dubai_phil

Empirical evidence suggest they will play higher level football than our team next season... As for how we got there, please turn to page 1 of S4E, then page 1 of TSF and then page 1 of TSW...

Good ole 'Arry, make sure the PR machine makes you out as the good guy all the time :-) But in this case it is appreciated, he didn't need to say it. More to the point is the throw-away from Lawrie at the end. "We deserve to be at the other end of the championship..." or words to that effect. Lawrie - we are IN this mess because from relegation day one we failed to understand that we were a CCC team and had to FIGHT our way out. This whole "we are better" stuff is just arrogance. Peterborough United are a better TEAM than us. Until we accept our reality and plan to change it. we'll just be a bunch of moaning dreamers, otherwise we'll have moans that we should be signing "PL quality players" that we "deserve" in order to get out of League 1..... We know how that worked in the CCC!

A great many people involved in football will be watching the Liverpool situation very closely. While the club is profitable, the way that they were bought using a leveraged takeover means that huge sums of money were borrowed on fixed term deals "in the good times" The massive issue now must be that nobody will want to take on those loans and re-finance them in the "new world". Even IF re-finance is found, the lenders will expect a lot higher return. The interest at Liverpool on the OLD finance deals equalled their annual profits according to some reports. Using my neck of the woods as an example, Dubai related businesses borrowed heavily in "Eurobonds" to fund the massive growth in property speculation. Those funds are no longer there, but Dubai needs to repay many of those bonds each year. Before they could "roll them over" but today everyone wants their money back. It is estimated that the debt here is now $112billion, which is about $100million for every passport holder. Sovereign wealth funds will have to address the issues in their own back yards over the next 12-24 months of making sure those bonds are all rolled over and the actual construction phase is completed. They'll still have the problem of SELLING the places but the whole issue is that CAPITAL that could have been used is vanishing. Taking out the Lowe effect for a moment. the simple issue with Southampton today is that they were under-capitalized and reliant on debt. MANY other clubs are in the same boat. Many more could follow Saints v Liverpool in the Blue Square isn't that likely, but Hicks & Gillet have problems looming

Loved this one http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/5232404/Newcastle-nearing-Premier-League-exit-after-Portsmouth-draw.html There were almost as many Oundle schoolchildren on a North-east field trip here as Portsmouth fans, although nothing could forgive the announcer’s taunt that Pompey’s faithful must have "come in a ******* car’’. He must hope the FA weren’t listening.

TBH I really don't care who buys us, or whether we've heard of him before. I just hope with these articles about missing money or worries about fines and pitch invasions, nothing comes along that throws a spanner in the works. This whole Stewart WGS thing doesn't go away though, so maybe I'll have a bullfrog on them so to speak

Well, if someone could show me how or where 40mil has vanished from I'd be mighty impressed. www.saintsfc.co.uk home page, then type annual accounts and select search saintsfc. It comes up with 13 results, leading to the published figures going back to whenever. Try looking at last year's published ones Turn Over 23.2mil Operating Costs 27.2mil and where did it go? Cost of sales 21.5mil Of course you could argue the "mysterious" 3mil for goodwill amortisation, depreciation and revaluing of assets.. Simple figure picked up from a forum no doubt, the 40 mil wasn't nicked, it was wasted on useless players on fat wages

I get a horrible feeling that this will come back to bite us in the ass. The FL are not happy with us, after all we are trying to dump 20 something mil of debt when other members are trying to keep in the rules. In their eyes, there is no way this can be claimed to be "a spur of the moment emotional thing". All they have to do is google "pitch Invasion" at SMS and they will find links to 2 threads on here PRIOR to the event. They can then claim it was all pre-planned. They have it in for us, we will no doubt hear that the ref ran away because he was getting the physio on the pitch and he couldn't see his "signals" to help Wotton. If there had not been a threat of a pitch invasion there would have been no dogs, so to use them as an excuse just plays straight back into the hands of those who have it in for us.

Lowe won't be coming back, unless the whole full sordid details and story comes out and the full minutes and accounts are released to show that others did hold blame over the past years. Lowe would have too many barriers to overcome, and too many other people will be fighting to ensure that all the dirty laundry is kept hidden so he keeps the blame. He is too useful as the fall-guy for too many entrenched interests, not least of which will likely include his old proxy buddies. The "old boy network" can work both ways

Some thoughts We do not need a RICH owner in League One. We simply need a WISE owner (and no NOT fookin Dennis). Look at how well all those "wealthy Clubs" are doing this year. Oh and secondly, what we ALSO need are OWNERS, MANAGEMENT, PLAYERS AND FANS who understand one incredibly simple truth We ARE a LEAGUE ONE TEAM. We are where we deserve to be based on historical RESULTS. We need to think like League 1, win like League 1, have a cost and management structure for League 1 and then, when we understand where we are, we can START to fight our way back. Over pampered "PL groomed players" in League 1 and arrogant fans? We'll get our asses kicked all the way into League 2. To go on a journey you must understand where you are starting from

You missed out 'Arry's dig at Lowe though which was quality... "you need serious money men, not someone from the Fred Goodwin school of humanity"

Finding out the Derby result while in a dull hotel for a business meeting But the funniest in an ironic sort of way was last Friday against Wolves, we're in the pub, EricofArabia comes back from the loo just before kick-off and says.... Well at least we can't possibly be as bad as the last time we were here to watch Saints on telly against QPR with the whole 35 sec oh bolox.......

OK so i was pretty much right then... shouldn't be a need for a CVA Couldn't find the original thread but knew we should be ok if the buyers pay off HMRC and get an agreement with Barclays & Aviva & FL. Cannot see a local supplier wanting to not agree some sort of deal one way or the other

Being honest, he was never really good enough as a PL player either, or for that matter in SPL. However what he was is a player with a footballing brain which allowed him to be that little bit better than his ability and which made him a very useful player to have in your side Not sure hcdajfu next year but that is the sort of player we would need to help bring the kids along, experienced and with a brain, and if we were honest is what we should have bought at the start of this season. We sought of hoped it would be Svennson, Wotton but....

What a great day out you lucky few. Match report? Player ratings?

CVA only applies in a voluntary administration. Keep up that was explained to us weeks ago

nailed on then me or nickh Oh, you didn't quite mean it that way

Hey, airmiles are precious, why waste them on the DB. Watching the lads playing on the common or Fleming Park, now that would be more helpful, but then I'd still have had to make 2 trips as I have a nice round of golf booked on Wednesday

:cool:

Any chance of the daughter coming to the game instead of you:cool:

"When the seagulls follow the trawler, it's because they think sardines will be thrown in to the sea". This non-stop fascination with trawling the Directors box for a few Sardines, finally I understand what Cantona was on about

OK thinking this through and reading some of the points made. Seems there is a link between LM & the Journalist. We seem to be getting signals from Morph that he is aware of someone bidding. We seem to here tales of a second mysterious but plausible bidder. It isn't a big leap of faith to take a huge guess that Salz and by nature his buddies from before are likely to be one of the bidders. It also isn't a big leap of faith to guess that they have no idea who else is doing due dilligence. It also isn't a big leap of faith to guess that someone aligned to that bid has made 2 + 2 equal 7, resulting in a rather amateur attempt to scare Fry into accepting a bid quicker than he would perhaps want, by stirring up the fans. The logic works quite well, especially when we consider that people associated with that group haven't been the brightest buttons when dealing with the media. I wonder if someone gave Lawrie a "smoke grenade" to lob in the direction of what they thought was going on. Will be damned funny if it blows up in their faces and their 2 + 2 = 7 was a totally wrong long shot

Is that an NDA the bloke is holding in his programme in the front row?

Don't worry Nick, he never made the shortlist.. There's only the two of us on it now & I don't feel like commuting to Staplewood each morning

Hope whoever got it delivers it to DMG as a reminder

Oh UP, [-X I can't believe that knowing Lowe as we all do you could post that. We all know that it wasn't his fault. We all know that the die was cast and he was just trying to perform an improbable rescue, after all, he said so himself on none other than Sky News..... so of course it's true......... Like I was saying, logic emotions and evidence are one thing, having the keys to the safe with all the dirty laundry is another. ;-) Just have to hope that it was malicious rumour mongering as Nickh tried to point out. I keep referring back to my point that we are still in the phoney war. This could as easily have been an expensegate retaliation tactic simply because someone heard that Lowe may be trying to get himself involved in helping some other group. It could of course be that it is Leon vs Scott in the "due dilligence race" and somebody thought they could do some political damage to the other or benefit to themselves - eg Fry - push through our inadequate bid because the bogeyman may have something to do with the opposition. Anyone who thinks we are out of the mire just because we are down now is mistaken. Unless all of the hangers on are removed by a new set of owners this will go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on