SaintBobby

Am happy with Cortese only giving one or two set piece interviews per year. He's the overall organiser not the front man. Disagree with comments on Whelan though, think he's doing Wigan fans a favour by being very honest and direct about the situation re Martinez.

Nobody does it better....Carly Simon So bad it's good.

Oh please. Adam Lallana has a zillion more followers than me, and I get death threats and abuse regularly. Don't be so precious. Or, in the alternative, ask the Saints Comms team how they advise you operate this. Jordan Sibley is - after all - widely considered to be a genius in PR sports management.

One argument I totally don't get is that Cortese doesn't like season tickets because the club makes more on a match-by-match basis. In that case, just alter the price. Make it dearer to buy a season ticket than 19 individual match tickets. Fair enough, I guess. My sense is that the marketing/sales side of the operation is just a bit crap. Not the worst thing in the world, I can live with it. But it's not some brilliant co-ordinated strategy about narrowing a slaes window to sell more ticktes. It's just a bit crap.

We're likely to be in a relegation battle - along with about half the rest of the Premier League teams. I'll say 16th - but so hard to predict until we know who we sign and sell.

Gees...some people are really obsessed by this stadium expansion thing. We will jack up prices for the present capacity by quite a lot before we expand. If we can fill 32,500 regularly at c. £45 a ticket, then it's worth expanding. But not until then really.

Best example is Brighton away last season..went from 0-1 to winning 2-1 in last five or six minutes. Or were you watching the Champions League on Sky Sports at the time?

Z-list...that bloke who runs the IEA and is on the TV and radio a lot on economics etc. Mark Littleton?

I'm presently feeling we wil be around 12th-14th-ish. So, I reckon we will avoid the bottom three with room to spare. But the most important thing is staying up, not my random guess that we should stay up with a few places to spare. So, yes, I'd take 17th right now, no question.

I don't think anyone with even half a brain will listen to your precition other than to laugh at it and you. You were predicting a bottom third finish even when it was close to mathematically impossible. Word of advice? A period of silence would be an advisable step....

Having just watched the live post-match BBC coverage of the Coventry game and the Football League Show, it struck me how terrible our media management was. Obv, at the time I wasn't much bothered. And I wasnt much bothered when I watched the stuff half-cut on Saturday night. But seeing it again, Adkins has a live camera in his face at the final whistle and simply doesnt want it there. I imagine that the rather odd remarks that led some to belive he might not be Saints manager for too much longer were also made under similar pressure and with no press office present. It's a good example of how not managing the media well can cause stress for the spokesman (in this case, Adkins) or confusion in your intended story (n this case, a semi-rumour, referred to by the BBC, that Adkins might go). It's not very important in comparison to actually winning 4-0, but it is the sort of thing a half-competent £20K pa press officer wouldn't let happen.

I'm being dumb here. Is this a poll of who we want to go up or who we think will? I want anyone but West Ham (prob Birmingham if really had to decide) But I think it will probably be West bloody Ham.

I do like it when folk dig up these old threads. It does expose the loons for who they are.

We're going to come under much, much greater scrutiny in the Premier League. The club's approach to communications in the last couple of years has been pretty much the only area of Southampton's operations I've been worried about. It seems slapdash, haphazard and amateur. There will be negative consequences if there isn't a more constructive, engaging approach next season. Anything that "goes wrong" - player gets into a fight; player in court; player in "romp" with girl who isn't his missus etc - will come under much more scrutiny. These things being reported with the maximum amount of negativity will not be helpful - it can disrupt players' lives, mess with their pyschology/morale etc. The media will be much pushier on trying to discover the truth about injuries/lay-offs. It's probably not credible to keep insisting "no comment" - journalists will seek any info they can get and will offer cash for it if need be. Jordan Sibley's mobile continually going to voicemail might just about amount to a media strategy in League One. Not in the Premier League. I really hope the club seeks to appoint someone to overhaul and professionalise its communciations - just media but with fans too. I don't claim to have much first hand experiecne of Jordan Sibley, but I think there's some reasonably good evidence to suggest the task is probably beyond him (although he might be a good numebr two/number three).

1-0. 90th minute winner from Sharp. Those who haven't realised Hull are 6-0 up at Upton Park will go mental. So, in fairness, will the rest of us.

I don't understand the new rules. If some benefactor wants to give a club of his choosing a few million, let him. I can see why they'd want to tighten up on debt/leveraging but not on straight philanthropy.

Totally agree with you. Managers always say they aren't taking any notice of what's going on elsewhere - but that has to be rubbish if it affects what their own team needs. One thing I'm adamant on from the get go is that Bart should be on the bench as we could easily find ourselves in a "must draw" or "must not concede again" situation.

It's my 40th birthday. The Mrs kindly booked me a corporate box many moons ago for what we assumed would be a relaxing **** up at a (probably) irrelevant-ish game. Will now be either an utterly awesome or very crap 40th.... I still wish Leicester hadn't folded...

Pretty similar in terms of impact of result to the various great escape seasons - the ones I can remember are Everton and Wimbledon at the Dell.

You will know at the end of the game if we're up or not. Well, there may be more stoppage time at West Ham, but unlikely to be more than a minute or so's difference.

It was, indeed, utterly hilarious. I'm sure I speak for all on the forum in saying it's proving difficult not to continually burst into laughter at the sheer wit and genius of it.

Genuine question on Birch. The bloke's no fool and no crook. So, why keep the club going if the bill is on him? Are there various big payouts that kick in at verious times which make it worth surviving until a certain date but not beyond? (e.g. parachute payments, prize money for league position etc?) If not, he surely would have liquidated by now. If so, when's the last tranche of cash that he needs to keep the corpse twitching to get in?

Coventry have only won 1 of 22 away league games. Keogh, their player of the season, is suspended. They won't give a toss. Southend all over again.

Agree on starting with de Ridder not Guly.

Think I'm okay, just. But yep, if we blow it on Saturday, the irrational bile that will pour forth from my mouth will be pretty intense. Readily concede I will be like a psycho with Tourettes if we don't get 2nd....