Whitey Grandad

Is it a case of not showing live action in the stadium if the match is being broadcast long TV? I seem to imagine a correlation but I don't have any real evidence.

I'm not sure. Finish 4th and get knocked out of the first home/away leg and that might be curtains. I've tried looking this up and gave up because my head started hurting too much. http://www.uefa.com/uefachampionsleague/season=2015/competitionformat/index.html http://worldsoccer.about.com/od/leaguesandclubs/a/How-Teams-Qualify-For-The-Champions-League.htm From reading these it appears to me that 4th place gets you into the play-off round where the winners go through to the Champions League group phase and the losers go into the Europa Cup. So 4th would guarantee Europa League as a minimum plus an extra home/away tie. At least, that's how it was for this season.

You're very welcome, just so log as you haven't bought my two seats

It appears we do. It has happened: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Loss-Essex-Whale-Penguin-Classics/dp/0140437967

We've been in this situation before, it's just that it was in League 1 and the Championship. I don't know which is more stressful.

Aye, there's the rub. These are only the warmest years in modern records. The world has been a lot warmer before, and a lot colder, come to that.

Yes, indeed they do. But it's wrong to highlight just one decision amongst all the others in the match which may not have had as much of an important direct influence on the result. If they're going to examine just the one then they ought to examine all the others.

That's fair enough, but as shown on MOTD (amongst all the replays) the referee was close and had a clear view. Fortunately for us he decided it wasn't enough for a penalty. Strangely enough nobody analysed the ball hitting a Newcastle player on the arm a couple of second before.

There's not enough time to think in these situations. The time of travel of the ball is shorter than a normal human reaction time. The trouble with making all contact with the hand a penalty is that teams would spend the whole game aiming at their opponents hands instead of trying to score a goal. Then we might end up something like rugby or American Football with 4 points for a normal goal, two for a penalty foul and one for a penalty handball. Where would it all end?

You're absolutely right, of course. What I meant was that it's not surprising that anyone should be surprised that some of us are surprised by others being surprised by our position. I know I am

Please don't, it's always good to hear from you and I didn't mead it to sound like a put-down, I was just expressing a different opinion.

But your friend wasn't refereeing this game, so his opinion doesn't count any more than yours or mine. In my opinion it was definitely ball to hand and I don't consider that Fonte was charging down the ball but some referees would have given it. What I don't like to see is the endless discussion about these type of incidents with all the endless replays and slow-notion views. It wasn't given, life goes on. Some pundits are far too ready to hand out penalties right, left and centre. A penalty is a severe sanction and should be awarded sparingly. Perhaps teams should concentrate more on trying to score through normal means and TV could cut out all the over-analysis.

This indeed. He did his job here too well.

Ah, but that's what I'm used to!

But does he have the necessary beard?

It would need them to slump a little and we would have to be near 100% but if we hang in there the last game of the season could be very interesting.

A special mention for Mike Read today, always in control and kept up with play. It always gives more authority to your decisions if you're standing right next to the players when you blow your whistle.

It's hard at the top.

There's a comment on another thread about heads coming up ten times in a row and the probability of the next toss. Probability doesn't really come into it. Last year was as warm as a previous one, more or less. And what about the years that aren't on record?

It's so annoying that you wouldn't want to say anything funny in front of him.

Probably it was his missus doing it in order to get him to commit.

Only that in other cases where he hit the woodwork it may been because of inaccuracy whereas yesterday it was because of a partial block.

Not really surprising though, is it?

That header was deflected off the shoulder (or something) of a defender.

Yes, it was just this one because in order to play in the first round he would have had to be registered by 12:00 on Friday 2nd Jan and the window hadn't opened by then.