Tamesaint

Blind loyalty maybe but also look at the win stats which shows Adkins to have done better than Pardew. Throw in the facts that Adkins won 2 promotions on the spin. The first was after taking over a team in mid September in 20th position whilst the second came in a season where we were never out of the top 2. I don't want to decry Pardew who did a lot of good for us but Nigel 's achievements are immense. Nigel's successes have been accompanied with a great style of football. If nothing else, Plan B does exist for Nigel when it was often non existent for Pardew. We are very lucky to have Nigel as our manager.Pardew was good for us but I much prefer Adkins.

Or perhaps we should just build a bigger stadium and keep the customer satisfied.

As this thread is now apparently over itis a shame that you don't see the need to elaborate further.

How do you know that the thread is over? Do you finally admit that you were wrong ?? The jump from Championship to Premiership is large. The attention that the Premiership gets from the media (international not just UK) is huge and I would have thought we would easily attract an extra 8,000 fans who did not want to see the likes of Barnsley, Doncaster or Peterborough but would jump at the chance of seeing some of the household names who make up the Premiership. In addition there will be at least another couple of thousand extra away fans next season.

Do you really think that we wouldn't find an extra 8,000 fans in the Premiership? Do you really?

would you care to elaborate?

I knew several people who couldn't get tickets for West Ham at home , for Pompey or for Coventry. What does that say? Next.

Not 20,000 extra fans now. But an increase to capacity allowing an extra 6,000 fans now and future plans for more is not particulatrly freakish.

Little did they know that 32,5k was the magic number. It is plainly obvious to some of the more enlightened souls on this thread that it is written in the laws of the universe that Southampton Football Club will never be able to justify a stadium with more than that as the capacity.

I am sorry but I was not trying to represent your views whatsoever. I was asking a question which I thought that you and others like you would be able to answer. You say that demand for tickets "significantly outstripped supply." So why is 32,500 the current capacity of SMS the magic number ? If Stoneham had gone ahead we would have had a capacity of 24k - 28k. Why is 32.5 k the magic number? Why wasn't 24k or 28k the magic number ? Why not 36k or 40k? 32.5 k seats were not enough on several occasions to fulfil demand last season. It was not enough on several occasions the seasons when we were in League 1. Why will it be enough in the Premiership? Why shouldn't we plan for further growth?

Forgive me if this point has already been answered somewhere else on this turgid ramble of a thread but can the CB Fry/Charming Man Gang of "nothing ever changes in football so the sooner the better we accept our place in the food chain" explain how the move to SMS ever happened. How on earth did we justify a stadium which could house more than double the capacity of the Dell?

Shortly afterwards a Brighton fan wrote in and gloried in the fact that the Saints fan continued our tradition of being runnersup. FA Cup 2003, League 1 2011, Championship 2012 and the SSG. Sometimes you have to feel sorry for the little Brighton fans.

No way. Nige knocks spots off him.

Claire Balding suffers from the Fiona Phillips disease - she has been a Chelsea fan when interviewed in the last few years. Her brother who is a successful racehorse trainer, was / is a season ticket holder at SMS.

It is posts like this on threads like this that really make mefear for the sanity of some posters on this forum.

Coming back from a few days away and catching up with this thread, I find it staggering how whenever a thread gets started which indicates that this club can go forward and can progress, the usual suspects come out and ridicule everything. The vehemence of thier beliefs and ridicule of anyone making an optimistic point is quite amazing. This thread is a classic example of this. Any thread which talks about expanding the stadium suffers from the same fate. Has you know who yet posted his "man walking on the moon" comment on this thread? Very few people say that we will win the Prem next season or the Champions League the following year. Very few say that we need a 55,000 seater stadium tomorrow. But you have to be rather blinkered in your approach to life to say that a steady, consistent progression for Saints is not to be aimed for and that one day these dreams may not be so unrealistic.

Can anyone spot somebody famous in this photo? http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/650_41675323196_8422283196_1185429_9406_n.jpg

Look up the page at 61972

Hmmmm. If Mark Fry had not taken the Pinnacle consortium as seriously as he did and had instead given Markus's bid more credence we could have been bought 6 weeks earlier than we were. Thank goodness that Markus was patient and didn't walk away from the deal. I think our current rosey position is despite Mark Fry and Begbies Traynor rather than thanks to them.

The BBC interview with Adkins is superb. I think we have heard some more of this in the last 20 months! Interestingly 8 of the team from that game were in the 16 man squad last Saturday!! http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_div_2/8968093.stm

Lets bump this. It would be criminal mr ****e if people did what I did for so much of last year and missed this blog. I plan my monday evenings these days for when your blog appears on here. You and Rallyboy (who posts often on the Pompey Takeover thread) have a great ability with words. I wiould be very upset at the wasted talent if you and he did not make your livings through your creative abilities. I regularly read Private Eye but the offerings that both you and he give us are just as good as what you can read on that magnificent journal. Well done sir.

Yesterday,according to ex skate Gary O'Neill,West Ham could have scored loads more goals against Hull but they eased off once they saw that we were winning so easily. There was little point in them scoring more against Hull. Yeah Gary. I am sure that you could have scored loads more goals if you could be simply bothered. West Ham are clerly such a great team that they can do whatever they want againt the dross of the Championship. West Ham have clearly not yet learnt the lesson that all relegated teams must learn - they have not yet learnt to respect the division that they are in. They were relegated last year because they were simply not good enough. Until they appreciate this and start to show some respect to their rivals, they will not go up. Why am I so sure that this is the case? Because it took me 3 years to respect the Championship. We were relegated from the Prem due to bad luck / a couple of fluky decisions etc etc. We were bound to go up at the first time of asking as we were a big club. We had been in a Cup Final 2 years befiore. We must be better than every other team in the division. I probably saw the light during our third Championship season and our final day win v Sheff United. From then onwards I respected the division that we were in. I respected the opposition more. I appreciated their football and their better players. My belief is that you only achieve promotion once you appreciate where you are and respect the division you are in. Until West Ham do this they will not go up.

I know it is hard to believe but one day you will get rid of SISU. We finally got rid of Lowe. When they go things will look better. Respect the league you are in. Enjoy it. You are there now because you haven't performed, Acknowledge that fact,move on anfd you will enjoy League 1. Enjoy the JPT. You wiill be back and I will welcone you. Good luck.

My thoughts exactly. What a wonderful man. His family must be so proud of him.

Agree completely