The Kraken

I remember this coming up before. Wasn't the TV on in a pub, not the radio? I have a memory of Leicester maybe being on TV, either that or Darius Vassell!!

Like others, I made the mistake this time last season of questioning whether RL could be as effective at Championship level as he was at League 1. Last season I thought his all round game actually improved, and he kept scoring goals too. This time round I'm more than willing to hold my horses and wait to see what he can do; instinct tells me he will succeed. When we played Pompey in the cup as a League 1 side he completely bossed them about and on another day could have easily got a couple of goals. And our team to support him is immeasurably better than then. The centre backs even for the top sides are really not going to relish playing against him, and he is a great penalty and free kick taker. Plus in pre-season last he scored only 1 goal, which led to many to write him off. I think he'll be a star. Besides, what's the uproar in putting a £10 bet on?! Are forum users so poor that wasting £10 on an optimistic bet is deemed so tragic as to question someone's sanity?

Chainrai's bid goes through, the council saves face, repeat the administration process when the parachute payments stop.

Of course they're trvial, its a message board for irrational and bored people while the football isn't on! Anyway, I don't want to carry on moaning about the people moaning about the moaning....

In which case I find it surprising that you're trying to stop others doing the same. But never mind.

Maybe some do find it hard to navigate. I don't like the OS, not for those reasons, but I thnk its pretty bad. Same old rules, really. If you don't like the debate, either don't participate in it or try and shape it. Sniping from the sidelines about everyone moaning is equally pointless; just ignore it or put up a counter argument.

Well that's an obvious bonus.

Are only positive comments allowed?

That doesn't mean the gnashing and wailing won't strike up on cue after our first 3, 4 or 5 games where, lets face it, we'd be doing amazingly well not to be bottom of the table given our fixture list. Actually it probably won't take that long.

Reading have pretty much completed their signings for the summer, they purposefully got it all done early. They signed 8 players. West Ham have secured contracts for 7 players who are either new signings or confirmed from previous loans.

What about if we lose every one of our first, say 10 games?

Four Four Two have announced their prediction for the final positions in the PL. 1) Man City 2) Man Utd 3) Spurs 4) Arsenal 5) Chelsea 6) Liverpool 7) Newcastle 8 )Everton 9) Sunderland 10) Aston Villa 11) Stoke City 12) Fulham 13) QPR 14) Norwich 15) West Ham 16) Wigan 17) Southampton 18 ) Reading 19) West Brom 20) Swansea I can't see Spurs finishing above arsenal, though agree with Chelsea in 5th. No way Stoke as high as 11th, I think they'll struggle. Bottom 5 or 6 about right, West Brom with Steve Clarke could be in trouble IMO.

I didn't ever say there was, in fact I stated that there wasn't.

Put TBH's windows in.

I wouldn't read too much into it; Birch has done all his business through the media and this could just be his latest tactic to put pressure on TBH and Lawrence to sort their deals out.

He saw a UFO as well, or some other such nonsense.

"Twitter" is a bit of a vague source.

I think we will. 1 or 2 CBs, left back / left wing for the Buttner collapsed deal, and a right sided winger as alluded by NA. If we want quality then those positions won't come cheap.

I'm not sure why you're getting aggressive with me. In any case I must have failed to see the hordes of people claiming the club are doing nothing about signings; there seems to me to just be a concern that we haven't hit NA's targets of bringing players in before the 19th (and with no rumours in the wings as per previous signings its looking increasingly unlikely that we will). Would be disappointing to not hit the manager's expactations of readiness for the start of the season is all.

Would love to get Jarvis from Wolves; £7M or £8M could get him, but I doubt we're looking at spending that much.

You're preaching to the choir about this. Most people surely know that the recruitment team are not sat around scratching their arses. This is the point. We struggled to get our targets last year with various late aborted efforts for centre-backs. Nigel Adkins has set himself an objective to have players in by the Man City game, and its getting closer and closer with no player in sight and no new news. So therefore its a concern that we could go into the season with a team that the manager doesn't consider strong enough in certain areas.

No idea. The stories that I've heard are that the club are exploring options for a sale, as the family want to explore their exit strategies. No timeframes or anything and its not immediate, but heard they're looking for buyers. All rumour of course (which I first heard almost a year ago), so we'll see.

I take the rumour seriously as I've heard it from a couple of people who work within football; but its far from a new rumour, and certainly not encouraged by that bullsh*t site.

Is it big enough to accommodate all those extra fans? I'd guess not, I remember it being a moderately small bar.

They've been charging membership for some time now; its being refurbished, its not a new thing.