dubai_phil

I watched that episode for the second time today. I honestly cannot remember ever seeing anything that epic on TV before. Reading many of the reviews I suppose it was a Lord of The Rings/Battle of the 5 Armies kind of event, but this was TV ffs and t be honest I felt it was more compelling than either of the movies. Jon Snow has been a dull almost characterless numpty for much of the show and last night without becoming the Hero he took numptyness to a new level where I now actually care about him. And yet the previous 40 minutes was so deep as well, Cersy (sp) in the Dungeon - (we all know what is coming when she confesses and looking forward to Bearsy's review of that) Tyrion & Denyraes (Sp) & Joran (Sp) Hell even the many Faceless one is starting to become watchable now My favourite thought at the end was of all those look at me Politicos that said they'd never watch it again after the Sanza rape scene. Winter has sure as hell bloody well come. Send for the Dragons! So glad I've recorded the whole series. Whenever there is nothing on over the long hot summer here I'm putting that back on. Stunning. Emmy, Bafta & Bloody Oscar just for that - and more awesomeness to come apparently

Could Qatar finish off FIFA? Look, I don't know what stereotypes you guys are seeing portrayed these days, but one thing I know is that the locals down here are not actually that stupid. While it is pretty damn clear to everyone and their Dog that "something happened" to allow Qatar to win the bid to host the WC, it COULD be extremely difficult to find a smoking gun of evidence of anything actually coming out of Qatar or the organising committee. In fact, there is already a skapegoat - Mohamed Bin Hammam. He was an the Head of the Asian Confederations and wanted to stand against Blatter last election round. Some kind of deal was done and Hammad stepped down. Subsequently he was banned for life for trying to bribe other FIFA members to vote for him. So far, Qatar has (rightly) been able to swat away any and all allegations. So far nothing can be linked directly to them. I know some of the techniques that the FBI will be using to dig into Forensic Audits (willingly or not) of IT systems, but it will be very hard to find a smoking gun. Which leaves us with a bad stench, and the probability of a number of proven payments to corrupt FIFA officials made by 3rd parties over the years (possibly some by Bin Hammam himself). His lifetime ban was just too convenient for all the parties. So, IMHO, there is a possibility that evidence could be produced (maybe even Blatter himself could be linked) to some form of wrong doing with the bid (and that is without the whole withholding of the Technical Committee's report FFS). There could be enough evidence for the world of Football to say NO to a Qatar WC. But not enough to take direct legal action against them - (Think here of Andrew Jennings - made all those allegations over so many years but never got sued by FIFA for Libel or Defamation). Qatar have a binding contract with FIFA. That gets cancelled. FIFA would get sued and Qatar has spent well over US$5 billion on the infrastructure so far. Which is the amount that FIFA have in the bank. The Bid could be found to have been corrupt, Qatar COULD actually be "not proven guilty" and sue the ass off FIFA. Now. For the record I believe it is right that the Middle East holds the WC. The PROBLEM is the only current candidates were UAE & Qatar. UAE actually has a football league, hotels & infrastructure but is more interested in finding a way to hold an Olympics down the line (2030 onwards) when the Nation has developed better. IMHO the millions of fans here who helped Saints earn more money through the TV rights DESERVE a WC. It's just that Egypt, Iran, Iraq Algeria & Tunisia could never afford it (under old FIFA ways) let alone provide security. But Qatar? Where you will need to book into a 5 Star Hotel to get a Visa on Arrival and could be arrested if you shared a room with a mate? Where you couldn't get a Bud in the stands? Seriously? Meanwhile. One thing I DO know. The "Implosion of FIFA threads" on here could last longer than the Pompey Takeover Saga. The bad news just ain't gonna stop coming for them

Because Blatter is a Hero. (IF you park the corruption for one moment) Blatter took the game to the world. It was, at the start of his reign a Cartel carved up between Latin America & Europe. He set up a structure that invested in developing the game globally. Japan, Korea, China, USA, Australia have all improved as footballing nations in this era, and of course, so has African football. Grassroots development, a fair share of funding have helped to improve our Premier & European Leagues as well. Much of the people who are his "electorate" see that, and you don't have to search to far on Twitter to read articles from around the world sharing that view and condemning the FBI & English Media. The PROBLEM of course is that wonderful Ideal managed to become so utterly and totally corrupt. The entire edifice is now rotten to the core so that so much money has been sucked out of the Developments and spent on Conferences and slush funds. It is now totally evil. The PROBLEM is how to bring everything back together, not just cleaning up FIFA but also the FA's. Just saying "Give Figo the job" is not the answer. Whoever comes in must put in place Compliant processes but the Turkeys would be voting for Christmas. They have to vote to cut off the gravy train. Yet still must share the money to the FA's in the same way and at the same percentages/levels they have had up to date AND make it Compliant - bloody nightmare! The best solution may actually be it's total destruction and removal of all the voting rights of the FA's.

They are the bestest and biggest Supporter owned Club in the World. They will never accept the sale of their club. Their pipes are fat free. Referees are intimidated by the bestest atmosphere in World Football to make incorrect decisions for the benefit of opposing teams in Cup Finals. Peter Story went to court and proved that they were solvent while in the EPL. Harry Redkrapp was proven innocent in a court of law which had nothing whatsoever to do with an amount of evidence being deemed in-admissable due to clerical errors and not one journalist in the UK knows about this allegedly

We have a full on Dubai Massive meeting up at our usual "Official Pub" for this one. However since every time he has been down to watch Saints of late we've lost, so Eric is being forced to stand in the naughty corner wear claret and support Villa Dubai Saints ‏@dubaisaints 3h3 hours ago Who wants to go on a European Tour? #GunnerForADay #SaintsFC

Blatter wins. What great news. He will enact reforms, that is superb. Celebrations all round, let the bells ring out! Because what now has to happen is that the rotten core has to be untangled. Lackeys will get instructions and the complex structures in place will need to be taken down. And all the time, the FBI, NSA, Fraud Squad & GCHQ et al will all have wire taps and bugs everywhere. The Lackeys will have read Jack Warners' words, they will know that if more sh1t hits the fan it will come their way not to Teflon Septic, some will be quietly fingered (on the collar unlike those already in the Jail Showers), it will only need one to turn and there will be plenty. Meanwhile for FCPA & Corporate Governance Laws in the US, Teflon will still be the "Responsible Corporate Entity" which makes it easier to stick him with a low level but fatal dose of non-compliance. Having Teflon Septic in the Chair is the best thing that could have happened if the World ever wants to nail HIM. Meanwhile, Russia will go ahead, but it gives Septic the chance to show he has seen the error of his ways and negotiate a way out of the contract with Qatar, who promptly mail the FBI the bullets they need once the Yanks let them know they'd re-instate the contract under set conditions. Yeah I watched the Lego Movie tonight, Cloud Cuckoo Land. However I DO believe that the only way they can nail Blatter is under US Compliance legislation, (or contempt of court) as with Al Capone, with Organised crime it matters not what you get them with, just that you get them

There is an easy way to oust Blatter. His power base are the areas mentioned in the US Indictment, Africa, Asia & The Americas. They support him because "Blatter has developed football in those regions". The FA's all do very nicely out of their tournaments, Asia Cup, African Nations, Copa Americas etc. European Clubs are "not keen" on releasing their players for thos long tournaments and Internationals with Long Haul travel UEFA need to withdraw from FIFA, then the European Leagues can refuse to release players for those events, which would be greatly devalued and the FA's of those Regions would see their income streams fall. A tactician could achieve that effect by simply WARNING those regions of the implications. #stopthegravytrain Blatter created it and that is why he gets the support. Hurt it but give them a way out. Yes of course it is Blackmail, but when i that a surprise in World Football

Going into PTS nutjob territory, now would be a good time for all Football fans everywhere to learn the term FCPA. While they may not get all of ExCon (Hmm that has ring to it) on the pure Bribery statutes, FCPA makes it pretty clear that any member of an organisation who does not instantly report a breach of the regulations "may have an issue", a defence of "I knew nothing" is pretty much invalid. Under all the training I had, in fact a Duty of Care exists in "Leadership roles". I can almost see an Al Capone type charge bringing that arrogant self important fool & his Tower of Babel down to earth Taking that as an aside, the interview on Sky News at 10pm with Andrew Jennings elicited a look of totally shock on Adam Boulton's face. I can only imagine the Sky lawyers pooped their pants as Andrew re-iterated a number of allegations that he made on Panorama & Granada and how he had been introduced to the FBI investigative team by an ex member of MI5. He did not ease up so he basically made allegations against everyone in FIFA and said "Come sue me" There are a couple of lovely ironies, 1) a batty old English Journo may have supplied the evidence that started the FBI Journey and 2) the concept of the IRS & FBI guys humming "We're coming for you" throughout their insanely damaging (to FIFA) Presser. The World needs a clean FIFA and fast otherwise Florida Marlin's post in the lounge will become a very clear probability

OK Nutjobs. Something has been bugging me of late. When they created the world's bestest supporter owned club out of Admin number whatever, they had to defer a payment, but they said it was "ringfenced" - possibly by the (or one of the) charge(s) on Nott Arf I've been trawling back through the pages trying to dig this up. Was it the PFA? Had they actually paid all of the Football Debts in order to get their playing licence back? Help? This has become a heated debate between us lot, some Boro fans and some Scousers, there is beer involved!

This is a superb article. It's almost as if the Journo was "Embedded" in the FBI team, there is so much detail in it. So many things that the article raises, for example the way Jack Warner's resignation made problems "go away" may be sound under FIFA regs but would never stand up in court. A reference to 2010. That gets an ORLY as well. The fact that the Swiss raided FIFA HQ. With my location I have to be careful about commenting except to say that today is probably Soccer USA's greatest moment. God Bless the Yanks, go get 'em boys! http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/28/sports/soccer/fifa-officials-arrested-on-corruption-charges-blatter-isnt-among-them.html?_r=0

ON a randomly connected side note, one of PTS's pet Journos is a very happy bunny this evening - Matt Slater with whom we had some run ins back in the first 1000 pages or so of this thread is a Southend fan, so congrats to him

Nope not me. Why would I do TA reviews of this place? All everyone needs to know is Barasti for Football, Ravi's for a Curry & Stables for half price drinks on a Tuesday with some karaoke thrown in. You can find us lot on @dubaisaints on Twitter or Dubai Saints on FB. If you're down or planning to come we do help with where to go where to stay stuff & meet up for beers. We average a tourist every two weeks to watch the games with us & forum members about once a month. (Big shout out to an S4E legend who was down a couple of weeks ago) We get between 12 and 25 Saints fans down the pub for a game. We're just proud to be a small part of the awesome machine that is Aussie Saint and the #globalsfc brand that Ralph mentioned in his speech (before the world fell asleep) the other night. Shame about Morgan really tough to call the team for Sunday. When we have pace & tempo in our game we are unbeatable, however we don't do that so often when we play with two DM's, then we play more controlled and "grind" out good wins (eg WHU away) Against Citeh I am not sure we can grind them down, they are flying at the moment after their mini slump, yet I fear we could get torn to shreds playing Davis VW & JWP in the centre up there. The selection really hinges on which one of JWP Reed & Davis are dropped IMHO, and yes while sentiment is great, Gazza is improving and this is a huge game for us. Kelvin wouldn't get a start I'm afraid no matter how much I believe he has earned it.

Whatever. It's our last game of the season. Last week was a "Dry Day" here so nobody went to the pub to pay 10 quid for a glass of Pepsi, but this Sunday it's our High Press #Showyourstripes end of season bash. Our Twitter meister had promised a part at his gaff when we hit 40 points for the last two seasons so think he'll be supplying the Amstel Radlers. We are a few weeks away from Ramadan and the end of life as we know it for 4 weeks, we know we've had a stupidly sensational season and we (like the club) know we could have easily had 9 more points. Arsenal are already on the beach, Villa will do them in the final thanks to us kicking Sherwood up the ass last week so it is out of our hands somewhat. Each and every Dubai Saint is PRAYING we can get some obscure trips on our version of Ryanair to some Eastern European Europa Cup games, but if we don't? Sod it, we have cheap golf all summer and we have Hobgoblin on Draught for Sunday so it'll take us a few days to regain concsiousness. It should never be mentioned on Social media but, let's face it, Dubai ain't huge Citeh fans so let's do this for our two Cities and let's have a p1ss up on our version of Monday afternoon that will stuff us all for the rest of the week!

The Barry Gale outtakes were better than the original PMSL and woke the whole house up!

Did Koeman mention golf there? Loved seeing the full Ice Hockey Video. We really do things our own way now

Hmm. GoT its Episode 6. (No spoilers) Okey dokey. Well, that has blown up the entire planet. Seems there is absolutely no comment that one can make on "The final scene" without being branded anything from attention seeking through to non-PC or even a supporter of let's just say "abusive relationships". I mean jeez even the US Congress is wading into the act (so to speak) The series had just been kind of dawdling along with occasional bewbs and the rare televised sh@g and then kapow, all hell has broken loose in the press and on Twitter. In all the rage people have managed to miss out that ISIS have taken over Kings Landing, Amazon Fighting women are wimps and that a dwarf has a giant d1ck (allegedly). (oo sorry may have been a spoiler in there The growth of Ramsay as one of tv's most nightmarish psychopaths should surely have given warning to everyone that something really nasty was likely to happen, but the show can portray thousands of men being butchered in battle, one man being mutilated in a manner that would put all men off entering a 50 Shades style Dungeon, and yet the planet rises up when a nice girl is involved.... And even those thoughts get ripped up as being non-pc when people have posted them on Twitter & the like. One thing is for sure. There will be thousands of people round the world watching on download & catch up TV to see what all the fuss was about. A series that stepped above the mundane through it's ability to shock has done it again and people are shocked. Job done by the scriptwriters again then. It was a very disturbing episode, in the context of the show it was needed and I think the rest of the series will now be the better for it. But I am not going to say I actually enjoyed it, it was all very wrong and uncomfortable.

That was sublime. No trip to our pub today as it was a Dry Islamic holiday here so we were scattered to the winds. Couple of the gang at SMS, couple in NYC with the US Saints, the rest of us watching from home or round friends houses. Don't know who your BT taters were but we had Martin Tyler & Gary Neville who absolutely loved us. Even brought up the Grey shirts story. Great to see Sherwood get his tactics so wrong and let's give credit to Saints for ripping a right back in a left back role to shreds and the balls over the top. Certainly the movement up front was back today - what a difference that makes and credit to the Villa fans that didn't do the walk of shame on camera after 25 minutes and who stayed to push SMS to such a great atmosphere. Our neighbours actually rang the doorbell to ask if everything was OK after the screams when Shane Long's 40 yarder went in! I think today was a really important game for Gazza as well, to be out on that pitch in that buzz and "not screw up" in the eyes of the fans has to be a huge boost to his confidence. Hell Neville even said he made two "Top Class saves" in the second half ffs. Also for the future Djkurjic showed his footballing brain with that 1-2 which I think is important in squad terms next year and then back on here to see Alpine's on the beach thread after Palace ruin StevieG's big day. Shame about Hull but honestly cannot see Villa coping with Arsenal. Wenger will watch that and will know what to do. Bloody marvellous day, so jealous of all of you who were there

Gonna have to be careful when you guys try to learn the High Press over the weekend. Got a strong feeling a lot of you could end up being Gobsmacked if you aren't careful. This whole thing sounds like a very professional roll out of news and hype, typical of an IT Industry product launch. Think the only curve ball I have seen is the signing of James Rodriguez, Colombia, Burnley, whatever, but I get the feeling we're in for a very hyper "buy your ST's & Pre Order your kit now" run of news and releases. Toby & Clyne? Could even already be done deals.

Bloody hell. OK so first up the Daily Fail had utterly failed to notice that we have been playing in Stripes this season - quoting So that called for a "If you didn't have your head so far up the big clubs .... " quote AND they published it. Wonders will never cease. Bring on tomorrow High Press all round at SMS on Saturday I hope

I am concerned that nobody has commented on the sudden plummet of our moral standards as a club. How can any Saints fan not have noted all the references to "Having a Massage, going to get a massage and worst having a Chinese Takeaway" in our latest News article. Why, anyone would think there were insinuations in the direction of Hortons Heath? Actually, the standard of script writing was so sublime, the finger on the pulse of the club, it is now clear that only one person on the planet could have written that P1ss release. Nice work Rallyboy, now we know your day job

Great to have him sign, having the greatest Colombian Footballer in the world back in our squad next season is a real statement of intent. Clearly Dr Barry Gale has had a role in High Pressing him to re-sign

Cringeworthy bloody genius. Absolutely loved it. So much to take from it, we now have the high Press, surely a new song for Pelle (What's new pussycat)

Plan 2 days in Monterey minimum. Do the Whale Watching Trip. It all looks like a rip off but was there a month ago and we had over 600 Dolphins around us then 15 Humpbacks, it is sensational. (Tip set your camera on manual and over expose the pics at sea unlike my pal who got a camera full of darkness!) Also at Monterey dine on Cannery Row, drive the 17 mile drive to have lunch in Carmel and visit local vinyards. Also you MUST stop to see the Elephant Seals just before Cambria - insane. in 1992 they were thought to be extinct now there are some 500+ on one beach. Everyone who has been there loved Hearst Castle. Monterey has expensive hotels by Fishermans Wharf & Downtown but a mile or so on the road out of town are plenty of nice comfy Motel type places. Cambria Pines Lodge is lovely down that way. And yes do Highway 1 North to south - this was my 2nd time and it REALLY is so much better that way round for stopping to take in the view etc

3 Log InsComedy GoldOr do you mean there are two other posters on here who would be able to answer a sensible question about Aphibarnrat's Eagle on the 17th in Shenzen this morning?

Sorry Spudders. I would of course have regaled you with many months worth of Golfing Tales. In fact I was crazy busy. Obviously I did win the Ryder Cup (in fact I was on TV more time in the last hour of that small shindig than a certain Mr McGinley and so wanted to share how I was responsible for the TV crew catching Rory shooting his load too early. Then we had the whole Race to Dubai thing that was won by someone, all I remember was Tommy Fleetwood's 7 Iron being plucked from the bottom of a Lake by some Drunk Brit. Then we had the Asian Tour. I did think of Tokes about that time but then got into conversation with some Indian guy called Arjan who apparently knew all about me as Tiger had mentioned that I was his new Life coach. Then there were the Ladies and the whole Desert Classic taking the p1ss out of a Manc (Rory) because we'd just beaten them. But seems everyone just got fed up with anything to do with Golf so instead I allowed myself to get stabbed in the back by a moron at work and have spent the past months trying to cancel my Resident Visa so I could actually get another job (so far to no avail). I also discovered Golf Wags. Especially at the Ryder Cup. Mrs Matt Kuchar set me on the right path with a new career idea. I thought it was all a but stupid at first but then without a Visa I can't work full time & Mrs D_P was very supportive so I became a 50 Shades Trainer and, well, to be honest I have nothing else to add, after all The Bear owns anything to do with that genre and I shamelessly used his Opus as my manual. I had a bit of a sticky moment or two when I first started out, but after finding the Japanese Fisherman's Knot Tying Manual and a local store selling cheap plastic Fly Swatters I feel I have made my mark in my new trade. In fact it really is amazing just how many Men seem to be missing out on satisfying the urges of their women folk by spending so much time at work all day. Once I tied in with Uber to collect their kids from School safely I was onto a winner. Hopefully in the next week or so I may actually have the chance to grab some clubs again. I feel that swinging a fly swatter or a Camel Whip at a perfect bikini tan line has cured a few of my issues in weight transferance in my golf swing. It certainly helped my Golf Swing and I did pass a few tips onto my pal Tiger a couple of months ago. Although think he may have tried them in the bedroom and got his tooth knocked out rather than trying to be a Master. Anyway I lurk occassionally. Maybe later this year I'll get one of those Muvi things and start recording the sessions for you all.