Gloucester Saint

I don’t aspire to those fans at all, just factually observing that our fanbase whether in the stadium or online is more moderate comparatively to a lot of similar sized or bigger clubs.

Wasn’t that the transfer Spors said he would never have signed off on?

Ex-Saints academy and son of Mark Alleyne, Gloucestershire CCC head coach and 1990s serial one day cup winning captain.

You’ve not been to many other grounds and clubs I take it? Just a few examples: - Watch the clips after Nathan Jones’s only PL win at Everton. Their fans turned on them with some vitriol and went further in the car park directly physically accosting their players and then blocked roads around Goodison Park stopping their escape hurling further abuse and objects. - West Ham at home to Burnley which was a full scale pitch invasion during the second half, mainly aimed at their owners but their players copped plenty too. It also got very tasty at Upton Park after our last minute winner in 2003. - Skates loads of times, not least the abuse Carl Tiler got after an error ridden game v Palace. Even the skates at work the next day were staggered at the level and scale of the hatred spewed at the Fish Shed. - Man U most of last season at Old Trafford - Liverpool fans at TAA after his move was nearly complete to Real - Eric Dier took so much of it from one section of Spurs fans he climbed in that section to confront them - Granit Xhaka moved overseas to get away from the Arsenal booboys - Chelsea fans and Brian Laudrup, not sure he wanted to be there, and Chris Sutton. Going further back, targeting their own player Paul Canoville for horrific racist abuse.

CM who is first team ready makes sense to rotate over 46 games as Charles and Downes will get bookings and injuries. Aribo very likely to move still and increasingly Smallbone. At his age he needs/wants to be starting and a mid-level to lower Champ club is his best route. He can’t play in a two for a promotion-chasing outfit, we know that, and he’d be back up to at least one #10 signing even in a three. He won’t be allowed to run his last 12 months down either if the club can help it and no sign he’s been offered a new deal.

It’s not unreasonable though, no sign of him being offered nor signing a new deal, and he’s not had a particularly great pre-season under Still. Nor does he look any more likely to be able to play in a central two for Still’s preferred formations. He’s at an age where he needs to/wants to start regularly, especially to stay in the RoI set up, so as long as Saints aren’t silly about the fee - £2-4m seems fair - I can see him departing for the right Championship club.

I think it’ll be Grace Dent if the Celebrity series goes well. I’m ok with them showing the last series, would’ve been unfair on the contestants who bust a gut to compete and in one case win.

Good job we gave Jack Stephens that contract extension - if he joined the Masterchef crew, that hair would be far too tempting to pull.

Grace Dent replacing Wallace’s non-professional chef co-presenter role for Celebrity version, presumably without the alleged perviness…

Trump, Vance and David Duke will be having a good old tug at that image

Quarshie probably starts and possibly Downs? Hasn’t played lots of pre-season but must be fairly fit with the US going quite deep into the Gold Cup?

Which I’d actually be supportive of provided they are of a calibre to hit the ground running relatively quickly. 2, 3 or 4 quality players coming in could make a significant difference to making top 2 as long as we don’t fall too far behind during August and September points-wise. SR have clogged the squad up and spread investment too thinly so if it’s quality over quantity this time then yes from me.

There had to be far more outs than ins, for the last two seasons in the top flight the squad’s been too big to get in one dressing room for a start. I think we will sign more than 2-3, possibly a couple of permanents and 2-3 on loan late on, but need to shift players even so, and not just the two everyone is talking about for big bucks. Aribo - Turkish clubs are very slow but he will go, confident of that all along, still three LBs so either Taylor or Manning are going on loan. Wood - unless THB suddenly goes, and even then I think we will replace. There’s a player there with Wood but fancy Martin might swoop in if the fee isn’t too rich. ABK - who knows. Smallbone on a loan as not sure at all if he can operate in Still’s system as a 2. Unlikely BBD will go though if this hip issue is anything more than a week out, AA won’t get the same wage anywhere else and I think Archer has more to give. Downs only just joined. We need to add some pace and unpredictability in wide areas which might liven up the likes of Archer as well through the middle.

End of March wasn’t it? Pahars came in on that after a scuffle on the work permit.

I’m somewhere in between you and Gio in that I think he’s saying ‘no crisp packet wrists in the first 3 games or we will need to bring genuine competition in. We’ve got a new keeping coach and we are giving you better development that you had 22-24 but no excuses’

London Spirit getting routed by Oval Invincibles again - a fox on the pitch at Lords was the most exciting thing.

End of season trip to North Korea?

And even more so this year I fear. Could be another Brookline-type incident with their players pumped up by the mobs.

I can’t see her fancying a falafel burger any more than Russ enjoying her theories on Trump.

#RylanTV

Wait until the Ryder Cup starts in a few weeks and there’s morons in MAGA hats shouting ‘Get in the Hole!’ at De Chambreau teeing off on a par 5.

The agent is encouraging Tyler seemingly to hit the roof (boom boom).

Robins is doing some good business, top 10 this year, not quite play offs.

I was responding to Nic’s post starting with ‘Surely you meant’ who was responding to yours.

There’s certainly a keenness at the club to recover some money on Gavin as an asset, but also there’s a practical risk element around how much budget Still has to bring in another central midfielder, two/three wide players and a couple of #10s. Working on the basis there of THB staying and TD/MF both leaving. If he wants a couple of standout £8-15m bracket players as replacements to re-invest, assuming we get top coin for those two above, rather than SR £5m kiddie projects, then he might opt to take more of a risk in the keeping department if THB stays to get his higher shortlist wide player/midfield targets. That’s the trade he may have made with Spors and Dragan. Time will tell if it pays off. We’ve all done it at work when we’ve got a budget, you prioritise where to re-invest with most impact. His comments suggest someone like Ryan coming in as competition to me on a free and medium wages so Gavin won’t have the untouchable status he enjoyed under Martin. Ditto Smallbone and others. Jack Stephens - don’t know. Had the feel of a Chairman decision to me.