The Kraken

I think there are plenty of people on here who genuinely thought we would be targetting a mid-table place. Most would have accepted it at the end of the season of course, but there were quite a few who said we should rule out promotion and consolidate! NA and NC look to have played a blinder as far as transfers are concerned (so far), and if we do get a new striker and a Jaidi-like CB come on board, well, that would be amazing.

Just how many "agents" are there on twitter absolutely gagging to spill the beans about every deal going?! :lol:

You realise we won on the opening day of the season, right? And that we won on Tuesday, correct? Couldn't have been too far away from being "ready". Obvious WUM is obvious.

Ewe Rosler

Why not? Even is he doesn't leave Brizzle it could happen.

With AOC the club have known he was going since Xmas. Christ, even I knew it was a fact he was going to Arsenal back in March (although the usual suspects shouted me and others down about it at the time....). So they've had 6 months to prepare for exactly what they need to replace him and strengthen the squad. Good work all round and well done NC and NA. Now get on with it and get the other two on the bus, pronto!

Good news. I wasn't too surprised about this one though. I could be mistaken, but i believe that Morgan is now considered a home grown player with us, as he's spent 3 years here before his 21st (he turned 21 last November but I'm sure that season counts). As a consquence we would have been entitled to a development fee for him if he had left when his contract expired., so it's in his interests to presumably get himself on better wages for at least a season then see what happens. I'm sure MLG will be along soon to correct me on that, but that's the way I read it.

Sorry, couldn't resist it. Agree about the CB, Seaborne just isn't there for me. Martin is ok as cover but againts top strikers will get found out at times. And it seems as if old age has caught up with big Radhi. If someone like Gorkss and (as is still being rumoured) Maynard were to arrive, well that would be as close to a brilliant summer transfer window as you'd realistically hope for.

Probably would have been more accurate listening to what Exeter fans were saying about him

Very much agree. NA has already said that other deals were in place before Chamberlain going, so hopefully there is still room for a CB and CF. Mills was looking like going to Preston at one point wasn't he? I'm sure his days here are numbered.

Agree with you, not sure I'd have prioritised LB over the other two poisitions. But then NA did comment that there were deals still in place, so maybe the first of two or three. Fourth Official on twitter is still saying Maynard is on his way, I just would really like to see a Jaidi-type replacement to play alongside Fonte. i think Dickson's days are numbered; couldn't displace Harding last term, hasn't looked all that sharp this season. Now third in line, and with Ben Reeves also coming through.

Can't see Dickson getting much of a go this year, he failed to displace Harding last year. Not sure that I'd have prioritised a new left back, but I'm sure NA knows what's doing....

Nah, has to be incoming, they'd never talk up a departure like that.

Hasn't he been banging on about this for a while now?! The bloody tease.

FloridaMarlin, can't fault the effort!! I'm not sure if I agree with you though. You seem to be suggesting that the motive of the clubs is to restrict access to only club websites that can give out score information etc. Which is a similar motive to what SFC tried to do with the photo thing. I really don't think that's the issue here. i think the clubs are all saying that any website will still be free to post the information they currently provide, with no form of censorship or otherwise. It's just that a hefty charge will now be incurred. Your concerns are all perfectly valid, I just don't see that they're entirely relevant in this particular situation.

I was going to debate the matter, then you come out with the unnecessary Lowe comment, which is neither true nor realistic. You put your dummy back in and we'll choose to ignore each other. You offer nothing but ignorance and childish idiocy.

Unfortunately there are a minority of people like that on here; I'll thank you for not insulting my intelligence or willingness for rational debate by ranking me alongside them. Its a cheap and ignorant shot.

There is that argument. All publicity is good publicity, and all that. I think this is more an exercise in control. In itself, the fixture list publication fee that I mentioned is utterly ridiculous. That you can't publish a list of teams next to a list of other teams without having to pay a huge amount of money is just a laughable idea. Yet there it is, in law. This is just the very next step along those lines, making all websites etc have to pay for publishing live scores or any information from the grounds. If it passes you can expect massive crackdowns on individuals and websites reporting from matches. Not a good thing. As for your second paragraph, all I'll say is that it smacks of censorship, and is the potential start of an erosion of free press. At least with this current situation, there are no potential censorship issues, it's just making various news outlets pay up for the privilege of distributing their own content.

F*ck off telling me who to support you clown! You're so clueless, do you really have to resort to making things up?! As I've said, please feel free to identify where I continually slag him off. Unlike you seem to be, I am capable of being very grateful and complimentary about the many things Mr Cortese has done for our club. He has made some mistakes, but they are far outweighed IMO by the good things he has and continues to do. You are clearly an idiot if you can't or won't do something similar, or indeed recognise it in others. Go and support someone else. Are you 10 years old?

Please feel free to identify my negativity towards all those factors. I suggest you grow up a little if you're incapable of entering into a debate without throwing your toys out of the pram and polarising everyone into a pro-Cortese or anti-Cortese camp, which is a ridiculous notion in itself.

The "free content" motive, yes. That's where the motive is similar I agree. The methods though are vastly different. The clubs are not looking to restrict incoming photographers such that only medium that is allowed out is one that is effectively controlled by the club. That's what Mr Cortese was trying to do, no other photographers were to be allowed in oher than ones employed by the club. The current situation seems to be almost an extension of the rule whereby you have to pay to be able to reproduce the fixture lists etc. There's no restriction on who can access the ground and publish the information, the clubs just seem to want to extract a fair charge for it.

You are aware that, while there are some similarities with the motives, there are massive differences between what Cortese was trying to achieve and what the clubs are trying to achieve this time round? Right?

Oh dear. You really don't know too much, do you?

What a ridiculous statement. Wilde gambled all the family silver on getting back to the Premier League. That failed. We all know what a crippling, financial mess that left us in. Lowe then went on to make further mistakes with the appointment of the Dutch duo, but while his actual methods were flawed many could see that, given our state at the time, we didn't have too many other choices than to make huge financial cuts. As for your statement "at least he tried, and gave us hope", well I find that remarkable. Peter Ridsdale has tried at a couple of clubs; he's overspent and they've almost gone to the wall. Peter Storrie tried, and gave Pompey hope for a while. Does that make them good chairmen? No, it doesn't. Lowe did quite a few good things for this club He also made some very, very poor errors in judgement. But he always had a plan to keep the club on the financial straight and narrow. Wilde and his lot spent money they didn't have chasing a footballing dream, then woke up to a financial nightmare of their own creation.