The Kraken

We'll see. I've been keeping an eye on it, we've sold a few hundred since the middle of last week. I imagine we'll get close to sell out, maybe achieving that on the day itself.

Tickets aren't exactly flying out; still comfortably over 2,000 seats available. Villa have taken their full allocation.

:lol: Christ on a bike. A wage bill well above the league average, recruiting players many other teams simply cannot afford, and avoiding relegation would justify a manager of the year award! :lol: Give Appy the keys to the city.

We have no way of knowing in either case, so its pure speculation on both our parts. Just a personal opinion, but I don't think we filled the main priority positions that NA identified (I still find the signings of Mayuka and Rodriguez to be a little bizarre at this stage). You disagree, I respect that, I guess we'll never find out one way or the other.

Maybe he lies about his height (that's why he gets on with Cortese so well).

Fair enough.

It was reported on BBC right at the start of the transfer saga; I've just looked again but they don't seem to archive that far back. Adkins comments on it were very clear that he didn't know too much about the impending transfer. Its not something I made up, in fact I think I commented on it on here at the time (but I'm buggered if I'm trawling back through that thread to find it! I'm not saying Adkins didn't want him; just it very much didn't sound like NA had highlighted him in particular as a target.

He's 6'2"; taller than John Terry.

Agreed, but that's what I think we have. I'm sure NA is involved, in suggesting the positions he needs and the type of player, then the committee does the rest. Quite how much influence NA has is IMO debatable. As I said he clearly knew very little about Ramirez, I assume the same for Mayuka too. And he stated that he wanted to bring in 1 or 2 keepers, 1 or 2 CBs, and a left back yet only got 2 of those 5; one a reserve keeper and one right at the end of the transfer window. I'm not sure if our signings matched the priorities of the manager.

Where on this thread has anyone called for Nigel Adkins to be replaced? Edit: found it, Saint Richmond, come on down.

Buttner didn't seem to have any problems in wanting to sign for us, before we backed out and Man United came in for him. We spent about £30M this window, I'm not sure I can say attracting players was our problem. No idea on the playing side, but its fairly obvious from Adkins' quotes that the signing of Ramirez in particular was not directly his choice, but made by the transfer committee. Adkins knew hardly anything about him in the early stages.

Because of international duty Ramirez has only had one day of training with us; Friday, the day before the game. These training sessions are typically strategy based and intended to finalise set plays and systems, kind of reinforcing certain scenrios and positioning. Also, we were leading 2-1 with the team that started against Man United, so its far from unreasonable to give those players a chance again. Again, given that Ramirez and Yoshida have only trained with the squad for 1 day, and Mayuka for a day or two longer than that, I'd suggest he doesn't, no. But he will do by the time of the Villa game next week. Agree with that; I feel anything but a win against Villa will push Cortese into making a managerial change. Do I agree with that? Not in the slightest. But I simply don't see that he'll have the patience to stick with NA; he may consider that he's spent £30M or so on players this summer but is relying upon a manager he recruited from the lower leagues. As I say, I think that would be entirely the wrong move, but then I'm not the Chairman and we know that he's pretty ruthless in getting what he wants.

We seem to be going from one extreme to the other with the latest revelations. Back in 1989 it was initallly all the fans' fault, thousands of drunks and ticketless yobs caused the disaster. The Taylor Report thankfully went some way to redressing that balance, and highlighted the true cause of the tragedy whilst also apportioning a small amount of responsibility upon a minority of drunk and unruly fans. It now seems that there is currently underway a bit of a whitewash of this fact, and a desire to claim that all fans were not culpable in any way at all. This isn't right IMO. Most of the fans weren't to blame in any way, that's perfectly clear. And the actions of the few weren't a hugely contributory factor in the ensuing events of the day; but they did have an impact, that's for sure, and I don't think that should be forgotten or glossed over. I'm all for the families finding the justice they are looking for; of course I am and I think most right minded people would hope for that too. The police were ultimately to blame for what happened that day, and the fault lies at their feet. But it remains a fact that there were a minority of Liverpool fans that day who let themselves down, and as you rightly say, I think they (and the public) should admit they played a direct role in making a terrible situation even worse that it already was.

Couldn't really go anywhere else. The team that started against Man U was 2-1 up before it got reshuffled. Yoshida and Ramirez will only have trained yesterday, which is normally a finalising session working on specific positioning tactics and such like, so no real chance to integrate into the squad. I'd expect to see Ramirez for Puncheon at some point, and having Chaplow is a decent option if we're looking to shore things up and need a bit of energy in the midfield. Decent selection IMO, but would expect Ramirez and Yoshida in for the Villa game. I'm still not quite sure what Mayuka "does" yet, or where he fits in.

Double facepalm and then some, this lad is still digging! We lost £30M in League 1! Of course we did, you daft c*nt! And Oxlade-Chamberlain's £15M sale didn't offset any of the Academy costs at all! Luke Shaw hasn't played a league game yet and is already worth a value approximately equivalent to 2 years worth of Academy funding. JWP probably the same, possibly more so. The sheer bitterness, I can just see him crying into his cornflakes and stamping his feet at the indignation of it all!

About to drop? As in, imminently? In which event he could potentially miss the game? Or have they just found out she's pregnant?

If it were up to me I'd instantly eject anyone who shouts out cr*p like that. The new fad is to shout random irrelevant nonsense like "Mash potato" or other such hilarity. As you say the Ryder Cup is going to be intolerable; I may have to watch on mute.

Golf is no less a sport than hammer throwing, shot put or discuss, and they're considered part of "athletics". If you're discrediting golf I think your list of actual accredited sports is going to be pretty low. I'll go for Aussie Rules. Bores me to tears within 10 seconds. But, especially back in the 80s, they really knew how to have a good on-field team punch up.

Agent Trevor

Hi Fratts. I'm still there, my old son. Not sure who you banned in your fit of pique, but it wasn't me

By his own admission Chainrai submitted his bid last week, so it must be in a pretty poor state if it still doesn't tick all of Trev's boxes. The Trust have supposedly upped their bid since they initially offered only part payment of the player deferrals, but obviously they're still some way short of where they need to be. I'd be massively worried by Birch's actions if I were the Trust. PKF's fees plus legal bills is fast approaching £2M now, and there's various other creditors highlighted in PKF's report who still have sums outstanding. That will have to be paid, and will be done so from the existing bank account which has been funded by the parachute payments (the same parachute payments which the Trust need to actually function). So the longer it all goes on, the PKF keep billing at their average of £299 per hour, the less operating cash the new owner will have to keep the club afloat if/when they finally get over the line. I'm very surprised Birch hasn't faced any sort of challenge from creditors; there's surely an argument that the amount of cash in the bank is more than the value of the club were they to liquidate.

What a surprise. Tricky Trev has extended the deadline further still. http://www.portsmouth.co.uk/sport/pompey/pompey-past/portpin-and-pompey-supporters-trust-handed-extra-time-for-bids-to-buy-south-coast-club-1-4266646

Not entirely sure; but I think one of the posters there lifted a bit of info from the post I made on here about Pompey's wage budget perhaps not being as low as they keep claiming; he then posted similar info on there, Frattoniser put 2 and 2 together and made 458, and promptly banned him. After which he had a hissy fit, claimed it was me, said I told him he'd never find me on there and wasn't he great for finding me. So some poor Pompey fan has had his account terminated because Frattoniser is a bit paranoid; that'll be confusing for the poor soul when he tries to log in next :lol:

I've actually got a login of my own now Hypo, so you're not at risk