stevegrant

Valery Bojinov did his cruciate ligaments 8 minutes into the 3rd game of last season and missed the rest of the season. This season, he's lasted even less time, snapping his achilles tendon in the warm-up before today's game against Villa, and is likely to be out for 6 months. Can anyone think of any other footballer who's had such ridiculous bad luck with major injuries?

JP stated why he didn't have another striker on the bench in his post-match interview. In hindsight, he may have kept John on the pitch and gone with him and McGoldrick up front, rather than keeping the same formation. I was surprised Wright-Phillips or Dyer weren't at least on the bench, but JP also stated that he wasn't happy with their effort/performances in the last week or so. Hopefully they'll take those comments and put the effort in to prove they're worth a place in their team.

Pretty much exactly what I was about to write. The high-tempo game we're trying to play requires a supreme level of fitness and stamina, which yesterday showed we clearly haven't got yet, and we haven't really had it since the beginning of the end of Strachan's term as manager. It's going to take time to get that fitness level up to play this sort of tempo for 90 minutes, and you could clearly see we were knackered after about an hour and were looking to just hold on for the rest of the game. Given Birmingham's ridiculous array of strikers, that was always going to be unlikely. A summary of my feelings after the game: disappointed but encouraged.

I really don't get that attitude, in all honesty. What about those who have season tickets in block 42 and half of block 41, who get forced to move when we get a cup draw against a team who want to take the full 15% allocation? I don't remember many people saying that was the final straw when they had to move for the ManYoo cup game in 2005...

The atmosphere in blocks 4 and 5 was generally excellent today (up until about the 70th minute, just like Saints' performance on the pitch), I was expecting it to be a bit rubbish but was pleasantly surprised.

Oh, and given the £60m you've spent in transfer fees in the last two years, don't you think that only just achieving 40 points would be an absolute disaster? You're matching ManYoo and Chelsea for spending, and yet seemingly still aiming for safety? You're not "little old Pompey" anymore considering you're spending money to rival the title contenders, and yet you'll still probably be lucky to finish in the top 8. You can't really call yourselves underdogs anymore, and with that (rightly) comes added pressure to continue the momentum. Without the matchday revenue, and the clear signs that Gaydamak isn't going to spend any more of his (dad's) own money, the only option (as Redknapp has said today) is to sell players. And we know where that leads... eventually you run out of players to sell.

Given that your matchday revenue is severely limited by the capacity of Fratton Park (matchday revenue of about £9m the season before last - even with the price hikes, I can't see that going above £11m any time soon), I don't see how you can possibly balance the books unless there is another new TV deal that dwarves the current one. Your matchday revenue is only just covering the wages of Campbell (£5m per year) and Crouch (£3.75m per year) with very little left over for the rest of the squad, which means the TV deal is being relied on totally.

As usual, please keep all match discussion to this thread.

I'd imagine it's mostly full of people banned from Goals, to be honest!

I know you're not stupid. How many forums with the levels of traffic this site has (120-150gb per month, conservative estimate) do you think are NOT either: a) backed by a large company/network, e.g. Rivals, Club Fanzine, Vital Football, etc with corporate advertising deals, or b) personally funded by a generous benefactor? The answer is "not many at all". This is one of those "not many". Donations have been used in the past, and I'm sure you noticed yourself that the server we could afford with that money just wasn't up to it in the end. We considered asking for donations again, but even if we got the same amount of money in as the first time (incredibly unlikely given the "law" of diminishing returns - once people have donated once, they would feel a bit put out if we were to come back 6 months later with cap in hand again), it would last less than half the time given the required technical infrastructure. We'd then be on a downward spiral until eventually the donations run out completely and nobody's willing to put anymore in. If I felt it was worthwhile, yes. It was mentioned right from the very beginning. Nobody should be under any illusions as to the situation. We have also stated (both on here and also on your forum, in fact) that a) us admins are also paying the £5 - we don't get a freebie off the back of everyone else paying nor would we seek to, and b) we have budgeted for a small profit in the region of about £100 which (while it's actually none of your business, given it's our company) will be reinvested into the business. I really don't get what the big deal is.

What the hell is Football Superstars?

Not much point in me trying to sell my Leon Cupra R (03) then, given that it's done nearly 80k and it's yellow

That's just La Liga.

Samuel Eto'o. http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/football/la-liga/2007-2008/league-tables/top-goalscorers.html

It's a loan as well, so he's got to be good... Jerome Thomas from Charlton. Wow. I wonder if the money's dried up (or been tracked down to Daddy Gaydamak)?

I believe so, yes.

Apart from a loan fee and a wage bill £20k a week lighter... We've probably made back at least half Rasiak's £2m transfer fee in loan fees now, given that Bolton stupidly paid about £700k last season!

I suspect a number of factors have come into the decision to let Saga move to Denmark. It's probably been a straight choice between him and BWP, and the following have been taken into account: 1. Wages - MS probably slightly higher than BWP 2. Last season's record - 8 goals for BWP, only 3 for MS 3. Willingness to leave - MS has changed clubs quite frequently throughout his career, so he's probably not too bothered about a change

Consider it on its merits, like the club should be doing on all offers. Rasiak and Saganowski clearly don't fit into the intended system (Rasiak particularly) so it makes sense for them to be sent out on loan to relieve a bit of the wage bill for a few months. If someone came in with a ridiculous offer (£1m+) for SJ (which they won't... clearly), it would probably be accepted. However, I would expect that to be subject to us finding a suitable replacement. Whether Rasiak could be moulded to fit into the system at this stage of his career, I'm not convinced, which would probably leave us looking at the loan market for a season-long loan if possible from a lower to mid-table Premier League club. Not ideal, but that's the situation we find ourselves in.

Don't think SFC saw any financial benefit other than perhaps Bradford continuing to pay a portion of his salary.

Dan Petrescu came from Bradford City...

I would suspect not. International loans tend to be a bit more "fixed-term" than domestic ones, whether that's down to UEFA or just the done thing I'm not too sure.

Given McGoldrick's recent run of first-team goals, I'd now be inclined to agree with you on that one. Previously, DM hadn't shown that he could score goals at this level, so he couldn't be relied upon as the "pacey" option up front. Wright-Phillips has had that role pretty much since he arrived at the club and managed to keep a place at least in the 16 if not in the starting 11 on the basis that he was the only option for an injection of pace up front. It's entirely possible that we now have a better option in McGoldrick. It is also, however, entirely possible that this is a never-to-be-repeated purple patch for him...

Logic would dictate that this reported "interest" is complete ********. Why would anyone be pursuing him now, given that less than 6 weeks ago they could have got him for a relative pittance through a tribunal? Given that John Bostock, a 16-year-old with the likely potential to play for the full England side, something I suspect Dyer hasn't got, was only valued at £700k by the tribunal panel, we'd have been lucky to get £500k for Dyer.

On the other hand, it encourages people to buy in advance (a lot of CCC clubs do it for league games, let alone cup games) so the club can prepare enough staff to cover the anticipated attendance.