Mao Cap

I wouldn't worry, though I liked the ground it's extremely difficult to get much going on an open end. I think even Leeds struggled to get much going at their visit and they're much better vocally than us. God knows how they used to do it in the old days! As for the game, yes it was crap - not quite so bad as it's been made out to be I reckon, but disappointing and a little worrying, given that we haven't put in a good performance for a while (Ipswich apart). Not a lot to add to what others have said really, our corners and set pieces aren't up to much and we're very dependant on Lambert who has been pretty mediocre for a little while. Still, here's hoping we can pull something out of the hat twice next week

Good thread, some very interesting stories. The First World War was a lot bigger thing for my family (great-grandfather and six of his brothers in the Royal West Kents, the most serving in one regiment at any one time or something like that) but my paternal grandfather joined the Navy at the start of the war and was a Petty Officer (or possibly Able Seaman, I forget which) on a cruiser called the HMS Effingham, which hit a rock due to a navigation error and sank off Narvik in May 1940. The crew came ashore fine in an area not yet controlled by the Germans (who were in the process of handing our arses to us on a plate) were (rather bizarrely, considering they were sailors) presented with pistols by the Army and set about getting themselves offshore quick as possible; it was whilst they were doing this that my Grandad fell off the back of a truck, busting up his legs pretty badly. He was laid up in a hospital in Glasgow for a time after the evacuation, then soon after returned to his pre-war job on the railways, which I think were quite understaffed at the time. All has a faintly farcical, Spike Milligan feel about it, which I suppose is why he never had any problem talking about it to my father (died when I was 5). Like my other grandfather (who was a panelbeater for Rolls-Royce before the war and therefore of more use working on planes than in the armed force) he was fortunate enough to do his part without paying for it with any (permanent) physical or psychological damage.

Ta, I was rather chuffed with it myself. No chance of it taking off at a home game, but Might give it a try tomorrow if I drink enough.

+1 for Clavdivs. It's a combination of such a series being pretty expensive to make (all the main channels are in difficult financial straits at the moment) and a general fear of any sort of innovation in case a series like that doesn't get good ratings. That's what we get for being a nation largely comprised of (a) slack-jawed morons perfectly content with talent shows, or (b) whining reactionaries looking out for anything that is a WASTE OF TAXPAYERS' MONEY (because, let's face it, only the BBC has any chance of putting on such a production and it being any good). Frankly, as a country we get the TV we deserve.

To The Animals' "House of the Rising Sun" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C86oH5RwyJg "There is a house in Horton Heath They call it Unit One And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy And Avram Grant is one... *break into "Unit One, Unit One, he's the famous Avram Grant and he went to Unit One..."*

Damn, you're a lot of studs on here.

Past couple of nights I've been watching a thing from the 70s called When The Boat Comes In, with James Bolam. Set on Tyneside (as you can imagine) in the 20s and 30s. Never heard of it before and stumbled on it by accident but it's bloody good; like all those BBC 70s dramas (I Claudius) the sets look like something out of Playskool but the script and acting are top notch. I wish we still made stuff like this in Britain, unfortunately you have to look to the good American stuff to watch quality TV like this. Shame.

Bloody fantastic decision by the club, great stuff.

There's some mentally unstable mofos on there, that's for sure. It was ever thus, mind... Generally I only read the post-match threads now - ironically, they're usually the worst train-wrecks of all. Win, lose, or draw the first three pages are hysterical crap from people who weren't there, then you have about two pages of stuff worth reading from people who were at least at the game (even if you don't agree with their analysis) interspersed with more hysterical crap, then the last five pages are just bickering. There used to be a separate "Just got back" thread after matches, as I recall; would quite like to see that again.

I stopped shaving for about six weeks once because I felt like a change. It came in pretty well, but my cheek coverage wasn't enough for the full beard I was hoping for. I ended up with an untrimmed goatee and sideburns thingy, like an estate agent who had let himself go, and had to give up. They bloody hurt when you get rid of them as well.

I think it's because they had to put someone else other than Leeds on.

Bugger. In my defence, I've got a crap calculator that only goes up to 10 million, so I got the number of zeroes wrong and I did an English and History degree where there wasn't much call for figures. Nevertheless, never let it be said that I'm not man enough to admit when I've been owned...I'll shut the f*ck up now and let the other pro-education gayboys argue the case. Damn student threads.

Well I did a few calculations (yes, I really do have nothing better to do today) and assuming there's 30 million taxpayers in the country (65 million minus the old, the young, unemployed etc.): -University dropouts cost each taxpayer £6.60 a year -Each taxpayer contributes £40 on university education -If students didn't have government funded loans, it would save the taxpayer £4 a year. -Mickey Mouse degrees like "golf management" cost the taxpayer over £1.32 a year. Faaaaaakin students, if all mickey mouse degrees were banned and students didn't have government funded loans I could have paid my full Saintsweb membership :smt076 AND have over 32p spending money \\:D/

You did Shameful - singing the song of the rivals of the team you're playing is on a par with ringing a bell and chanting wordless dirges all game.

I fully support this, though I'd lower the legal drinking age to 16 as well so that teenagers can be socialised into drinking in pubs earlier, rather than today's initiation of hanging around outside newsagents and kids' playgrounds with tinnies, getting gobbier and gobbier until there's a fight with other kids or a respectable type who gives them a dirty look. The government should be encouraging drinking to be a civilised, social activity done in public houses. If I've got to pay slightly more for some cans or bottles when I go to house parties, I'd gladly do it if it had the beneficial effect that I think it would.

F*ck, it finally went through then So the massive pension funds etc. who are Cadbury's investors decide to turn an excellently-run company over to a low-growth peddler of American crap who'll ruin its products, just so they can make a quick buck in the here and now. Hyper-efficient capitalism at work, eh!

yep.

So that they're not seen to be bending over backwards to the faaakin muslims, of course. It would be electoral suicide not to ban Islam4uk (much good it'll do, because they'll just go underground). The type of people who start frothing at the mouth about this kind of pretty obvious wind-up hold immeasurably more sway in elections than ethnic minorities, particularly in an election year because there's tons of them in marginal constituencies. And yet they genuinely believe the government pays no attention to them, only to the effnicks

The FB status of a female friend currently reads "Promised ten inches and yet only got six...now where have we heard that before?" I lol'd...brazen hussy.

Sex robots? That's just creepy. I'll stick to my RealDoll, thank you very much.

"Kill it, Cook it, Eat it" on BBC Three. Shut up you whiny vegan faggit, they're only bloody chickens...

Barney, are you trying to say that it doesn't help to, in any given situation, direct our anger at government employees who are only trying to do their best? That's not very patriotic of you. We're English, that's what we do.

When I failed to see something that was in plain view, my Mum used to point it out and say "What's that then, Scotch mist?" which I always found confusing.

The medieval religious fanaticism of Islamists isn't the same as European fascism. They share similarities (hence the term "Islamo-fascism") but they differ in a number of ways (haven't got time to go into them now because I've got to get off the computer, maybe later). Nevertheless, I agree that UAF would get a lot better reception if they told these Islamist knobs that they're knobs as well. They stand for everything a good liberal or socialist loathes such as much as the fash. F*ck them both, I say.

It would certainly be nice if the national media took a bit of responsibility and toned down coverage of events like this for the good of everyone. After all, the only reason Islam4uk came up with this idea is because they knew that the tabloids would scream the place down. Without the coverage it would just be a few dozen oddballs walking down a mostly empty street with some placards. Unfortunately the media aren't there to do the responsible thing, just to get people to watch their programme/read their newspaper. So in a few months there'll be another stunt like this, and the reaction will be exactly the same. Sigh. I've used up my three posts all on one thread see youse tomorrow.