Pedantic Pete

True but there is no reason you couldn't agree it now in any league. However don't forget Man Utd already was floated a few years back, I think the owners have around 70% but I wonder how or if it would be different it if they owned only 49%? Surely there must be something else to the model.

I think its the rule in Germany of the league so there would be nothing to stop the league making a rule that any individual or corporation couldn't own more than 49% of the shares in a club. The issue in that case would be getting the clubs to vote for it.. Turkeys and Christmas comes to mind!

That's just mental...Well don't spend 70m on a centre back and don't pay 150k per week then it would be sustainable.

They just sell shares of 51% of the club. actually I bet Gao wished he thought of that before to get some of his money back!

I think you are right but the greedy owners of the other 14 will be desperately hanging on to those hundreds of millions. I fear that football is too far gone to ever reset itself.

I hope those teams can source brick proof coaches for the trip to Anfield!

TBF less people might be interested, but as a saints fan were you less interested in league 1?

However football has become less competitive than ever. Every league- including the premier league- has only a few clubs that realistically can win the league and that's it. Money has destroyed any pretence of competition so IMO it's time for them to move on. Fans have been walked over for years, it's not sport it's business, and if those clubs stay they will find ways of taking a bigger and bigger share anyway, increasing the gap further.

That's interesting and reflects on the poor running of the club but the discussion was about whether we should be embarrassed that Bournemouth have a higher record transfer and/or spent more money than us (which they didn't?) My assumption is that we paid better wages- mostly to players who only played a handful of games between them- and therefore managed to waste a lot..Again this may be a work of fiction- i haven't checked its sources- but it suggests we had a much higher wage bill than Bournemouth. https://www.footballfancast.com/exclude/every-premier-league-clubs-wage-bill-in-2019-2020/11

But did they outspend us? We spunked millions and millions on players who didn't make the grade. This suggests we spent more than them over any period I choose. (perhaps I have the settings wrong?) https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/premier-league/einnahmenausgaben/wettbewerb/GB1/plus/0?ids=a&sa=&saison_id=2015&saison_id_bis=2019&nat=&pos=&altersklasse=&w_s=&leihe=&intern=0 If you are talking net spend then this article suggests that from 2015 to 2019 Bournemouths net spend was the 11th highest in Europe and more even than Liverpool's..Does that mean every other team in Europe (apart from those 10 higher) should be embarrassed?- Including Liverpool who went on to win the league..I bet their fans were thinking, this is nice but I would rather that we had finished 12th and spent more! 🙂 https://www.football365.com/news/europes-biggest-net-spends-since-2015-bournemouth-leapfrog-liverpool

Not being funny or belittling your opinion but that is crazy IMO. You are saying worth is only measured in the value of the transfer fee paid? So you would rather we had spent 25m on Lermer than the 20m on Ings just so you can boast to a Bournemouth fan that our record transfer fee is higher? Would you be happy if we had paid 26m on Carillo just so we had a higher record transfer fee? It's an interesting concept.

Its the inevitable conclusion of the pursuit of cash- since the formation of the premier league-which has eroded competitiveness to an extent that the league is won by a very few teams, often by April, obtaining nearly or over 100 points.

I don't find that embarrassing at all? How many seasons have they finished above us? If I was a Bournemouth fan, I wouldn't be on an open top bus ride because we had a higher transfer fee..I would be concerned over who is higher in the league table!

This has got me excited..I hope those clubs, pack up and leave and we can just have a football league less built around money. Even if it means remaining premier league teams going bust and a new order of sustainable teams from lower in the pyramid taking over, it's got to be better from a sporting viewpoint? Perhaps I am just a dinosaur but in recent years I have found the premier league more and more boring anyway. I haven't watched MOTD for three years, I cancelled sky sports at the same time and would rather just enjoy a good day out in a well fought mid/bottom table clash than seeing one of the top sides come down with the plastic fans, big egos etc etc. Perhaps I am alone in that but I certainly won't miss the so called top 6 one bit.

Is the question that if they do ban everyone posting anything racist, is that going to eliminate racism or just stop people posting racist comments?

I think there was one game in each of the last two season's which impacted on that quite heavily!

Could we combine this thread with the "who can we buy off the relegated teams" thread? We could sell our players and buy all of West Broms when they go down..That would set us up nicely for next season!

Personally I think they team in the VAR room should be allowed one extra look in normal speed, no lines drawn etc. If it isn't obvious there's an error from the one look you go with the decision already made. It was brought in to stop those "OMG that's so obvious moments" not to forensically examine every detail of every decision..Giving them another option of "in all probability" will just mean we end up with an even longer debate about what's right and wrong.

It's funny that some people are suggesting Eddie Howe... If our possible 70 stat is a bad..In Bournemouth's best season in the prem they conceded 61 goals, the other seasons they conceded 65, 67 ,67 and 70 goals. Ironically it wasn't the year they conceded 70 that they went down!

Absolutely just like we try to get murders down to zero too!

I had something on in the background not really listening the other day, so for the life of me I can't remember what it was. However I took notice as they were arguing about someone who had said that you couldn't completely get rid of racism and they were slating the person. I must say that I agree, you can't eliminate anything completely. Look at murders..You'd think in all the years we have had laws people would have learned by now but there are still hundreds? or is it thousands of murders each year in the UK( as an side I think read there are 30,000 gun related deaths in the US per year? that's mental! ). So i tend to agree, you can do as much as you can do but ultimately some idiot will do what they want anyway be it racism, murder, nicking a car or dropping some litter!

Thomas Frank is interesting comparison when talking about replacements... Brentford P 137 W 64 D 33 L 40 W% 46.7% Ralph Saints P 105 W 40 D 22 L 43 W% 38.1% However arguably Ralph is in a more difficult league and at Leipzig he had a win% of 48% so stats wise is it much different? (not my figures they are from Wiki...so if they are wrong I apologise)

Back in the day it was awful in the stadiums but now people are less tolerant it has improved a lot, still work to do but it is less acceptable. I hope that now people are less tolerant on social media it might get better, as the first step is that awareness.

Or perhaps it's always been there but people are more aware of, or sensitive to it now?

TBF everyone knows we were never the top 4 side that that run suggested But what If we had spread the last two seasons results out better would people be happier with Ralph?.. So if we hadn't had this bad run currently but lost those 12 games or whatever it is over the two seasons more evenly especially during that 38 game run? What have we had? 88 points over the two seasons with 7 to play. Most people would probably accept that. For reference over the same period Palace have 81 points, Newcastle 76 points, Burnley 87 points, Brighton 74 points, Everton 97 points, Villa 79 points, West Ham 94 points, Sheffield 68 points, Wolves 97 points. I think the truth probably is Ralph isn't the world beater that run suggested but he isn't as bad as the run we are on now suggests.