CB Fry

Correct, and Alpine is absolutely spot on here on this thread. You mongs going on about "who cares about paintings gathering dust" want to get yourselves an education. Southampton City Art gallery is ace, and better than is available in many cities, including Nottingham and Derby whose galleries are appalling. Although there is a new one in Nottingham coming later in the year which is shaping up to be very good. Not that you lot care - far better to spend a couple of million on a frigging left back. Hey, if we sold all the library books in the city for kindling maybe we'd make enough to buy a holding midfielder. Just a load of old books aint it? What about grinding the bargate into dust and selling it on as shingle. Might pay six weeks wages for Alan Pardew to take over. Just a load of old building aint it? Welcome to dinlow Britain. :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

I can see what you are saying but don't think you could do that in the real world, not least because the fans would go mad. Can you imagine MFI saying "these kitchens are dirt cheap, but that's because we can't guarantee you getting one if you buy one from us". Being in admin is a bit like being pregnant - you either are or you aren't and you can't suggest you might be nearly and use that to secure more cash from your customer base.

Correct. What affinity did Ferguson have for Utd, or Wenger for Arsenal, or Mourinho with Chelsea, or Moyes with Everton, O'Neill with Villa, or indeed Mccarthy with Wolves, Coppell with Reading, Mcleish with Brum, Dave Jones with Cardiff, Coyle with Burnley, or Mowbray with West Brom, Pulis with Stoke, Brown with Hull, or in the League we'll be in next season what affinity did Pearson have with Leicester, or Di Matteo with MK, or Ferguson with Peterborough? Their complete lack of affinity has seem to have done them alright. Is that a long enough list? I hope we appoint someone with absolutely no affinity to the club whatsoever. Affinity is a mug's game.

I think we'd have a decent selection to chose from. All the names on here, except Hoddle and Keegan are realistic if we are in reasonable financial shape. Holloway, Lawrie Sanchez, Tisdale, Cotterill, Adams, Boothroyd, Pardew. Any of them, and I think most of them would give us a go if offered. Wotte will be long gone.

15 potential will probably throw up 2 or 3 genuine contenders. ie real investors/business people with serious plans and maybe some serious money. This is what the club needs, and this is what I have been saying. What we don't need is people shaking buckets, running charity fun-runs and all that guff. We are not Weymouth even though reading some posts on here that's what some people seem to want us to be: as if being some tinpot nothing club in the bottom division or the conference is somehow more noble than than being the top-two division club we've been for decades. Put your buckets away, spend your money on your families. Just pack the stadium. That's all that's needed at the moment.

I'm with Rattlehead. "Every little" is barely going to "help", and buckets and auctions and all that is not really going to make a blind bit of difference. We need genuine investment. You lot can sit in baths of baked beans and go on sponsored swims if you like but I think its a waste of time. Sorry.

If you need to track down Gavyn Davies, your best bet will be to pitch up at the Emirates Stadium, Islington at around three o'clock tomorrow where Mr Davies and his family have season tickets for some considerable time. If I were you, I'd grab him at half time, so you don't take him away from his beloved Arsenal.

How many Industrial and Provident Societies do you expect to be promoted to the Premier League in the next ten years? This is fantasy land stuff. If you want Saints to be bumming about the bottom two divisions for ever, then go down this route. If the self satisfied smugness of being part of Kibbutz FC is your prime motivation, then this is the solution for you. Who's volunteering the home made cakes for the stall at half time? It's hilarious that when people rant about "greed" and "raw capitalism" then they always infer that the "suits" that are the problem. Bradley Wright Phillips will walk off with £1m for the course of his contract. Rudi Skacel is on nigh on £1m a year, every year, as was Rasiak and others. Do you think they are going to play for a club who uses the pitch to grow lettuce in the close season to make ends meet? Footballers are as "raw" and as "capitalist" as you could get yet its those in the ties that get all the stick. PS - why has Zero been removed as an option?

What part of "£5,000 would pay the wages of one of our worst and over paid players for one week" don't you understand. We're not Mansfield or Accrington so passing the bucket round the stands isn't going to make a blind bit of difference no matter how "good" it makes people feel. And secondly expected ordinary working class people to chuck £5k to cover the wages of the likes of BWP in the middle of a recession and mass unemployment in the south and nationally is obscene and don't appreciate your tone.

Zero. Don't believe in the principle of fan ownership on this kind of scale, and especially as, say, £5k would pay the wages of Bradley Wright Phillips for one week. Any normal wage earner like me would have to be mental to put £5k in and it just shows how insignificant £500 would be.

Rubbish. The appointment of Wigley is where the demise began. What demise was there between Woodford handing over to Askham and before the appointment of Wigley? Show me the league finishes and tell me how it equates to a demise. If anything its a slight upward curve. We'd finished twelfth in the Prem only two league games (and six months) before the appointment of Wigley. Twelfth in the Prem is pretty bloody good, isn't it?

Harsh. See below for the York notes study guide GCSE explanation of my first line*. I'm glad you liked it, at whatever level! *The point I was trying to distill was if we have to go through this turmoil, doing it before the Charlton home game and the Watford game in hand is as good a time as I could think of, because at best, it will galvanise us. On the other hand, going through this kind of thing is obviously rubbish. Hope that helps.

I think this is actually quite well timed, if these things can be, which of course they can't. Lowe going will galvanise the fans if nothing else - any doubts or fears the players have will allayed on Saturday by the fans getting their club back (excuse that dread phrase) from that man. It should be a cracking atmosphere on Saturday - a bit of siege mentality and pure support. And I think we are allowed to hope, just for now: someone will save us, and we will love them for it. Come on!!

What about the road to Cardiff and the road to eighth in the Prem? Was it Super Guy Askham's red and white army then? We are where we are because of the effects of relegation. Nothing to do, whatsoever with what happened in 1997. Nothing. Even if the 1997 events were bad, wrong, corrupt etc, its all too long ago and none of us can predict what could have happened differently. And being the likes of you would swallow Madaric's or Gaydamak's co c k whole for them to get involved in Saints, you getting all moral and uppity about people how people make money doesn't wash.

Fu c k all chance, he says . Christ, I'm pessimistic but we beat the worst team in the div at home on Sat, and then win our game in hand against a team with not much to play for and we're well on the way to surviving. Charlton have **** all chance. We have a chance. You are an utter moron.

How is that having it both ways.? Where exactly do I say not being a PLC before "didn't work"? My reponse is pointed at the likes of SaintRobbie who love to trot out the line that "it all went wrong the day we became a PLC" when, clearly, rationally, obviously, it didn't. Things getting better than they were for the five years immediately preceeding the change is clearly not "all going wrong" is it. Being that we had a very good run in the prem, and a trip to wembley and a fleeting trip into Europe and a new stadium following 1997, the kind of acheivements lots of other clubs could only dream of, its difficult for anyone to suggest how anything could have been better had something different happened in 1997. It's too long ago. How much better have these clubs faired than us since 1997? Leicester Coventry Derby County Forest Sheff United Sheff Wedsnesday QPR Luton Norwich Ipswich Wolves WBA etc etc. If our history had taken a completely different turn in 1997 none of you has any idea of how much better we'd have done. We could well have been relegated in 1998, just like we very nearly were in four of the five preceeding seasons. And my point is, just before the kneejerkers get all excited is NOT how fantastic Rupert is, but AND READ THIS, PLEASE, is 1997 is far too long ago for anyone to confidently predict we'd being doing any better than Forest, Derby, Leicester, Coventry and countless other clubs have done in the last decade. We just don't know. Plenty of other clubs have successfully got themselves nowhere without Rupert's help.

Just to confim everyone, according to Alpine: SMS is the mecca of football. £4,000 is a minimal amount. Just remember those two facts when in the next few days he starts whinging about the stadium debt (surely money no object for the mecca of football??) or our indentikit stadium blah blah or getting all unbelievably shirty about Lowe spending money, (say, less than £4k) on some corporate marketing or catering or some other triviality. Trust me, it'll come, and the tune will change.....

Sorry, this is utter rubbish. Our PLC did "work", and "work" fantastically well up until the end of Sturrock's close season. In the five seasons before we became a PLC we got through an average of a manager a season, and we were in last-week relegation scrapes in four of the five seasons and the only time we had a successful manager he scooted off at the first opportunity. Oh, and we sold all our best players, except the one who didn't want to go. Oh, and that one player we were lucky to have was the only reason we did stay up during that time. You seem to think it was the magical power of not-being-a-PLC that kept us up. Stop talking rubbish. PLCs work, and they worked for us, quite brilliantly. We're up **** street now, but its not "because we are a PLC". Grow up.

Not quite as ridiculous as people whinging when the club try and do something that a) might bring some revenue through the shop tills and/or b) get a few more fans in the ground what a bunch of cun t s they are for doing such a thing.

Agree with this in general. But although Leicester have spend a lot of money keeping hold of their CCC standard players - they probably have a better squad than us, Blackpool, Forest, Norwich and others - they haven't used that many "journeymen". As a squad/team they are pretty young actually. And okay, the L2 doom scenario is possible but I still think unlikely. L1 will probably mean yet another new start, but I think more players than we think will stay, and the likes of Gillet are L1 standard, easy. We just (!!!) need to appoint a half way decent manager to get us organised and we should finish top eight, which to be fair all our equivalents (Man City, SWFC, Forest, Leeds) have done. And let's not pretend that any of those clubs got relegated and had some miracle "fresh start" or had it any easier than we will. Those clubs were decimated on relegation. It's boring, but very likely. I've been saying that the boring thing will happen for the last eighteen months when those people screaming "we're defitely going into admin TOMORROW!!!!!". It isn't going to be that exciting. Relegated, yes, and then a reasonable slog in a rubbish league next season where we flirt with the playoffs. Boring, but chances are that is what will happen.

Not sure why you are the one laughing - its you that look foolish. I'm still trying to work out why you think it is wrong to believe the clubs explanation of why stands are x distance away from the pitch. What is your explanation of a) why the stands are where they are b) why the club would lie in explaining why they are where they are? Because all you have done is snipe at nickh with childish nitpicking about what is a law or a regulation blah blah when you know damn well what he's getting at all along. You just read like a conspiracy theorist ranting that everyone is lying because they must be evil or something and I said so because I am an architect or met one in a pub once or something. So do answer those two questions so we know exactly what point you are trying to make.

Actually, yes you do. This idea that millions and millions have been frittered away on non wages is just stuff in the heads of the likes of you. That is where the money has "gone". And transfer fees and the stadium. And paying off managers. Proportionately, not on "dividends and expenses" and "being a PLC" all the other "evil" things you think about. So just to confirm, what you're saying is we should have saved up lots and lots of money in the prem years just incase we find ourselves at the bottom of the CCC? But maybe we shouldn't spend that money then either, just in case we find ourselves at the bottom of L1. Do you see? As someone else has said, name a club that has been storing up money for 27 years in fact name some that make consistent profits season in, season out (Spurs did this season, but they won't every season). Go on, I dare you, name Man United - they made massive profits for years as....a PLC. Oh dear. Your problem is you just bundle absolutely everything you can think of up and rant rant rant. No-one has said there is no mismanagement obviously there has been. But why not just stick to that, instead of scattergunning and blathering on about "27 years of top flight money" and "expenses and dividends". How many millions of pounds worth of profit did we make in 1988, anyway? Maybe Rupert found it all in a chest buried behind the old community building at the Dell in 1999 and spent it all on gold plated clay pigeons?

What a load of drivel. You're off your head if you really think "expenses and dividends" are the one of the key sources of our problems. You do understand how much professional footballers earn, don't you? Andy Oldknow's company car allowance is the kind of money even the likes of BWP could lose down the back of the sofa.

Well, the fact that he didn't do what "normal" players do and progress to a bigger club is odd, and that makes him a maverick. And as a Saints fan, and someone that worships MLT I think he was a bit of a plonker for staying with Saints all his career. I wanted him to play for England more, and I wanted him to go off and prove that he was brilliant and could cut it at the top level at a big club. He never did, IMHO he should have, ergo maverick and bit of a plonker.

So what exactly are the wallies saying now? Lowe overruled the architects and insisted the fans were as far away from the pitch as humanly possible, just to spite us all? Don't tell me, Lowe was seen screaming "put the cu n ts half a mile away from the pitch half a mile away I tells yaaaa" during the architects design presentations? Or maybe, just maybe, the fans are no further away at SMS than they are at, say, Pride Park, the Riverside and every other comparable modern stadium?