stevegrant

Can more or less guarantee they'll be very expensive compared to booking the trip yourself within an hour of the fixtures being released, perhaps with the exception of the real long-distance trips to Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.

I believe that our place in Pot 3 is now secure. Gabala have knocked Maribor out

West Ham losing

Yeah, it's a new rule as of last season, hence Arsenal ending up in a group with Bayern last season despite their coefficient still being ludicrously high compared to their actual achievements (this season they'd have been in pot 2 under the old rules as well). It's basically the reigning champions plus the champions of the 7 highest-ranked leagues, or if the reigning champion won their league as well, the champion of the 8th-ranked league would also be in pot one (which was PSV last year as Barcelona were both European and Spanish champions)

They pre-draw them, I think, partially based on geography. Fortunately, as there's at least 80 miles between all of the three potential stadia in use in this country, that won't be an issue. It might even be - god forbid - a completely random draw It's marginally less tedious in real life.

Going back to the subject of early kickoff times in eastern timezones, there is an interesting addition to the Champions League group draw rules this season, which I guess might also apply to the Europa League draw tomorrow:

Sake

We are number 23...

Usual story, don't judge the score until both sides have batted. Lots of wickets to spinners in the first innings is interesting, we were docked points for preparing a similar surface a few years ago...

The kickoff times are all unified across Europe with the exception of those in timezones further east than CET. *shrug*

As far as I'm aware, Tallaght was OK for the third qualifying round but not good enough for the playoff round. I'd be surprised if they were able to play EL group stage games there. 99% sure UEFA wouldn't let them play at Windsor Park in Belfast, so Dublin's really their only option, I think.

There are two time slots, 6pm and 8:05pm (UK time). I think there's generally an even spread of kickoff times for everyone, so I assume we will have at least one home 6pm kickoff, which is a bit **** for people getting there from any sort of distance away from Southampton. There are exceptions for games that take place in the most easterly destinations (i.e. Georgia, Ukraine, Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan), which tend to kick off earlier because of the timezone differences.

Hence why they played their CL playoff game against Legia Warsaw at the Aviva. Their EL group stage games will almost certainly be there too.

It literally took five minutes, FFS Main benefit is that it ensured that the tickets ended up with the people who most deserved them, rather than letting people bump up their purchase history by flogging their ticket to a mate. As already said, doubt it'll happen for most venues, the smallest ones are likely to be the most remote this time, I think.

Ah, fair enough.

I'm not 100% sure that's correct - while obviously the profit from player trading is useful for FFP purposes because of the way transfer fees are accounted for, I don't think there's specific allowance for player trading profits to supplement the wage bill. However, there absolutely is a specific allowance that enables any increase in commercial revenue from the previous year to be used entirely towards the wage bill if the club wishes. This season sees new commercial deals with Under Armour and Virgin Media - along with a load of other partnerships that are popping up every now and then - which has added north of £10m a year to the commercial revenue, which can ALL be lumped on wages if we want to.

Think it's probably more to do with the Premier League and keeping overseas broadcasters happy, to be honest. Much easier for NBC, for example, to co-ordinate their programming to show three games at 14:15 UK time than one at 14:15 and two at 15:00.

The "rules" on Sunday kickoffs have changed so that non-televised games must kick off at the same time as a televised game so there is no overlap. Used to be that you'd get a 2pm and a 4pm kickoff on TV, but then a handful of 3pm games due to Europa League involvement which overlapped the two.

Shouldn't be supporting this sham of a competition, IMO.

Somerset and Surrey away, Yorkshire and Durham at home left to play. A tough ask to close that gap but reckon two wins and a draw could be enough.

I assume you missed the numerous articles in the last three months where key first-team players (and JWP) signed new long-term contracts? They won't have taken a pay cut to do so...

We've got a game against Watford's fans team tomorrow at BTC Sports Ground on Stoneham Lane, 10:30 kickoff. Still looking for a couple of players, and also a referee - if anyone is available and fancies a game, please let me know.

Given the awful timing of it, I fully expect that other away game to be Everton in January.

I'm not, he's 34.

8th. I think each of the journalists involved put their full league table in as a prediction, and then they work out an average position, rather than just asking the feature journalist to say where this particular team will finish. Considering some of the Guardian's writers - especially Louise Taylor, who probably had Newcastle and Sunderland finishing 5th and 6th respectively last season - that's probably a sensible move.