benjii

I don't eat a meal between 15:00 and 17:00 so I couldn't care less what food options there are.

A few things: 1) Men's tennis is interesting. Women's tennis is dire but sometimes worth watching for aesthetic reasons. 2) I generally think Clattenberg is one of the better refs (Mason and Friend, for example, are habitually worse), however on occasions he can't keep his ego in control and this results in decisions made for the purpose of attracting attention. This inevitably leads to inconsistencies. I didn't think their penalty appeal in the first half was a pen at all and it didn't even make the MotD highlights but that is precisely the sort of decision he might occasionally give to prove what a visionary he is so, in a way, we were lucky. 3) Payet's spastic-attack was embarrassing. 4) I don't know why the governing bodies don't issue a strict edict at the start of the season that dissent (which includes hounding and shouting at the ref, even if not the accused party oneself - ie. what Noble et al were up to) will be a yellow card every time. It is quite within the authorities to stop intimidation and abusive language within the existing rules so goodness knows why they don't. They must think the players are just too uncouth and matches will end up 8-a-side all the time. 5) West Ham is a nasty little club which has won precisely zero major trophies since 1980 so goodness knows why its fans seem to have such a big opinion of themselves, particularly when there are clearly much bigger clubs in the capital.

Indeed. If you want a sausage in a long roll in Brazil you must ask for a "hodgy dodge".

Easy win really, even if we did sit off them. West Ham had one meaningful attack all match and that was from a soft Clattenberg-special free-kick. It never felt like they would score. Our 5-2-3 should have been changed to a 5-3-2 sooner, I thought. In a way, the league positions of us as and them are pretty clear indictments of the ****-poor premier league. Both teams have glaring weaknesses but on balance we should be above them.

That's a good way of showing it up to be rubbish. It predicts that Liverpool will do SIGNIFICANTLY better than Leicester and Spurs in the remaining matches. That is palpable nonsense. It thinks Bournemouth will get only 3 more points, whilst Villa will get 11. Mental. Even more mental, it thinks Villa will perform at the same level as Saints in the remaining games. In fact, Bournemouth are the only team that it thinks will do worse than us. As others have said, no system is perfect, but whatever was used to generate this will obviously be shown to be wildly deficient.

Was it like this? [video=youtube_share;_f4XZOmvTsY]http://youtu.be/_f4XZOmvTsY

"Being without Adam Hammill was like Real Madrid being without Ronaldo". Re Isgrove, glad he's getting matches and doing OK. He should have a fair career in League One and maybe the odd season in the Champ.

I've been saying for weeks that Spurs will win the league. An injury to Kane would ruin that but they are more consistent and solid than City or Arsenal.

Sorry, item 3 should say 6th or 7th will qualify, depending on whether item 2 has happened.

Isn't it this: 1) 5th qualifies for Europa. 2) If one of the top 5 wins the League Cup then 6th will qualify for Europa. 3) If one of the top 5, or top 6 if item two happens, win the FA Cup then 7th will qualify for the Europa. You would have to think there is a pretty good chance of 2) happening given City have to beat Liverpool in the final and City will certainly finish in the top 5. You would also have to think there is a pretty good chance of item 3 happening although Chelsea's league position counts against that as, on their day, they are still one of the top two teams. Hopefully City can knock them out in the next round. Obviously there are outliers but, in the last 10 years, Chelsea, Arsenal and Man City have won the FA Cup 7 times. Liverpool won it in 05/06 and they finished third in the league then. When the Skates won it they finished 8th which is a relative outlier. Wigan won it the other time, which was a genuine exception. So, in summary, I reckon 6th is very likely to get a team into Europa and 7th is also pretty likely. We should be targeting 6th place now - this Saturday's match is a real big one for the club. West Ham have Norwich then Sunderland after this weekend so you would think anything other than a win will make it very hard for us to finish higher than we are now. Having said that, another injury to Payet and they become a very ordinary side again.

Hello Saints fans, Where might one generally find the best live streams nowadays? IOS or Windows are both of interest to me! Regards.

I would expect Kelvin to play for the promotion XI because Bart is the only other keeper who is eligible! Also, hopefully Fonte does, alongside Jos, with a cameo from Jaidi. Lambert, Guly, Hammond, Chaplow, Harding, Butterfield, Richardson, Fox, Sharp, Connolly, Barnard... maybe Morgan and Ox.

It is a bit strange. I think he has all the attributes to do well in the Prem, just needs experience to help him learn when to tackle, when to drop off, concentration levels etc. A loan would seem obvious.

The original date change, from Saturday to Monday, was only announced on 17 December. I find it hard to believe many ST holders have subsequently made irreversible plans for Saturday 6 Feb. Yes, it will annoy a few, but so will anything and I'm not really sure what the club is supposed to do about it. It's been a possibility ever since West Ham got through the third round of the cup.

What a day! Brilliant. Johnno Quick.

I like Terry Wogan. Sad news

Because it used to be free and better.

Would be silly to have Lallana unless he is a real close mates of KD's. Would be a shame to have genuine boos at this short of event. I reckon KD and Fonte will play for the promotion XI. Would be great to see Guly, Chaplow, Hammond, Harding, Lambert... Looking forward to it

Worth exploring, f'sure.... http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html

To clarify, by "unpaid interest", I mean any interest attached to overdue payments. Not all interest that would have been payable over the life of the loan. The acceleration fees are compensation for loss of the margin on that interest.

It would have been all outstanding capital and unpaid interest plus some sort of additional charge (whatever was permitted under the loan agreement) for the loan being accelerated.

I think Markus did the following: - paid off all the small creditors in full (ie. Terry the builder), although these were relatively limited; - reached an agreement with Barclays and Norwich Union (or was it Aviva)? I'm pretty sure that NU/Aviva did not receive the full balance remaining but I think they did receive a pretty decent chunk (purchase price was reported to be about £15million) plus a bonus payment of several million when we got to the Premier League. I recall a payment in the accounts of about £6million, I think. The main differences between Saints and Pompey are: i) when we did actually become insolvent, Lowe put is in admin - we went "by the book"; ii) pompey traded insolvently for ages and actually went out signing players on tick when they were clearly insolvent in the January window; iii) we were never used as a money-laundering front; iv) we were never "owned" by someone who did not exist or, if he did, was just a name to cover a bunch of other individuals; v) we were never owned by mafia; vi) our lawyers have never been fined for channelling our funds improperly through their account; vii) we did not leave a raft of unpaid footballing debts (players, clubs, small trade creditors etc); viii) we did not leave a raft of other unpaid debts (local schools, charities, small businesses etc); ix) we paid all our taxes. Basically, we overspent, accepted the consequences and were lucky enough to find an owner who paid everyone in full apart from some institutional lenders whose job is to accurately price the risk of lending and who have deep pockets and accept it as a business risk. Even then, they got a decent amount back and certainly not the 0.4% of 0.2p in the £ or whatever it was that PFC paid. There was no suggestion of improper conduct. The other myth around our insolvency was that we somehow tried to weasel out of a points punishment due to the group's corporate structure. Again, this is complete nonsense. The structure pre-dated the footballing sanction insolvency punishment rules and was a legacy of the debt structuring for the stadium finance. Perfectly normal. When we got in trouble we pointed out that technically it was the holding company not the football club in admin and the rules might be read in such a way as not to apply the points penalty but when we were told to get lost, we accepted it. A favourite Portsmyth also relates to the fundraising match that was cancelled due to lack of interest. This is probably true but also not surprising. Bucket rattling was never going to raise the £10million + needed and, even if it did, wouldn't provide a long-term solution. On that basis, I, a long-term season ticket holder was never moved to throw some coins in a bucket or stump up to some amateur event. It would have been pointless. No lack of passion, just a bit of rationality. Pompey, of course, were run criminally or recklessly for years by a succession of unusual characters and shafted loads of people. That's a fact. As others have said, it's not the fans' fault but there is no equivalent in English football when it comes to plumbing the depths that the Skates plumbed.

He's going to win the league this year, I expect but it will be interesting to see if he is perceived as a managerial legend or a fortunate beneficiary of the dismal quality of the league at the moment.

I really feel for the lad. Comes all the way over to Europe and ends up having to live in Hull and Middlesbrough FFS!

It should obviously go to one of the back five. Three clean shots in a row. Maybe Long for general effort but JWP - why? For one decent free-kick?