CB Fry

I think the only person using this football club as a "plaything" is Cortese, with his pursuit of something so petulent and pointless. Using "Tokenistic ammunition" and being "self important" and someone who can "give it but can't take it" sums up Nicola pretty bloody well, actually. I don't think there are any "idiots on this board" who "think the papers give two monkeys about us" either.

I've read enough threads after live TV games from bellyachers whinging about anti-Saints bias on BBC, ITV, Sky and elsewhere to know that there are plenty that do care what others think. And the vast majority of people grizzling "sod the press" come from the angle of "boo hoo, we never get a mention anyway". My main problem is this action is an utterly utterly pointless waste of time and energy from a man I am losing respect for by the day. I thought we were trying to get promoted.

How much money is being made on photos from League one matches exactly? Do you really think this is some kind of goldmine the national press have been depriving poor liddle Cortese of? Whatever this is about it isn't about money. If we were that desperate for money we'd have a bloody shirt sponsor, we wouldn't be on the selling-photos-of-Dan-Harding-taking-a-throw-in gravy train .

The Plymouth Evening Herald is owned by DMGT (Daily Mail General Trust) while our beloved Echo is owned by American group Gannett (Newsquest in the UK). So no, not connected. Evening Herald offices are in the shape of a giant ship, you know. I've been there. True story.

Good post. It's a shame there are three threads about this now, but Cortese's arrogant stupidity on this utterly pointless matter is making the club a complete embarrassment when we could be basking in the glory of being favourites for the title and back on the up while that lot down the road rot. Oh well.

While at the same time deciding not to take up a shirt sponsor for the season, which might bring in a teensy bit more money than the zero pounds this dopey photo ban is going to rake in.

The papers will happily go all season without printing a single picture of a Saints player from St Mary's, especially if opposition clubs follow Plymouth's lead. Err, no we haven't. We've heard the announcement from your favourite news source, the super corporate official site, about the ban and the reasons behind it and we are beginning to see the response from the clubs and the media outlets. That's two sides to the story. Both sides to the story. We've all heard both. You've said this about five times on this thread, and apart from your favourite news source, the corporate OS (they have exclusive video interviews with the advertising sales manager - take that, BBC!) those images from the game are nowhere. And the media making up rubbish. Boo hoo. Real Madrid, Inter milan, Man United and Chelsea just about live with it, so I think a nondescript League One club could too. Listen, this is how the real world works, we're not in a computer game now.

Correct. It's not what people want to hear but he desperately needs to win on Saturday. A loss or a draw won't mean the sack but I think he would be staring down the barrel going into the third game and it's often a spiral down from there. Hopefully it will be all academic and we will do the business against MK Dons (we couldn't be playing a better opponent in that we always beat them). But Pardew has the sword over his head. Harsh but I think true. He, and we, need a blistering first ten games from here on in, not least because a Pardew sacking is more likely to lead to a Strachan-at-Boro rebuild (again) job rather than a Lambert-at-Norwich storm up the leagues. And I say rebuild not that we need rebuilding, just that I think if Cortese sacks Pardew he'll sack them all -Murdoch, Wilkins, Downes, the lot. And let's be clear before SOG starts bellyaching. I don't want him sacked at all. In my eyes he delivered the instant success I said he would (and SOG and many others said he wouldn't) last season. And I think he will get us promoted, underperforming in the first game is irrelevent and not uncommon for champions. But the pressure on him, now, next week and the week after is immense. This is not Steve Gibson we are dealing with here.

Doesn't "on the way up to the Championship" mean being in league one these days then? Anyway, the media won't actually give two shi t s about us when we make it to the Prem either, just like they don't give two sh its about Blackburn, or Wigan, or Wolves, or Sunderland. Anyway, this dopey old ban thing will be long forgotten by then. I doubt it will survive three or four more home games.

Total contradictory garbage. Have cake and eat it too. Get your facts right sunshine. All we ever hear is your pompous "money doesn't guarantee success" routine. We know you say it. Christ, do we know. Over and over and over again. But the important thing is no one ever says money guarantees success. No one ever says it. It's just you lecturing the rest of us. You decide that the rest of us think something and then lecture us in your patronising way that the rest of us are wrong. Without digging up too much old ground, your beloved Mr Burley was able to in your words above buy the type of players that give us a better chance. He threw money at it and failed. Again, in your words, back then they had to decide how much promotion is worth and weight it up against what he wants to spend on it. Clubs spend money on players, and then expect a return on that investment. Precisely what I have said for years and years and years and years, and any time I bring that subject up you come back with your "money doesn't guarantee success" routine. So, sorry, don't try and lecture me now sunshine. I've been saying what you are now cobbling together for eons. I've been saying it for eons. Welcome aboard, what took you so long. Nice to know I was right all along. Apology accepted.

Delusional Saints fan alert. We're in league one and "the media" couldn't give two sh its about us.

You've changed your fu ck ing tune. You can't have it both ways and christ can you bore for England with your pompous arse routine about how money doesn't make any difference blah blah blah. But now you're screaming for Cortese to splash the cash. What a hypocrite you are.

I do hope no one is complaining. This time last year we nearly had no club etc etc etc blah etc blah. Running out of pies is just Cortese running the club as a business. If we upset a few people on the way then good. Upsetting as many people as possible means the business is being run as efficiently as possible. I imagine the Echo bought all the pies out of spite so it is definitely their fault as well. And the official site says the catering is brilliant and that's the only source of club information anyone could ever need. Hopefully they'll post up a twenty five minute video interview with the head catering supervisor on Saintsplayer saying how fantastic everything is. I imagine I should be able to crack one off to it. Then I'll get back to my football management simulation games.

I can't see any images from the game on the BBC or Sky website. i doubt either company will entertain paying some piffling League One club for oh-so precious pictures of their home matches. Neither will the nationals. Cortese has dropped a b ollo ck here. An arrogant, pointless bo lloc k. No sensible business reason, and of zero benefit to performance on the pitch. Utterly, utterly pointless.

Yes, but they haven't got £13m for wages, have they. With their parachute payments for the first two seasons gone already, they are at the same level as the likes of Bristol City and co - the revenue they can generate from their miniscule gates is all they've got.

Losing the first game was good enough for reading a couple of years back and they stormed the CCC (as was). It's not a bad result in terms of a kick up the bottom. If you're going to lose, lose the first one.

Quite right, and no doubt there will be 50,000 megafans packed into your toilet for the Reading game next week to prove just how gigantic you are.

Have to agree with this. If the current arrangement is good enough for Arsenal, Man United, Chelsea, Liverpool and the rest, what on earth makes us so special? Really, really, really, pointless arrogance. The people who say it isn't a big deal aren't wrong - it isn't, but it's Cortese making it a big deal. The decision isn't going to cost us three points, but letting in photographers just like every club in the country isn't going to cost us three points either. Nicola - get over yourself.

What a load of pompous twaddle. Any thread called 'a little perspective' usually is. You're making out NC is some infant businessman making his way in the world. He aint. In the meantime fans have the right to complain about things. They've all been around longer, and will be around for a hell of a lot longer, than the current management. Have that little perspective.

And that, in a nutshell, is why the echo is a billion times more reliable source of saints information than the spin doctored corporate brochure hot air guffed out of the official site.

I said this to someone else on the thread - this is not about the FCR, it's about the financial bubble around football bursting. Clubs will be more circumspect because they have less money, but not because the FCR is going to be binned. Anyway, it isn't going to be binned.

Errr, gee fanks for the patronising stuff, again. I know you inferred it was me who would buy a holiday etc, etc. I can read. Shame you are incapable of seeing beyond anything other than a clunking literal response. It's that lack of perspective again, I think. The point was no one would buy a holiday in your sixth form analogy, except maybe you as you are the wally that came up with it. Hence why I wished you luck. Did you read that bit? Did you comprehend it? I am right, it is as simple as that - the football creditors rule will not make football more circumspect. Other things might make football more circumspect, but the abolition of the football creditors rule isn't one of them. And you can call for the FCR to be abolished, it's fairer on everyone, esp the butcher/baker/builder. Fine by me. But it won't make football clubs, players or agents "more circumspect" in any meaningful way. That's pie in the sky. You making up dopey analogies and getting all offended by name calling - like you've never had a pop at me - does not make you win the argument.

That's a pretty lame analogy, sunshine, especially as you had a go at me for extreme examples earlier on in the thread. What idiot would book a holiday with a company they knew or suspected was dodgy, just because ABTA existed. Yeah. Because I don't actually care about wasting my time, or not having a holiday at all, or being stranded in a hotel for three days when I should be back at work. Because I've got ABTA. So that safety net means I plough on regardless and ignore absolutely every other piece of information at my disposal. What a moron you are. The removal of the football creditors rule would not make football more circumspect, it would just shift the terms of reference and strategy of the contracts and the transfers. More money up front, shorter contracts. The more unscrupulous clubs would be prepared to gamble more because they now have a safety net that they don't actually have to pay everything if it comes to the crunch. And those clubs prepared to gamble, and the agents and players as greedy as ever, will take the bigger money on offer. The FCR is a pointless element in the wider process, apart from the benefit to non football creditors who get a fairer slice but that's a different argument. Good luck booking a holiday with a company you know is dodgy because you have ABTA. I tend to use more information because life is generally about the broader perspective. You should try it some time.

Clearly, I'm not confused. This takes us nicely back to where we started. The "selling clubs" example has been done, because the french clubs selling players to Pompey aren't covered by the FCR and they still sold players to Pompey. Nice try. Getting rid of the FCR is not going to make football more circumspect like you fantastists are making out. Anyway, lets get back to laughing at Pompey, because I've had enough fun laughing at you.

Well, no, not really. You're confusing the " removing the football creditors rule will make football more circumspect" silly argument with the evolving economic state of football. If loads of clubs go bust, there will be less money around. That's not about the football creditors rule. The fact that there is or will be less money about and more clubs going bust will not make agents and players more circumspect. They will be as greedy and cavalier as they are now. A wage cap tied to % turnover might change things. But removing the football creditors rule is not going to make clubs, players and agents "more circumspect". The clubs get a "nice little get out" because the football creditors rule currently means they have to pay every single penny of every contract back. Take that imposition away and they can be even bolder because the contracts are not as binding as they once were. So clubs can offer more, and this fantasy land you seem to be in where the football agents will be saying "are you sure you can afford this, old chap" is just laughable. The clubs will offer it, the players will take it and if it goes wrong in two years time, then the circus just moves on to the next club. I don't know about you but I would find a world where I am forced to pay only 20% of my obligations a little bit more liberating than one where I have to pay 100% of my obligations. That's a nice little get out in my eyes, much like all these wallies going bankrupt to get out of their credit card debts. There is nothing in removing the football creditors rule that will make clubs, players or agents "more circumspect". Football going skint and more clubs going skint might reduce the money and we may see wage deflation, but that is not the same as this thing that getting rid of the football creditors rule is some silver bullet that turns football into the Girl Guides. And the argument I make works just as well if club a is offering £45k and club b is offering £40k. Agent and player will take the most cash most immediately available. Correct. The players and agents will take jam today, not waft about being circumspect and fretting about who might go to the wall in two years time. Circumspect footballers and football agents. You lot are off your freaking heads.