Wurzel

Or maybe do a deal similar to some player transfers with a add on clauses. Accept we're shit now and take £100m now with extras over next 5 years every year we stay up, win a cup, qualify for Europe etc.

For me, despite the injury he's our player of the season. Sorely missed

Why the delay getting this one sorted? Looks like there's only midweek next week and final week as possible dates .

Christ, what odds did you place it at? They're still offering 50/1 now. If I can stick £20 on now and get an immediate £43 cash out I'll keep doing it over and over again.

Don't let that stop you. "To be eligible for the Premier League Hall of Fame this year, players must have been retired as of 1 August 2020, and only a player’s Premier League career is considered in his candidacy"

Re wage caps I'm no lawyer but I reckon there's a grey area between employment law and these are the rules if you want to participate in our competition. I.E. No restriction on whatever a club wants to offer Messi for his employment, but if club wants to participate in the PL then they can not pay a player a wage of more the £x per annum. Or maybe a Fantasy League style limit per team, choose Messi and 10 donkeys of field 11 JWPs. Maybe restraint of trade? Re the agents driving up prices/wages for Neymar/Haaland. Realistically, whether we like it or not there's currently probably 12-15 clubs that could even consider buying such players. If they are capable of getting together behind the scenes and (almost) launching a breakaway league, surely it's not beyond them to make a collective "let's stop these players/agents taking the piss and all offer sensible wages" type gentleman's agreement. Or would that be a cartel? Guess trouble with that there will always be one (Probably Real Madrid or Juventus) that would break the agreement (overtly or covertly) and there we're back to where wer are now.

I think the transfer fee deflation will naturally happen. No-one *has* to buy a certain player, they can always make do with what they have or turn to a cheaper option. If buyers don't have available funds the selling price will just have to drop or no sale takes place. But even if that doesn't happen, transfer fees are just money moving around from one club to another (ignoring VAT, agents fees etc). More of a concern for clubs is high wages. Every time payday comes round that is money that not only leaves the club, it leaves football. It's in the players bank, it can't be recycled to buy or pay another player at a later date. Not sure if anything can be done about current contracts but I can't see any player being offered higher (or even as high) contracts than they're on now in the near future. And maybe lower basics, higher performance bonuses will become the norm. That's what really bugs me about Perez and co complaining about losing money. Their biggest expenditure is transfer fees and wages, no-one is forcing them to offer such massive contracts other than their desire/obsession to make sure they get their man and no-one else does.

Maybe we have it the wrong way round. Maybe Plan B should be defend deeper for the first hour and play the high press for final 30 minutes as the opposition tire. Then again that would require keeping a clean sheet for those first 60 minutes. Ok What's Plan C? How about fresh legs off the bench after 60 minutes instead of 85?

Can't argue with that . I like his personality and his commitment but it is rapidly dawning on even my glass half full mind that tacticaly he is either lacking or stubborn - either way it's not getting us points. Was shocked when I read he's had 93 games. Maybe it's down to the last stop start season and this one just not seeming real but in my head he's still new and finding his feet here. 93 games! That's more than enough to have done something about it. Thanks to CoVid I've been able to watch almost every game of ours this season on tv and it feels like I've watched virtually the same performance in every one of them. If I've seen eveery game then so have the teams we play against. We can't catch anyone by surprise with our tactics any more, they've all seen them and know how to counteract them. Yet we still haven't learnt to counteract their counteracting tactics. Something needs to change. I'm hoping it's RH working out a Plan B, C & D but if he can't, or is so stubborn it's plan A or nothing then afraid it's time to give someone else a go. Who? No idea who'd take the job right now but one thing is for sure, it needs to someone who relishes a challenge.

What's going on! Have they had some sort of clear the air talks since Sunday. Fast, positive, committed, actually playing with smiles on their faces. Best 45 minutes this year. Still, guess it's easy against a mediocre mid-table English team, glad we're not up against one of the European elite teams 😂😂

No, according to THIS they would both qualify but we would have less Europa/Conference places. Hope they do receive some kind of punishment but to be fair they've provided us with more entertainment in 2 days than the rest of the season put together

Whipround?

Remember it very much like you describe. As for the people lining the bridges, where did they all come from? This was years before the internet, let alone mobile phones, social media etc yet somehow literally hundreds if not thousands of people had the same idea to go to their nearest motorway bridge and welcome us all home. Great day.

Great idea posted by someone on BBC website which unfortunately we can file under "Ain't gonna happen"

Interesting theory from an agent in the latest Athletic article, the ESL clubs likely to pay *lower* wages than they do now. With no threat of relegation and no need to win enough games to qualify there'll be no need to pay mega wages to ensure they get the top players. That would be really funny, fans around the world wetting themselves with excitement over a *Super* league full of journeymen.

If the PL doesn't have the guts to kick the 6 out , then the other 14 should instantly open negotiations to rejoin the Football League, leaving the 6 to play each other every weekend as well as midweek. Let's see how long tv viewers and live supporters can stay interested in that.

Checking my Fantasy Team I accidentally clicked on the PL pages and noticed a link to Tables (plural) which confused me a bit. Have to admit I only ever follow the first team, but this also has the Tables for PL2 and the U18 leagues (as no doubt does the clu OS, but rartely check that either). Current tables First Team 14th in League of 20 (2 wins in last 5 games) PL2 Team 13th in League of 13 (5 defeats in last 5 games) U18 Team 13th in League of 13 (1 draw in last 5 game ) Looks like the whole playing side is going tits up from top to bottom, aany hope of loads of new youngsters coming through to save the day looks to be a forlorn one. I really like RH and hope we keep him but it does appear that it's time to rip up his "playbook" and have a total tactical rethink.

Just wondering, was VAR the reason the PL banned the artistic pitch mowing the likes of us and Leicester tried to outdo each other with every week?. Love to see them trying to judge how to draw the offside lines straight on some of those pitches.

I'd agree, if they couldn't prove original call was wrong then they had to back it. But they drew 2 lines on screen. Bartley's(if he's the guy nearest the camera) foot and Vesterfard's foot. So offside. I'm sure someone in the VAR booth is watching Sky as well and realises after play has resumed, "Shit we lined up with the wrong player's foot" and quickly made up some nonesense about obscured body views to pass on to the commentary team and get themselves out of a self-dug hole.

That was so blatantly wrong it was laughable. The two forwards even had different colour boots there was no excuse, yet they managed to come up with not being able to get an angle that showed the goal scorers body 🤣

Think you're right. First half especially we seemed to hold our formation well, rarely did I look at the defense/midfield and wonder where one of them had gone. It's just that WBA were ghosting past them as if they weren't there. Apart from one excellent chasing back tackle by Bertrand I can hardly remember a challenge being made. Then when we did get the ball I can't remember seeing so many underhit passes. They sat on the lead after HT so Vestergaard spent most of his time pushing up into midfield but there was still too many passes going nowhere, no-one making the incisive runs to enable a defernce splitting pass. Hopefully Adams can start in the semi, really don't think we can accomodate Theo and Redmond in the same team. (assuming Mimimimo cup-tied?)

Saints have been drawn against Leicester (City or Fosse) in the FA Cup 6 times before today. In one of those amazing FA Cup coincidences, Leicester have also previously drawn us 6 times .

For about the last 15 minutes I kept looking for him thinking maybe I'd missed a substitution, wherever I expected him to be Djnepo appeared, but Bertrand wasn't covering for him either. Then I kept spotting him in or around the edge of their area. Unsure if he was told to try out some new tactic or simply deserted his defensive duties due to being bored shitless with nothing to do back there.

I think you're getting confused with the fact that Sholing's ground is in Portsmouth Rd.😂😂😂

Lunchtime kick off. Everyone has gone straight down the pub to celebrate. Oh 😥