ant

What a disgusting, unempathetic attitude. It seems some are so short-sighted as to not realise that people paid less than a living wage will need to be subsidised by the state. That affects us all, quite aside from the morality of the situation. It is a football-related matter because it directly relates to the operations of the club. Even if you ignore the disparity of the wage allocation, when a company's turning a profit as large as we are and none of it trickles down that's wrong.

I'd go virtually full-strength for this. We're at the stage of the season where match sharpness is a bonus. Shouldn't we actually get into the competition first? Some are already talking like we're going to be playing Thursday-Sunday every few weeks throughout the season. If we end up struggling stick the ball away (it does happen!), we need to lock Vitesse out. I wouldn't fancy trying that with a defence/defensive midfield consisting of kids and reserves. If we get an early goal then that changes everything and we can start playing percentages, making early changes to protect players.

Ticket bought - I'm in.

Pretty special evening, that. Rapidly warming to this competition!

Uhuh - in the same boat as I'm away for the first home game too. Looks like it'll only be useful later in the season.

Tell me about it. Basically come to the conclusion that 5.30pm is never going to arrive.

What a shame - will have to stick to drinking something worth drinking then. Worth knowing in terms of the queues to get in though!

Yup. I'm told that Yates was packed from pretty much the moment it opened. Great support! Should be a buzz about the city tonight.

Yep, my understanding is that we have the option to purchase, and that if we decide to take it up, QPR can't buy us out of it. Thus me saying "no buy-out option".

Caulker's not eligible to play either.

Loan confirmed. No buy-out option.

Hospitality still available though - from £30 pp apparently. Quick!

Well, we're quick enough to say our lot don't do anything other than steal other fans' songs. I've not heard many chants from other clubs based on 'Zombie' or 'Black Betty'... Give 'em a pop.

Dark.

Nah, you can use your ST account to buy anywhere. For example, the seats next to where my ST is allocated weren't free so I bought for myself and my girlfriend (who has membership) elsewhere in the same block. My ST seat still seems to show as reserved so I assume that means it'll be released for allocation from Thursday. In my hurry to book them before work, I did manage to book her an under-11 ticket somehow so that'll be a call or email to the ticket office to sort, haha.

I'd be very interested to hear what strategies the geniuses of SWF would utilise to stop bigger clubs picking off the best of our talent. Actually, no. It'd be uninformed drivel. Might be interesting to hear Reed's thoughts on the matter though.

Only one bloody right back in the squad, and Roy didn't pick him. You'd have every right to be furious.

If we somehow conspire to finish 5th... SO hyped for this. Praying that our fans will be up for 90 minutes of singing and a top final day atmosphere (and why not in our best ever PL season?) If not I'll stand and chant on my own, win or lose. COYR, one final push...

Was contemplating staying overnight as I couldn't hack 14 hours of train journeys in one day. Ended up making rather speedier travel arrangements so will depart and return all on Sunday. Was still tempted though as I've heard for a while that Manchester's a decent night out.

Just relegate it to the back of a cupboard. Nobody will notice it or mention it for a generation.

Tried to sign up to the Sotonians site and met with an error message - apparently my username's too short. Does this make me the first victim of de facto Papsweb censorship?

Looks like Bolasie had a bit of a field day at Lovren's expense today. [VINE]O1JFW1bIJDK[/VINE] [VINE]eKYijOmA9Fu[/VINE]

I'm not buying that the Villa fans outsang us for long periods, let alone the whole match. Despite spells of them being very loud, it certainly wasn't incessant. Not to mention their near-silence between Mane's first goal and Benteke's. There were also quite a few occasions where we turned their chants back at them with different words and completely took over, noise-wise. Some baffled faces in their section when that happened. Still, fair play to those that took the opportunity to turn it into a bit of a party towards the end. What else can you do in the circumstances? As a Saints fan, you really couldn't ask for much more from a final home fixture.

Looks smart and it'll do the job. Will probably buy it since I've got one of each home shirt since I started supporting Saints as a nipper, but am getting too old to be genuinely excited by the prospect of what the players will wear from any given season to the next. That said, I can't say I've disliked any of our home kits since a couple of the 'in-house' efforts from our pre-League One spell in the Championship. Perhaps I'm just easily pleased.

Seconded. Or will Sky put it up to stream at all?