CHAPEL END CHARLIE

Really? He did okay, but he is still far from the rampaging midfield enforcer we saw before his injury IMO. I'm not really expecting to see that type of dominant performance again from VW until next season. For the record I thought that Jack Cork was head and shoulders above the rest of our midfield today in terms of effectiveness. Indeed he, and the equally excellent Nat Clyne, were to my way of thinking our leading MotM contenders.

Three good, one (very) bad. Classic Car Rescue - Channel 5 I like old cars and I also enjoy programmes about the process of restoration. So as you can imagine a series about restoring old cars is 'right up my street' if you will forgive the pun. In this type of cheap 'reality' TV the formula demands that someone behaves like a utter d1ck in order to inject some tension and 'Human Interest' into proceedings that might otherwise become rather too technical for some. The d1ck role here is fulfilled by a slaphead Cockney motor dealer called Bernie who appears to be constantly on the verge of a coronary. Although he does make quite a convincing lunatic I'm not really sure I believe it. Never mind, this is still a consistently entertaining series for car fans. Salvage Hunters - Quest There is something compulsively watchable about this series, indeed it fascinates me. A guy called Drew and his mate drive around the country in a Transit van buying up a wide variety of old stuff from sheds, much of which to the uninitiated appears to be virtually worthless old junk fit for the skip. They haul it back to their saleroom in North Wales, tart it up a bit, put it on the internet and then sell it on - making a very tidy profit in the process. If you remember that old Harry Enfield sketch set in a Notting Hill antiques shop 'but I saw you coming' ... well it turns out you can actually make a decent living now doing just that. The Making of QI - BBC1 Anyone who doesn't love QI has something wrong with them if you ask me. This look behind the scenes at the history of the series and how John Lloyd (and his QI elf's) put it together proved quite as entertaining as the programme invariably is. Although it seems utterly inconceivable now, it turns out that Steven Fry (blessings and peace be upon him) was not actually the first choice to be QI host - that honour befalling Michael Palin who refused to do it, This was news that I certainly found quite interesting. This programme also provided yet another opportunity/excuse to show clips from some of the QI's funniest moments - Dave will be furious. Jamaica Inn - BBC1 I settled down to watch over the Easter weekend this 3 hour long adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's novel having both read the book and seen the old Alfred Hitchcock film version in the past. However, after 45 minutes I'd come to the conclusion that I just didn't give a tinkers cuss anymore about what happened to any of the characters and by the time I'd forced myself to endure it to the half way point I was starting to lose the will to live frankly. If the Revenue Men had hanged the lot of them after 15 minutes that would have been a act of mercy.

That map is v funny Pap. Although drunken sailors are actually quite thin on the ground here in Dorset, the 'inbred' and 'too fond of tractors' assessment of our East Anglian friends is so true it's scary

Endeavour update: This series concluded on Sunday night with a undeniably dramatic, but highly 'un Morse like' shoot out. Although the resulting drama was quite exciting in a over familiar kind of way, the cliche ridden script (a murderous conspiracy attempting to cover up child abuse) left something to be desired in terms of originality I must say. Believe it or not the script writers actually had Morse saying "you can't hope to get away with this" at one point, which is a clichéd old line so hackneyed they wouldn't dare use it on 'Scooby Doo' any more. To compound this crime the villain of the piece was himself shot a split second before he intended to pull the trigger on young Morse - but only after carefully explaining his dastardly plot for no obvious reason of course. Hands up anybody who has not seen this exact scene enacted a hundred times before. The production values of this series make it - at its best - a beautiful thing to watch and 'Endeavour' also benefits from some of the very best acting talent this nation has to offer. However some of those responsible for writing it need sacking if you ask me.

While this nation still exists in what we might call a 'Christian tradition' clearly for the most part the UK is now overwhelmingly a secular society. There are some noticeable exceptions to this rule in places such as Northern Ireland, and indeed among many of our more recent immigrant populations, but I think in general this is the truth. From a historical perspective this secular society of ours is a relatively new, and still quite uncommon thing in the world. Most Victorians for instance might well find our current level of indifference regarding matters of faith to be quite shocking. I strongly suspect even today many devout British Muslim would feel likewise. But there you go - it is what it is. Why has British society developed this relatively atypical culture? Many would say that the spread of education and a more widespread understanding of the rational explanations that science does offer for what were hitherto the unknowable mysteries of the world plays a part here. I also suspect that the unprecedented levels of wealth and social care that many of us now enjoy in this 'welfare state' of ours enables the common people (for the first time in history) to live their lives now with a reduced reliance upon the old solaces of family, community and church - comforts those living much harder existences in the past found so very necessary. However, none of the above can provide a full explanation because wealth, social care and scientific knowledge are available in the United States and Italy too and it is generally accepted that these societies are still far more religiously inclined than ours is. So this is a question I cannot even pretend to fully answer. Be that as it may there is one last point I want to make here. Although like most on here I'm not a man of faith myself, I must confess that I find the teachings of the Bible to be inspiring and the New Testament in particular to be without any doubt quite the wisest and most remarkable work of philosophy I've ever read. I must also add that many of the best Human Beings it has ever been my privilege to meet in life have also been deeply religious people. For example, recently a Catholic lady of my acquaintance told me she was giving up her (successful) business in order to devote the rest of her life to caring for terminally ill people. Make of that what you will, but perhaps one of the reasons many of us are now so non religious in outlook is that to accept Christ into our life's, and live life as he taught us to, would be so daunting a prospect that many of us just can't face up to it anymore.

Me too. Actually he would be a perfect 'fit' here if MP were to leave. Remember the record shows that at Everton Moyes was a consistently successful manager prepared to work within a reasonable budget. Hell he even succeeded in never wining a Cup - what more could we ask for!

Revelations that the US was keeping a very close eye on the Soviet space programme - and vice versa no doubt - should really come as no surprise to anyone. Indeed, as revelations go this one hardly counts as earth-shattering. Even if we leave to one side for the moment issues surrounding national prestige and the intense levels of rivalry in existence between East and West during the Cold War era, a 'Civil' aerospace effort and a 'military' research programme were often closely interrelated fields of endeavour that each side felt the need to monitor. Therefore this type of behaviour became commonplace. But if anyone doubts that both sides were playing the very same game, I will offer the following images for their consideration: 1 - Nasa STS 'Space Shuttle' and Soviet 'Buran' vehicles: 2 - Soviet Tupelov 144 supersonic airliner - not often know as the 'Concordski' for nothing methinks: Espionage, and other forms of intelligence gathering, did not of course come to a sudden stop with the fall of the Berlin Wall. Only last week I saw reports that the security of the US Department of Defense's computer network at the Pentagon is under a constant threat from a hacking attack campaign emanating from a large Asian country with a name that rhymes with 'Bhina'.

Do my eyes deceive me, or is the first time in the history of the internet that Ottery has posted on here without employing even a single 'smilie' for the benefit of his many fans? You have me worried old chap - please tell us you are not ill.

Had this forum funded it something tells me the resulting banner might have been a tad more acerbic. I'm also now expect an attempt at retaliation from our fishy friends during a future home game of ours. Speaking of which, do the ground regulations specificity ban fans from taking 40mm Bofors guns into the Chapel Stand?

Excellent post. The problem is that you can give some young players all the time in the world but the (undiscovered) limits of their talent/dedication means that they will always have more of the 'David McGoldrick' about them, rather than being the next 'Alan Shearer' if you know what I mean. Knowing how to spot the difference between those youngsters who are destined to become another 'journeyman pro' and one of those rare talents who are set for greatness is the really difficulty part of course. Those with the required levels of knowledge and insight to do that job successfully get paid a hell of a lot more than I do ... and given the financial consequences they deserve it.

What a bloody awful story this is, so many youngsters lost. I see speculation on the news that this ferry performed a turn too aggressively causing vehicles on the car deck to shift. This transfer of weight in turn causing the ship to list and take on water. The crew may also have delayed mustering the passengers at their assigned life-boat stations on the upper deck in order to avoid reducing the ships deteriorating stability state even further. While we wait for a proper investigation to report this all seems horribly plausible. If you study the history of disasters there is often a time when those with what we might call 'heightened survival instincts' stop listening to what those in authority are telling them and assume responsibility for their own survival. These people seem to have a better chance of surviving this type of tragedy compared to the rest of us who wait passively for someone in authority to tell them what to do. This latter group - of which I strongly suspect I would be a member - often seem to perish I'm afraid. Study aircrash survival and you will find that sometimes people escape from burning aircraft when they were actually seated further away from the emergency exits than many of those who did not survive. The explanation for this is that these survivors are capable of rapidly formulating a sort of 'escape plan' for themselves and they then enact it come-what-may. If the escape route in front of you is blocked then climb over the seats instead. If someone gets in your way ...well you make damn sure they are soon out of your way even if it means walking right over them.

Endeavour (ITV Sunday) An admirable series this that succeeds brilliantly in resurrecting that old 'Morse' magic where ITV's earlier effort 'Lewis' failed so miserably. Shaun Evans's performance as the young Morse is of course central to everything, and although this talented young actor bares no real physical resemblance to the late/great John Thaw, he has I think managed to capture the essence of what makes Morse 'tick'. You might say that Morse in his twenties is a noticeably less irascible (and tight fisted) detective than he was to become, but any man's personality does change as he ages does it not? However, two members of the supporting cast deliver such 'stand out' performances they play a significant part in making this series the success it undoutably is. Indeed they threaten to overshadow the star on occasion. Roger Allam as Detective Inspector Thursday is quite superb here to the extent that I can think of no other actor who could play the role better than he does. DI Thursday in other hands might be a somewhat dull, mild mannered and very domesticated policeman, but Allam's wonderfully subtle performance adds so much to this part that he somehow comes alive in a way that it is hard to explain to anybody who has not seen the series. Even though he does not get all that much screen time, and the part is not at all a sympathetic one, Anton Lessor as Chief Superintendent Bright is also hugely impressive in a nicely understated way. More of Lessor please. If I had one complaint it is about the plot. Right from Colin Dexter's 'Last Bus to Woodstock' all those years ago I have much enjoyed the demands of watching these slow paced and densely plotted stories. But however hard you concentrated on it, no one could possibly have guessed who the killer was in the last episode. It almost felt like the audience were being cheated by the script somehow if you know what I mean. Never mind, this is still one of the best series on TV at the moment I think.

I saw 'The Satan Bug' yesterday, which is a old favourite of mine that has not been shown on TV for some years now to the best of my knowledge. Station 3, a secret US Bio-Warfare establishment hidden deep in the Californian desert, is raided and a lethal virus that if released into the atmosphere might end all life on Earth is stolen ... I don't have this excellent film in my DVD collection so I watched it via YouTube utterly heedless of any copy-write infringements that may have occurred! Just in case anyone else is interested I can confirm that this link is both top quality and auto shifts so seamlessly between its eleven 10 minute long instalments that you hardly notice them: PS - If you pay attention you will see that a much loved 'Star Trek' cast member makes a brief (and uncredited) appearance in this film.

The Mini Metro I remember was once the 'great white hope' of the UK motor industry and it initially sold quite well on a wave of 'I'm backing Britain' style patriotic fervour. It might even had succeeded in the longer term had those responsible for making the bloody thing cared a jot about it. As for the infamous 'All Argro' after many years of trusty service from his classic Mk1 Ford Escort my old dad - for his sins - found himself owning a second hand Austin Allegro 1100 of ill repute. So I can confirm from personal experience these cars were quite as awful in reality as their reputation suggests they were. The story goes that for the launch of this car BL made a publicity film of new Allegro's being driven enthusiastically over some rough ground and even daring to performing a few 'Dukes of Hazard' style jumps with them ... the film did not show the wheels falling off the cars when they subsequently landed. Even if that story is apocryphal the 'wheels coming off' would still be a pretty apt metaphor for the fate of the British car industry during the 1970's and 80's.

I sometimes wonder if the pace and power of the Premier League is just too much for him. Given more time on the ball you can see how dangerous a player he could prove to be because Gaston can pick out a pass with the best of them. Unfortunately you seldom find yourself with the luxury of time in the rough and tumble of the PL. Perhaps this player lacks something of the instinctive awareness of where other players are on the pitch needed to perform successfully in the English game, a sense of situational awareness that very obviously some of his less naturally gifted team mates (players such as Jack Cork or Steve Davis for instance) seem to possess in spades. I must also add that considering how much he cost us he is also disappointingly 'one footed' in style. He is still young enough to learn how to adapt to the demands of our game I suppose, but frankly he's been here a while now and the signs are he may never be the world class young player we were promised he was when we signed him.

I can only agree. The reported search area is both remote and vast, while the transmission range of the locator transponders in question is tiny in comparison. Therefore either the search effort has been remarkably fortunate in locating these transmissions so very quickly or perhaps someone has a better idea of where MH370 went down than they are prepared to admit publicly. As I've stated on here many times before I'm innately skeptical of most conspiracy theories. However even I am now starting to wonder if commercial airliners are somehow being tracked much more closely than is commonly thought, or indeed are the US secretly monitoring all the world oceans (like they did with the North Atlantic during the height of the Cold War) via an array of undersea listening devices? It seems improbable this far off the 'beaten track' as it were, but does a super sensitive Indian Ocean SOSUS network now exist? But if we're going to speculate like this then the possibilities are almost endless. For instance say MH370 crashed by chance into the sea near the operational area of a US nuclear missile submarine and the sub heard the impact (or the transponders) via its sonar systems. The US would naturally want to help in the search, but at the same time but no nation ever discloses where its nuclear submarines operate for obvious reasons. Indeed this information is beyond secret. Be that as it may, I suspect we may have to wait a long time before we know the full truth behind this tragic story.

I Know Where I'm Going (1947) I've seen my fair share of old black and white movies but for some reason this utterly wonderful Powell & Pressburger effort has escaped my attention until now - very much a case of 'my loss' as it turns out. As for the plot a remarkably 'headstrong' young women (Wendy Hillier) sets off from Manchester for the remote Hebridean island of 'Kiloran' determined to marry a wealthy industrialist there and secure a prosperous future for herself. However a storm prevents her from completing the last stage of her journey by boat. While she is forced to wait impatiently for it to abate she finds herself in the company of a young naval officer (Roger Livesey) who is trying to get home to the island on leave. I expect you can guess what happens to these two characters next, but a certain predictability in the plot should not put anyone off seeing this film because the quality of the script, the old fashioned romantic nature of the story, and its utterly charming portrayal of life in the Scottish Highlands is quite wonderful. I suppose on a site like this attributes such as 'romance' and 'charm' may not rate all that highly in the film going requirements of the average forum member. However do remember that this is a Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger film, and if you know anything of cinema history then you'll also be aware that recommendations just don't come much higher than that. A masterpiece. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWUTcoEb_xw

John Connor for me. Anyone who has the nerve to send his own father back in time to a era before he was even born just in order to protect Humanity from the evil machinations of the Cyberdyne Corporation has to have balls bigger that Bill Clinton's.

I'd hesitate to say the idea that a 777 could ditch in the ocean and leave no wreckage is an impossible idea - but 'next to impossible' may be close to the mark. There is a fundamental difference between the problems of ditching older generation airliners and then attempting to do the same with today's 'big twins' such as the Boeing 777 and the Airbus A330. These modern wide bodied airliners are powered by two huge turbofans that are significantly more powerful - and hence much bigger - that the competitively small and low thrust power plants that were employed on older jets such as the Boeing 747 for instance. Even if the pilot manages to avoid stalling the aircraft and puts her down with the wings still level - no mean feat in itself - as soon as those enormous engines (mounted low underneath the wing) hit the water they will act as scoops. The inevitable stress overload that massive impact will impose on the airframe will almost certainly result in the aircraft's immediate and catastrophic disintegration.

Miserable news both for JRod, the club, and we fans. With the benefit of modern surgical techniques combined with the top class rehabilitation this club will doubtless insist on I see no reason to believe that this fine young player should not make a full recovery - in time. None of that however means that the need for at least one (possibly two) new strikers this summer is not now pressing. Surely the prospect of starting the new season with just SRL and young Gallagher as our only available strikers is unacceptable.

I have to ask why would the Australians be actively attempting to monitor a vast area of the (normally utterly empty) Southern Ocean, thousands of miles away from the last reported position of flight MH370, when there were much more likely search areas to explore first. No nation wants to expose all the strengths and weaknesses of its most classified military capabilities, but had they somehow known that this aircraft was heading in their general direction then I suspect the RAAF would indeed have attempted to track MH370 via the Jindalee radar system. However, INMARSAT's pioneering work re the calculated MH370 track that is the basis of the current search effort was not formulated until a matter of weeks after this aircraft disappeared.

It has been publicly acknowledge by the RAAF that its Jindalee 'Over The Horizon' radar network does not operate on a 24/7 basis: https://www.airforce.gov.au/docs/JORN_FAQS.pdf Therefore if we combine the above information with the fact that this radar does not maintain a constant sweep-like coverage of the horizon (as convention radar systems do) but rather focuses its attention on a particular area (or 'tile') then a ready explanation as to why the Australians may not have been tracking flight MH370 is apparent. Sorry I well know that none of this is as much fun as a good conspiracy theory is, but the world may just be a lot duller than some think.

Uncertainty re the position of the manager and having all of our best players (and even some kids who have hardly featured) constantly being linked with moves to other clubs must be somewhat unsettling for any fan, although as far as I'm aware only Morgan Schneiderlin has publicly hinted that he may actually want to go. However, as long as we can minimise any losses over the summer to perhaps one or two quality players, and then reinvest any transfer fees received wisely, then I see no reason to doubt that we should do all right again next season. Not that there any guarantees of success in this game of course ...

Rotten luck for a fine young player who was clearly in the form of his life. I dare say this is one of those rare instances when the entire forum can united in wishing our JRod a speedy recovery.

I think fielding a team of zombie 'Carry On' stars would certainly get us noticed: Goal Keeper - Jack Douglas Defence - Jon Pertwee, Hattie Jacques, Bernard Bresslaw, Harry H Corbett Midfield - Joan Sims, Kenneth Williams, Frankie Howard, Peter Butterworth Forwards - Sid James, Barbara Windsor* Manager: Phil Silvers *Not dead yet, but included because of her outstanding attributes.