The Kraken

Colbury.

I think he sponsored SRS a ton for his Brighton ultimate marathon too. A generous man, but still a loony.

A separate thing, but Channon Jnr's Windmill Diaries were a classic.

In light of the other thread running. Which posters did you used to enjoy on here, but don't any more? Apparently there are lots, so lets have a list. For me, only a couple: 19 Canteen, a fantastic loony; and StuRomseySaint, a poor old soul but capable of causing an e-riot on here. You?

This place was brilliant before they all left. The likes of you have ruined this place since.

Or dead....even an old school defender like Lawrenson is defending it. "Its what happens these days". I do hate that attitude.

3-1 now. But the amount of diving and cheating is off the scale.

The best. Oh I yearn for the good ol' days.

I preferred BournemouthSaint.

Not me though

Having lived in the US for 2 years, and visited the country on over 50 separate occasions (34 states and counting) the first line in this is the most accurate statement I've yet seen on this thread. The second is equally true.

Oh, and rallyboy for top spot. A genuinely cleverly hilarious man.

For me, and in terms of SFC related ITK-ness: Essruu, VFTT, FloridaMarlin, THEVMAN. For basic enjoyment of the forum and those who actually get the idea that its a place for a bit of p*ss taking and being taken the p*ss out of from time to time: CBFry, SmirkingSaint, Turkish, DogDog, BearFeatures, Tokyos and probably a few others who I'm too lazy or carefree to mention right now.

If you think those are the two only major downsides you've missed an awful lot.

You won't win respect like that, son.

And/or the booze....?

miltonroader07 and ART. They always speak sense.

For those who do travel abroad; I take it you do it as its a good opportunity to spend a few days away rather than for the game itself? I went to the pre-season game against Wolves last season at St. Marys and f*ck me it was a tiresome game!

If aliens do/have paid us a visit, I hope the last place they go/went is America.

Spain is looking good at the moment

Luke Shaw will the latest acid test. If we can keep him until he's in his 20s then we might be onto something. Anyway for me its a little irrelevant trying to stave off the big boys; its making sure we don't lose players to the tier two type sides such as Everton, Newcastle, Villa and previously Sunderland. We've lost the likes of Beattie, Kachloul etc to those clubs in the past, if we can cut that out as being seen by the player as a significant upwards move then that'll have more benefit in fighting a losing battle against the top 4.

And I've got no problem with that way of thinking. Look at the current batch of Saints graduates and your "1 a year" assertion isn't too far off. Its been a really good turnaround of players. Expecting us to hold onto those players? Much more difficult. As soon as top 4, Champions league clubs come in we're really, really up against it. And it will be the exception rather than the norm if we can keep those at bay. We've had a brilliant youth system for many years, if we can just look to continue and develop that I'd be absolutely delighted. Putting limits and unrealistic targets on it is a bit pointless IMO.

So we only had to keep hold of £80M rated Gareth Bale. And England stars Walcott and Chamberlayne. So close.

And these were the words from Les Reed in 2011, so I think the original sentiment was actually correct. "We’ve got an ambition to be not just a Premier League club but a competitive Premier League club,’ says Reed. ‘If we want half our team to come from the academy, which we do, the recruitment needs to be the best, and the development plan for each individual needs to be excellent, as do the facilities, the sports science and the technical quality of the coaching."

Kind of a pointless stat then, really. To "graduate" from the academy it means that you've been through the youth team and then been selected first team squad through that. So "graduation" in itself is the art of being selected for the first team squad. Unless they're saying they want half the Under 18 team to "graduate", its pretty much unquantifiable.