr Pie Man wouldn't gain much because the players would still be far bigger creditors than the Pie Man. When businesses go under suppliers get stuffed - that's the same everywhere. So football isn't being treat differently legally, it's just their internal rules and you seem to be happy for football to have internal rules. You can complain about this system all you like, but the idea that Pompey would stroll off scott free by paying all their agents and players 5p in the pound would be far harder for me to stomach. Not sure why you think that would be better.

This is fair enough but you have to remember the rule isn't there to protect overpaid footballers, but to prevent cheating. If the rule wasn't there, think what Pompey (or any other club) could get away with short term, signing swathes of players on massive contracts that they then welch on one year in. The rule is there to stop clubs overspending and cheating by signing players they can't afford. Of course in the context of Pompey it looks absurd but the spirit of the rule is correct - if you commit to paying a player x then you have to pay it, in full.

History books show the match was a draw, the tie was won on penalties. That's why the penalties aren't added onto the goal tally at the end of the game because they are not part of the match, they are a mechanism to settle the tie. That's why the result of the match is not 7-5 or whatever, but 1-1 or 2-2, with the shootout listed seperately. That's why goals scored in penalty shoot outs don't count on players' tallies for the season. Because they don't count as part of the match, just to settle the tie. So your argument that "we scored more goals and saved more shots" is just factually wrong. We didn't, because penalties scored in a shoot out are not "goals", they are converted penalties. Even commentators acknowledge this - you never hear them say "he's scored a goal" in a shootout. Those cup games were drawn games.

That would be pretty good. There are people on this forum that think the PR system would return 75 UKIP seats to Westminster, but I am prepared to take that risk........

Sorry - just far, far too many assumptions and you're missing the wood for the trees. Britain doesn't vote extreme, the Parties won't be any more extreme, and the extreme minority parties will get piddly numbers of seats. And in all your assumptions you seem to be forgetting the general process of parliment - ie votes on each and every bill. Your assumption that some ultra-hardline right- or left- wing government will take power and steam roll through legislation is just pie in the sky. The rest of parliment, and the members of the ruling parties will have a say in it all. In recent years, Cameron has whipped the Tories through to support a Labour education bill and Blair and Brown have narrowly fought off massive rebellions against their plans on schools, hospitals and tax. So your idea that a Tory government will just dance to the tune of the BNP or UKIP because they have 15 seats between them is just lunacy. Ken Clarke, David Willetts and Michael Gove are not going to sit back while the loons run the show. And neither will the opposition of course. And there is no electoral system on earth that is ever, ever, going to return 75 UKIP seats to the UK parliment. 75 seats for a one-note single issue dog whistle party. I think that's just your wet dream. Hague banged on about Europe in a UKIP style in 2001 and got bloody nowhere. It's not a big enough issue in the General Election. That's where your claims of "common sense" go down the toilet. And we may see whether a Lib/Lab or Con/Lab coalition creates this super efficient governing machine you seem so afraid of next week.

This would include the army of 27 megafans that went to the Coventry third round replay would it?