sandwichsaint

Is MLG Jordan Sibley? I think we should be told.

What's the story with the 'free' electricity panels I'm regularly being offered? Have to say I'm quite tempted from the 'never look a gift horse in the mouth' perspective, though I'm also hearing warning bells of the 'if something seems too good to be true then it probably is' variety. What's the deal with the 25 year tie-ins? Is my roof strong enough? (It is quite a good size and it is south facing). Will these panels really: save me money, make my house warmer, improve my love life? Anybody been down this route or know anybody that has?

Presumably these odds (all odds) are as much a reflection of the money coming in than any 'objective' view of the outcome? Saints (and West Ham) will be short money all the time people are betting on them. Look at the price for England to win the World Cup (any World Cup!), I don't know exactly what it was but it was prob something like 10-1 or 12-1 during qualifying and something like 5-1, 6-1, 7-1 when the tournament started; 'realistically' it was probably somewhere north of 25-1 but no bookie could afford to offer those odds. Don't expect to see Saints at a more realistic 10-1, 12-1, 16-1 to win the Championship any time soon. PS Haven't opened the link so ignore me if I'm talking rubbish!

Fair comment tho I think you can read the original both ways - your way is certainly a possible interpretation - I was thinking more of the 'let's sign some Prem Lge has-beens and reserves' - I hope we don't go down that road but I wouldn't say no to somebody like Bowyer (tho you have to balance that off with the fact if you pay one player a premium wage then, quite reasonably, half a dozen of our top boys will all then want to be on the same sort of whack). Back to yours, genuine question, do you think there will be 'plenty' of options to buy Premier Lge standard players (players that have either already played in the PL or players with the potential to move up and be successful) and that we can sign these fairly scarce players for very much less than a PL wage? As I say, genuine question. What is the gap in wages between the best 5% of players in the Championship and the bottom, say quarter, of players in the PL? I think that if we continue our policy of buying players from the league above and buying the 'best' pound-for-pound players from our rivals, especially in a scenario where we are either backed by the 'Liebherr millions' or we are sitting on 10m from the sale of AOC we will surely have to pay near-to Prem wages for the privilige? Tell me I'm wrong, perhaps we can pick up 4 or 5 'Prem standard' players for championship wages?

No! There is a world of difference between funding L2 players on L1 wages (RL? AL? JF? KD?) and funding Prem wages on a Championship income stream.... I see nothing to suggest we can afford 4/5/6 players on 'Prem' wages next year (could be wrong tho!)

Surely it's down to a bit of both? To 'compete' in the Prem (ie to have 'any' chance of survival) QPR probably need a minimum of 6-8 new players, perhaps up to a dozen new players. All these new players will come with very high add-ons in terms of signing on fees, agents cut, bonuses etc. before you add in any transfer fee. It probably costs somewhere between 1m-3m to get a bog-standard premier lge journeyman through the front door, before you look at paying 'premier league' wages and before you push the boat out on one or two 'name' signings. Factor in the rise in wages for the existing payers and their promotion bonuses and it's obvious QPRs costs have just gone through the roof. Obviously a lot of this is negated by the big Sky money available, but it still makes sense from the club's POV to absolutely max their income (or as you or I would say to completely shaft their loyal supporters!) On the other side they are clearly charging what they think the market will bear. They are offering top-line football (at least they will be from half a dozen of the visiting sides) right in West London and they have a very limited capacity- clearly they've done their hmwk and think they will sell out, or nearly sell out at these prices. The people to feel sorry for are their regular core supporters who've stuck by them home and away through some pretty lean times and are now being screwed sideways if they want to watch them in the Prem league. Realistically is there any alternative? They could freeze their prices, play this year's team, take the Sky money, and go straight back down; would 'fans' really want that? QPR have private backers and Sky money, surely they could make a go of it without fleecing their own and everybody else's fans too? Or perhaps there is a middle way - is it that the cost of employing Premier League footballers dictates that clubs need £40/seat per game just to stand still? I really do fear for my Saints supporting future when we get back in the Prem, on today's prices I don't think I would pay more than £30 for a standard game and maybe £35 for a premium game, equally the same prices would apply for me away from home: I just could not envisage spending £40 to watch Saints play in a bog-standard, mid-table Prem Lge game. Other than that it would be the cups for me home and away, and the odd Birthday/Boxing Day game.

Have you not both got it a little bit wrong? A wage cap would presumably drive the highest earners (the biggest star players) out of the league (assuming it wasn't a universal cap across the whole football world), this would over a period of time leave a less-good product for which simple economics would say there would be less demand. Which would then leave the clubs with a choice of say crowds of 18k paying 40 quid a go, or crowds of 36k paying 20 quid a go .... factor in merchandising and match-day extras and clubs would clearly prefer crowds of 36k to crowds of 18k. I'm sure all club's would 'like' to keep their prices at £40 for a less good product but all demand has some sort of elasticity and although all clubs have their 'die hard' fan base they all have their 'plastics' too ... look right at home to see that this is true. Clearly rising ticket prices have been driven by consumer demand (to see big stars and big glamour) and by clubs maximising their revenue by setting the highest tkt prices they can - to cover their costs and to make themselves more competitive, whether that be winning things or merely staying in the same league .... as a large part of their costs are 'wages' is it not logical to assert that clubs charge high tkt prices to fund players' wages?

Each to their own, Ipswich and Leeds are a couple of my favourite aways though I agree with Cov, Brum and Derby (apart from the play off obviously!). The game I'm most keen to avoid next season is Millwall away (all that penning and queueing to get out); Middlesborough is also a long way to go to menaced by over-aggressive stewards in a souless, half empty St Mary's-lite.

What's with the faux Blackpool rivalry! FFS, some of you sound like Bompey fans. Blackpool have been a breath of fresh air in the Prem and Holloway is a much, much better manager than his village idiot persona lets on; shame he won't ever get to prove it a bigger club. If they've looked after their finances (and no reason to think they haven't) IMO they will be a major threat if Holloway stays and he gets some of the parachute money to rebuild. I would expect both Blackpool and the battery-chuckers to finish top 6.

Murphy's decent but do We Need A Keeper? wot do u think?

Duh! somebody post this up for me - and tell me how you did it!

http://losslessalbum.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/The-Beatles-%E2%80%93-Sgt.-Pepper%E2%80%99s-Lonely-Hearts-Club-Band.jpg

Interesting stuff and I broadly agree with your rankings (think you've probably got Forest one too high and maybe Stoke one too low?) What sort of time scale are we talking about, say 10 years? On that basis it's very encouraging to see that we are as well placed as almost anyone on that page to move up a level; it's quite possible that we can be level with (or better than) West Ham, Sunderland, or Notts Forest in ten years time. (We 'could' beat Forest and West Ham on crowds and league position next season!) What the list does show is the massive leap required to get into the top 8-9 clubs and with all the will in the world that has to be seen as 'unlikely' at this stage, think most people would be very happy if we were solidly established in that fourth tier.

So what you're really saying is that Holloway should have continued with his first team in the cup, let them enjoy a game without as much pressure as a regular league game, hopefully/maybe win, preserve their momentum and team spirit, go on a bit of a 'cup run', and generate a bit of enthusiasm and extra cash from the fan base; maybe even win a trophy? And they may well have been in a beter position league-wise than by stopping their whole season, playing 10 reserves, and taking a confidence sapping hit from defeat by a third division team. That can't be right can it?

You never see a poor bookie do you?

I more than the team that comes third?

I don't see much incentive for the club to change what they did this year. NC's plan to sell fairly expensive STs in a a very narrow window, no half STs, no late STs, push hard on the day prices and add a tkt tax appears to have come up completely trumps - base crowds of 18-20k, rising to 25k for the bigger games, chuck in Brighton and Walsall, chuck in a cup game with Man U and playing just about all our other cup games at home - and NC can be seen as either a brilliant general or a lucky general! I guess we will see STs available in June and July only at 475-590, and day tickets at 24-30 plus the booking fee - take it or leave it! The club will see last season as a massive justification of last season's pricing policy; we will buy two or three decent players, we will do pretty well in the championship particularly at home, we will get crowds of 22-24, more if we are winning. I will prob go to 10 homes and 10 aways (and still not be able to get a ticket for the away leg of the play-off semi).... Boooooo.

And ain't that the truth? All this 'predictor' this and 'games in hand' that; 'what the second place team got last year' bollix can only take you so far, the points needed for promotion is the same as, or one more, than the team that comes third. If the team in third is going like a train then you have to go like a train, plus one. Which is pretty much how it happened. At the risk of poking a sleeping mathematical hornets' nest I'd say that at the time it was made 28 was a 'better' prediction than 20! As it happened 28 would have got us there with something to spare, 20 wasn't enough, even if 20 did turn out to be nearer the final requirement than 28. Factor in Hudds 'winning' their last game and the realistic benchmark was prob 24 points - an estimate of 20 turned out to be a game and a half short and an estimate of 28 was a game and a half too high. I know which side of that split we'd all like to be on.

Two bald men fighting over a comb! Did you really stay up until 2 o'clock to post this!! If anyone is going to bump this thread it will be me!!! I called it before Charlton away as us needing 7 wins and 4 mulligans (a draw or a lose) ... as it turned out we would have made it on goal difference with 7 wins and 1 draw, and we actually needed 7 wins and two draws to win it outright ... a pretty good prediction by me!!!! And can we go easy on the mental illness insults - anyone with any experience of these issues will know in reality this debilitating illness is a million miles away from the casual stereotype.

Just out of interest, has any team ever done well in their first season in a new stadium? My perception (and nothing more) is that half the teams do about the same as they were before, and half the teams have stepped back a level in their first season in a new stadium. I guess Brighton fans should be optimistic about playing in a shiny new stadium in front of bigger crowds, but is there any reason to think their team will 'automatically' step up a level?

This... LOL at those Saints fans who are mocking Walsall bringing 1500 on Saturday .... Respect!

Great grounds, great people, c-rap pitches! Never thought I would see Saints at wycombe, colchester, swindon, brentford, southend, Walsall, hartlepool, or dagenham! FFS! Let's move on and put it all down to life's rich tapestry. Onwards and upwards COYRs.

Leg one has been great! Two of the best seasons i

Saints Web in a nutshell?