Sheaf Saint

Here is an interesting idea... Why don't the FA / FL introduce a disciplinary system whereby teams get docked X amount of points every time they reach a certain amount of red/yellow cards. If they started using video panels to issue punishments for incidents missed by the officials then we would soon see a massive reduction in the type of gamesmanship that the clowns think is a perfectly acceptable way of playing the game.

Just watched all angles covered on Saints player and these are my thoughts on it... Brighton players are the worst bunch of whiny, theatrical, cheating tossers ever to grace the world of football. Harding was unlucky to get booked cos he won the ball and wasn't showing any studs that I could see. Reaction of the Brighton fans would have you believe he just decapitated their player. Lallana shot was clearly a foot over the line. Guly's open goal miss was a little more excusable than a lot of people on here made out as the ball was just behind him and he couldn't stop and hook his foot round it. Lambert sending off was comical. There's no way that was violent conduct and I am confident we will win the appeal. I stopped watching after that - didn't see the point of watching the inevitable horror show to come.

Why do so many people keep repeating how immense he was at Barnsley earlier this season? I was at that game and I thought he was actually quite poor. He's certainly no better than Hooiveld, so it really comes down to a question of if he is a better backup than Martin I guess, but I haven't really seen enough of either of them to make any kind of judgment.

Why should it?

No, not until it's mathematically impossible. In case you didn't realise we will still have a 3-point cushion at the top after this result. Some people are just unbelievable, but then I guess given our recent history it isn't that surprising.

Can you give me next week's winning lottery numbers please?

Because he's just like you Alpine: can't actually enjoy the ride when things are going well and instead continually moans so that when it does inevitably go wrong he can say "see, I told you so!"

Oh go and f***ing exterminate yourself you tedious wind-up merchant c*ck!

Clearly there are people on here with a much greater understanding of nuclear power generation than I, so I would be interested to hear your thoughts on this... http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/05/sellafield-nuclear-energy-solution?intcmp=122

I'm struggling to work out what formation we are playing, looking at the team lineup on BBC. Are Guly and De Ridder playing up front?

All well and good PFC123, but where are they all now that things aren't quite so rosy and FP isn't playing host to the superest dooperest glamour teams and players any more? Being a good 'supporter' means sticking with your team through thick and thin.

Does anybody know if I will be able to pay at the gate for this game? I can't seem to find anything on the OS about it.

Dammit. I took so long typing that last post that Alpine beat me to it regarding thorium.

You are certainly not alone in having these concerns about nuclear technology, but it is such a shame that there is so much opposition to it based on bad information. For starters, the safeguards in place in modern nuclear plants, such as in France, mean that what happened at Chernobyl could never happen again. What's even more sad about Chernobyl is that it could have been contained if it had been managed properly, but rather than immediately call for assistance, the people in charge allowed it to go past tipping point because they didn't want to bother their superiors and were afraid they would take the blame for it. As for Fukushima, well I can see people's concerns because it is so fresh in the memory, but you have to realise that it is a 40-year old plant that doesn't have the same safeguards as newer ones, and it was built on the most tsunami-susceptible coastline on the planet. Not exactly good forward-planning that. Of course, we wouldn't have such problems in the UK because we are nowhere near any fault lines and only experience extremely minor tremors at most. Yes nuclear is expensive, and there is still a lot of debate about how to manage the leftover waste, but in recent years there has been a lot of research done into the possible use of thorium as fuel instead of uranium... http://www.wired.com/magazine/2009/12/ff_new_nukes/all/1 This could be some way off being usable yet, likewise the ITER project which is researching nuclear fusion as an energy source, but both have excellent potential to become long-term clean, safe methods of energy production. For now though, I'm in agreement with James Lovelock (the climate scientist behind the Gaia theory) who not so long ago insisted publicly that nuclear fission is the best short-term solution to achieve the necessary reductions in carbon emissions.

This reminds me of the debate that erupted on here after the play-off game against Derby at SMS in 2007 where Pele gave away a penalty. My argument was that the initial contact was outside the box and so should not have been a penalty, but the consensus was that he was still holding on to the attacker when they crossed the line at which point the Derby player decided to fall over. Bit of a grey area.

I vividly remember this as I was so incensed about it at the time because we had been on a bad run, finally put in a great performance and deserved to get something out of it only to be robbed by the single worst refereeing decision I have ever seen. As I recall we had a corner and Monkou had come up from the back. Razor Ruddock was marking him and when Monkou turned to make space for himself, Ruddock lost him completely, so much so that he ran into one of his own team-mates and fell flat on his arse. Rennie decided that because of this it must have been a foul by Monkou who actually didn't get anywhere near making any contact with him.

Agreed. But the incident after that, where Lambert was ungraciously shoved off the ball by the same guy who was guilty of pulling his shirt in the first half, was the most blatant example of a foul you will ever see. It's fair to say the ref had a shocker today.

Yeah true, but a quick look at the table (any excuse right now TBH) shows we are currently 17 points ahead of them. Yep, that's right.... 17 points ahead of the team that all the pundits were tipping to walk this league because of their summer shopping spree. I keep expecting to wake up and realise it was all a dream.

From the replays I saw on the stream I was watching, the first was a blatant bodycheck on Guly as he went to go round the defender. No attempt to play the ball and every intention of stopping the player getting past him. About as clear a foul as you will ever see. The second one looked like the defender was trying to lift Lambert's shirt off his back (well, he is from Brighton after all!) and I don't see how anybody could watch it and claim it wasn't a foul. There was a handball in the box before these but it was point blank range ball-to-hand and although I've seen them given before, it would have been very harsh.

Bit of a strange game I guess with two dodgy penalties but they evened out the two we definitely should have had in the fist half. Perhaps the ref saw the replays of those at half time and realised his error so gave us a couple of soft ones to balance it out. After the red card it was a walk in the park, but even before that Brighton had nothing going forward (no shots on target according to BBC stats) and resorted to dirty tactics. Isn't is jut sooooo coincidental that a team managed by Gus chimp-face Poyet has the worst disciplinary record in the league? The table is 'as you were' with WHU coming back to win at Coventry, but Boro dropped some points at home, as did Birmingham who everybody was so concerned about if they won all their games in hand. After today's results they would still be 8 points behind us if they did. Can we start dreaming of the premiership yet?

Wonderful stuff, but why oh why oh why does my stream have to disappear every time we score FFS!?!?!? I've missed all the goals now. On a different note, I reeeeeeeally can't wait to hear what Poyet has to say after the game. No doubt he will tell us that Brighton were by far the better team and that the ref has cost them the game.

Summary of first half: frustrating. Saints clearly a little bit rusty from the international break and a ref who really should have gone to Specsavers!

Cov 1-0 up against WHU!

Poyet looks like he's busting for the toilet.

I'm really starting to dislike Marcus Painter. Made a total meal of it for Guly's yellow card and blatantly held Lambert as well.