pap

Some humble haggis to be gulped down if this transfer goes through, imo.

I really like Moffat's work but I'd stop short of declaring his genius. The idea of a contemporary Sherlock has been banging on for ages. This is actually the second piece of Victorian literature that Moffat has brought up to date (Jekyll being the first). But then you remember Coupling, which was arse. He was also responsible for Press Gang. Mark Gatiss is ace though, and has been for years. He is responsible for some pretty good Doctor Who episodes.

And that's the current estimate

Like I said, guess we'll see today.

Don't put your wallet away, British taxpayer. In addition to bailing out the banks, your money will now pay for a swish new yacht for HRH Queen Elizabeth II to celebrate the upcoming diamond jubilee. The yacht, pencilled in for £60M, will of course come as some comfort to the 2-3K of public sector workers that it would have paid for. Jobless they may be, but the Queen will have a new mode of transport, and that's all that matters. Guardian article.

I see today that someone is trying to re-ignite this thread after not reading much of what came before. Trip trap.

Depressingly and somewhat predictably, the missus is only able to name Rickie Lambert, and I suspect that is because he is from Liverpool.

No idea. Seems to be widely refuted on the Celtic forum.

Well, according to some reports, Hooper apparently is going to hand in a transfer request today. Time to measure some of the potential bs against some of the reality!

Benedict Cumberbatch is onto bigger things. I think he has two different parts in the Hobbit, and he has also signed on to appear in the new Star Trek film. However, they brought Holmes back from death in the stories. Sure they can find a way back for him if Hollywood doesn't play out. BTW: He has legions of female fans who refer to themselves as "Cumberb*tches"

I was at the reverse fixture, and thus, one of the few people to see the great Sven experiment Even though we lost that match, we made stupid mistakes in the first half and battered them in the second. Unlucky not to get anything out of that game. I am convinced that if we can keep our focus at the back, these boys are there for the taking.

Liverpool made a bad decision, imo. They believed that because they got 50M on transfer deadline day they should have spent 50M on deadline day. Their season was already fecked. Might have been a good time to take stock on their existing players instead of letting the money burn a hole in their pocket.

I love the chap who is taking the 35M price tag thing seriously. "If Carroll is wort..." Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! Carroll is not worth 35M. Liverpool are just very silly boys. HTH.

The other amusing part was when someone posted month-old articles to prove that Hooper is happy there. A month is a long time in football, especially during a transfer window. Hooper asked for a new contract a month ago, and I don't think he has it yet. That has to play into his thinking. I don't buy the notion that its a completely illogical move for him either, which many on there are suggesting. I don't want to be perceived as an English fan diminishing the importance of the SPL, but the English game has a much bigger market than the Scottish game. I am certain that Hooper could make the move straight to the Premiership from Celtic, but where would he be in the pecking order? Saints might not be a Premiership club right now, but we're on the way. If Hooper has done any research at all, he'll have seen the faith we kept in the team that got us up from League One. He'll also be thinking of exposure. Some very good comments on the Celtic thread about how English players playing in Scotland tend to become invisible to managers selecting international squads. If Hooper harbours any international ambition whatsoever, he knows he'll need to quit the SPL, and probably concludes that the EPL is the best shop window for his talents. Therefore, the only questions are when he goes, and how he gets there. He can join a big club and probably have to fight to dislodge an established striker, or he can come to us. If we landed him, I'd argue that he'd be one of the first names on the team-sheet, even after promotion. The one thing that the Celtic fans can't seem to get through their heads is that if we get promoted, more people in England/Rest of the World would know who Gary Hooper was in the first six games of the 2012-13 season than they would if he won the title in Scotland for the next five years. Not saying that's right, just how it is. The Adkins connection only serves to strengthen my feelings that this move might not be as illogical as the Celtic fans are making out.

I've just seen the 35M price-tag that Lennon has put on Hooper! I'm glad he's not pricing things up in TESCO. "How MUCH for these bananas?!!"

Yeah, he's just arguing for argument's sake, really. As for the transfer, I think that there is a fair chance that it'll go through. According to that thread, Hooper made overtures for a new contract in December [1][2] and has changed his agent recently.

I've just read that Celtic thread, and would thoroughly recommend it. It is educational

Many of us saw much more than the highlights yesterday, due to the nice stream of information that was available. Having watched almost all of the whole thing, there is no way we would have lost that game, even if Forest had kept all their guys on the pitch. Forest had a good spell toward the last end of the first half, but it was by no means assured. Quick breakaways after winning 50/50 balls involving maybe 2 or three players. Saints attacking game was in a different dimension. Patient, clever build up which pulled the opposition all over the place. The problem with highlights is that they are invariably focused on goal scoring opportunities. We won by three clear goals and missed a couple of sitters. That's what the highlights will show. However, I can assure you that in the meat-and-potatoes of the game, retaining possession, moving the ball, nullifying the attacking threat of the opposition, Forest were always second best to Saints and apart from one spell, didn't look like troubling us. Our passing was mostly bloody lovely yesterday. 61% possession says it all, really. Let's also remember that "poor run" doesn't necessarily equal poor play. Most people on this forum would acknowledge that we were very poorly treated by officials in the Brighton game, and even when we haven't won, I've rarely seen us play badly this year.

Wasn't the last man, didn't lose control of his body and contact wasn't heavy. Agree with you and mitch01. Never a red.

To be fair to @fourth_official, he was all over the mooted Ammar Jemal move, which as we all know, nearly went all the way but broke down during the negotiation of personal terms.

I am filling in some of the gaps on my 80s movies. It's always a dangerous thing to do. Some stuff holds up remarkably well, while other films are utterly obsolete relics of their time. The movie I am watching at the moment falls into the latter category and then some. (drum roll) Red Dawn. The movie focuses on a group of teenagers/young adults in the aftermath of a joint Soviet/Cuban invasion. It's almost one of the most overt pieces of propaganda I've ever seen. Communism is simply equated with evil. The very first action of the pinkos is to open fire on a high school. At various points throughout the movie, you also get to see wholesome US citizens mowed down by machine gun fire. Extremely interesting as a historical curio, but almost no value as a movie.

I've got no problem with Moffat's Sherlock series. The contemporary setting almost puts it in a different universe for me, nicely compartmentalised from my treasured memories of the original tales. Guy Ritchie's Sherlock films are crap. RDJ's accent seems to hit the right tone, but doesn't flow in the same way as a native would. Plus they relegate Holmes to an action hero, which is not really what he is famous for.

He is out of contract at the end of the year. Tribunal fee is likely to be around £2M, so I reckon Palace will bite any hands off that happen to be holding more cash than that. Really depends on the player and the sales pitch we give him. Wolves came in for him last year - Clyne didn't even enter talks. A quick search on Twitter reveals that every top (as in, think they're good) Championship club seems to be chasing him. Man Utd are also reported to be interested. It'll be something of a coup if we manage to secure his signature.

I'm not entirely surprised by this. I've also heard that many of the people on the US's space programme would have been involved in the design and creation of doodlebugs.

I am not ITK, but I do find the Clyne rumour interesting, particularly as we've been linked with him before and Nige is currently starting Dan Harding in at right back. If your first choice right-back is a left-back, then that's probably an indication of where we need to strengthen.