S-Clarke

Makes sense as there were talks of a J League player at St Mary's not so long ago.

The release clause is 3m though, not 1.85m - their chairman has confirmed that. He'll go to Leicester imo, we're not going back for him. I reckon we'll see this Trotta guy come in on a short term loan instead.

That's totally spot on john, he's in no way a cultured CB and never will be - but in emergencies he's fine, defensively he's strong and sound which is all you can ask for really. I never get worried when he's on the team sheet which is testament to him really. He'll never be a regular in this side though simply because as you say, his distribution is not even close to being good enough.

that was mr adomah, we really should have snapped him up when he was at Barnet.

they weren't **** tbf. totally deserved the win. Maynard was decent, loads and loads of pace as you could see, but we did manage him quite well defensively.

Said we've been working hard behind the scenes, will continue to do so and that most deals happen late in the month. same as we heard all august to be fair! I'm sure we'll have some nice surprises this month.

Police request.

Yeah from the saints pub - they did it last new years eve too. Could see them from shirley too!

Pretty much spot on.

Yeah fair point. Connolly is another one. He's not the sort of player that can come of the bench IMO, he needs to be playing and starting games to get his sharpness back. He was one of the main reasons we started so well.

and we all remember what happened after that last year...! let's hope we get another repeat.

was a police request, they didn't want us playing on new years eve as they didn't think they'd have the resource to cope with everything.

You've done it now.

The loss of chaplow is key. We don't have any drive or energy in the middle of the park anymore. We're very rigid and flat....no real dynamic midfield play is happening at the moment and it's all too predictable. Chaplow made excellent runs which opened up space and allowed other players to get into pockets. We don't have anyone like that now, which is why it's all side ways pass, out wide, cross in....in front of the back 4 etc. I didn't ever see Chappers become as important to us as he has, but losing him has had more of an impact on us than losing Lallana ever did. Massive loss.

I hope we're not going to continuously hear ''Well look at where we are in the league, no one expected that" - No, we didn't, it's brilliant. But we won't stay there if we keep playing as crap as we have been this month. That's the reality of it. I just don't want to see our first half of the season go down the pan, but we looked pretty crap today. Worst I've seen us in a long, long, long time. (I missed brentford last year so this was the first home league defeat since Rochdale for me)

Our away form is poor, yep. Has been all year really and we've kept our position based on our home form, now that's starting to slip (no surprise really). This month has been one to forget though. 5 points from 15 is no where near good enough, even if you're at the bottom.

Good young player. His loan deal is up next month at Wycombe so could easily come here on loan for the rest of the year. Haven't seen much of him to be honest, but he's creating a pretty big reputation for himself.

That was a truly dreadful performance. Bristol City deserved that from where I was sat, and that's not how I wanted to see us lose our record at home. From the first minute we were hassled and muscled off the ball and we couldn't get near them. They were passing all around us. I was constantly hoping for a spell from us, but it never came and Bristol city continued to retain and use the ball well (albeit with little chances created until the last 15mins). Lallana was a liability today, and you won't hear that said too often. He took too long on the ball, tried to take an extra touch in tight areas and continuously lost the ball and gave it away in really dangerous positions. I was surprised he wasn't pulled off at HT to be honest. Defensively, oddly, we weren't really troubled, but the real issue today came from the middle of the park. As good as the pair of them were on Saturday, they were utterly awful today. Cork just had no strength at all, couldn't keep hold of the ball in any position and morgan kept giving it away. When the engine room was as poor as it was it's no real surprise we didn't get up any real head of steam. I thought SDR was easily our most dangerous player, the one player that had a spark about him and it looked like something may happen when he ran at their full back - too often though his crosses were poor and didn't cause enough trouble for the position he got himself into. Don't get me wrong, where we are in the league is amazing, and the first half of the season was unforgettable. Our record at home will live long in the memory too and I doubt it'll ever be matched again to be honest.....but the fact is that this month's results have been utterly, utterly awful. 5 points from 15....let's be honest, I'd be gutted with that return down at the bottom. It's **** poor. Let's just hope it's just a dodgy month because if we have another one like this we will disappear out of the automatic race without a trace. I just don't want to see all our hard work in the first half undone by such a poor spell....we really need to get together and start stringing some wins together again. It's been a long time since we've had any one the bounce! Onwards and upwards I guess, new year....let's hope it's as fruitful as 2011!

Jay Rod was our number 1 target in late august, I know that from a pretty decent agent I've known for years. We did bid for both Fox and Jay Rod, that definitely happened. We went back in against on deadline day for Jay Rod, even Sky Sports confirmed that, but it was too late really for anything to be sorted out then. I still expect him to be our top target. He'll cost a fair bit of money, but the bid we made from what I've heard is still on the table and was to be revisited in January. So we'll have to wait and see.

Wow nice one - Didn't see this at the top of the forum! Nice to see all our first team players here for the long term. Beats worrying about players running down their contracts!

The temporary huts have been up for a while, but as far as I know no work has started and all the old buildings are still in use. Went passed a month or so ago and there wasn't a sign of any building activity what so ever. May have changed a bit since then though.

Chaplow smashing that goal in against Man Utd. FT at Plymouth, knowing we'd done it. Seeing the pictures after the game of the players celebrating promotion. Before the Leeds game at the start of this season. Big crowd, live on TV and we were back playing at a decent standard once again. After the Leeds game, realising that we've just ripped one of the so called 'better'' teams to shreds.....and all of a sudden our expectations change. Rickie Lambert scoring his first ever championship goal at Ipswich. He'd waited so long for it and I think a few fans were still anxious as to weather he could make the step up. - Well he could!

I have no idea why or how people are coming to the conclusion that Barnard is not good enough for us anymore. How many minutes has he had in this team this year to even give it a good shot? Exactly.

lol.

The silly season has started.