Gloucester Saint

Diaz the most likely - QPR and Weds could make the play offs but I think they’ll just be short. Fair play to all of them and hope Diaz goes get a move back there if they go up as got the short end of the straw with Martin trying to use him wide in a u-shaped formation. Nope, I didn’t understand it either!

He’d have been alright during the pandemic because he’d never have caught Covid if his ability with footballs are anything to go by.

Yes I did change it to leader of the free world and NATO on reflection. Canada sandwiched between a hostile USA and China, and the Baltic in Putin’s sights. And of course Russia and China share long sections on border. Obama had a pivot to focusing more on China than Europe for different reasons but not trying to dismantle western civilisation in the process.

JD Vance just put the final nail in America’s coffin as leader of the free world, certainly NATO. Then refuses to meet with the official German Chancellor but meets with the leader of the far right AFD. Great for China, only outward-looking genuine superpower left and eyeing up Taiwan. If Putin can get most of what he wants in Ukraine then it’s a green light for China. Hopefully this is to blindside Putin over Ukraine. Crazy stuff even so. Trump just had a spontaneous call with Starmer and Mark Burnett. It’s like a mad man theory in reverse - Hegseth and Vance are ultra aggressive bad cops but Trump is the better cop bringing more reason. Doubt that’s the reality but seems to be the public presentation.

Sounds like Hegseth announced Trump’s thinking for that moment on Ukraine without filtering it properly. Scott Bessant the Treasury Sec now rowing back at pace saying US air cover may well be on offer and Vance backing that up on the way to the summit stating all options are on the table and Russia may face further sanctions.

Sonny Baker, our new quick signed from Somerset, has been given an England development contract after impressing Flintoff with his performance on the Lions tour of Australia https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/articles/cn4m9rwm041o Same status as John Turner.

https://www.southamptonfc.news/opinion/one-alarming-statistic-shows-why-russell-martin-must-upgrade-key-southampton-position/

The second goal was the worst blooper, near post, low, not that firmly struck should be around the post or further across at a angle less likely to present a tap-in. Nearly a calamity coming off his line getting bullied and then glued to it in the second half. Cheltenham Town have genuinely got two better keepers than him. Whoever sanctioned £14m should be arrested for fraud. But our coaching has made him even worse than the League One keeper he was before.

Not in the same league as the previous What’s App issue and no worse than what was in Britannia Unchained about abusing an entire country. I just wouldn’t touch these groups with a barge pole if I were a public figure. Someone could hack it, disaffected colleagues or their partners could leak it. I remember getting a briefing in the early days of social media about the fact anything you post could be there for perpetuity and nothing was truly deleted.

Left on VR. That BBC News might be adding 2+2 = 4 but it could be 7. Looking at it with a cold professional head on, NDAs, which effectively is what that is, are there to protect the organisation. It ain’t there to protect the departing employees which suggests she knew where the bodies were buried at HBOS https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckg75jr5284o She’s clearly rubbed some people up the wrong way at HBOS in her time there. That link above says what you want according to whether you’re red or blue. I’m yellow so probably don’t matter. The culture on expenses in both politics and the corporate world actually stinks having seen it myself. And in the 00s it was a fuck sight worse. Grant Schapps also got caught out selling ponzi schemes under a false name and false representation and kept his job. What really grinds my gears is people seemingly misrepresenting. If I did that which I never have, I’d get caught but people like Schapps and Reeves either never do, or if they do never face the same sanction we would. I’ve had to work with loads of them and it depresses me because they are always the most slippery people to deal with. I always count my fingers after shaking hands with them. I suspect another one has been overseeing our football club’s demise if politics isn’t depressing enough. If you’ve worked at Bank of England for 6 years as an Economist, well done. But don’t say it’s 10 years because it’s not. Not impressed so far overall with her. I predict she will last 2025 but a re-shuffle after that.

That’d be his revenge - we’d never get any of our tickets in the post

It definitely did. Some gate figures on this article to back it up http://www.afcbournemouth-mad.co.uk/feat/ed13/memories_of_dorchester_21374/index.shtml https://www.dorsetecho.co.uk/news/5399356.magpies-ground-share-is-backed/ https://www.footballgroundmap.com/ground/avenue-stadium/dorchester-town

Ground shared with Dorchester when they redid it last time. Lovely for a Southern League ground but only holds 6k. Pompey need the rental income though…can’t be Exeter as not enough seats and Plymouth too far.

He’s a political worm like Les Reed was. Remember Reed at a fans forum shamelessly saying Guido Carrillo would return from loan and be a great asset in the PL to howls of laughter from the audience and the other panel members avoiding rolling their eyes. They genuinely believe they are Teflon and I’d bet he’s giving it large around the SR boardroom about Goztepe’s league position and how it’s all his great work. We’ve read enough about his role at Brentford but their fans burst that bubble in more ways than one when they visited recently.

Not acceptable behaviour. It’s human nature to think it, but in public roles it’s stupid to have these things written in chat forums. The lessons were there from the previous shambles with their What’s App, so to repeat those mistakes with the contempt, they need to take a long look in the mirror. And not take a role in public or civic life.

£15m is still close to the record Championship transfer fee which was Ruben Neves at Wolves (worth every penny) at £15.8m, so if Saints needed to get rid to strengthen elsewhere he’d probably be going there at a loss of some description.

I agree with your post in the main, we saw that at Hillsborough, and he won’t be cutting his pay by 75% next season to re-join us. Would definitely need pace and power around him if he did, which is the priority to get into the core of the spine over the summer.

That’s Foley’s influence (and investment). Very different to their previous PL spell and a certain East Hants club’s spell.

The prick (Rasmus) has a face like a smacked arse and that was even before the game started. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d been informed that Spores now controls recruitment for SR and that he now has the everyday management of Goztepe in the main.

He takes the blade with trembling hands, can Spores make the Final Cut (of all the weak shit in the squad)!

Yep, we need pace and raw physical power. Love JWP but far too many lightweight players already.

That’s what eight years of dreadful ownership, three managers (Pellegrino, Jones and Martin) worse than Ian Branfoot, pathetic scouting and laziness does to an established mid-table PL club. It’s a wonder the damage is even worse tbh, if we’d lost the Swansea game in 2018 we could well be playing Bromley and Morecambe by now, if we existed at all. Bournemouth are like watching us under Pochettino, perhaps not quite Koeman level. Eg strong, quick, pressing and counter attacking side who can cause the very best in the PL problems. If we get away with 1-4 we’re fortunate! On a different level, that’s where this summer’s recruitment needs to go 100% - quick, strong athletic units. We can add a couple of more creative midfielders near the end of the window but no more weaklings, midgets or Man City academy cast offs for the foreseeable. If they don’t look scary, don’t sign them.

The time is gone, The Season’s over Thought we’d something more to say

The market is quite niche - parachute clubs or the odd club with serious backing coming up from League 1 (Bham, maybe Wrexham). WBA already enjoying AA but wages of £65k pw rumoured even with a 40% reduction that’s still beyond most Champ clubs to attempt to make permanent. And Downes only recently went for £18m. Only way I can see is if Ipswich stay up and pay Saints what he cost from West Ham. Otherwise as you say, it’ll be about knuckling down, getting fitter and re-integrating.