benjii

Incredible really. They are thuggish but because it's the whole team doing it they seem to get away with it, rather than having a Keane/Barton/Costa character.

Yes, although flag should have been up! Stoke look awful. We should have got a second really. They will probably improve because they've been that bad.

Pretty creepy closing statement from Milliband there! When you see the likes of Sturgeon and the Welsh One it does make Labour look pretty useless. I mean, seriously, what on earth is the point of the modern Labour party? What does it stand for?

Yes this is correct. I'm afraid the OP has made an error.

Cant say something wrong....................................... with a country because of things like this. Clearly this......................... was a parenting fault. Had the parents taken the time to train their baby in the safe application of lethal force as a proptional deterrent.......................... and equipped it with a lightweight, modern firearm then this would never have happened....................... guns don't kill people, people without proper gun discipline kill people................. and why was the baby trying to crawl away? You ever stop to think about, huh? No............................. cos y'all so small minded and European.

I like Clyne and I think he is the best English right back in the league and arguably the best in the league of any nationality. However, he is just a full-back. How often does a full-back win man of the match? Answer: hardly ever. So, if Man U want to pay him £100k+ per week and give us £20million+ I'm quite happy with that. As long as we don't replace him with a donkey like Fox we may end up with a stronger squad overall by investing some of the money elsewhere.

I'll be annoyed if we finish 3 points or less behind Liverpool, particularly after getting completely stitched up against them by Friend. They do have some nice fixtures though and by the time they play Chelsea the title might even be done and dusted. Hopefully the Chelsea players aren't all out on the lash that week. However: i) we do play twice in the league before Liverpool next play a league game so we have the chance to get a decent lead over them and apply some more pressure; and ii) Liverpool really aren't much cop so hopefully they make a mess of an "easy" fixture. If we beat Spurs we will finish above them. If we draw with them we will probably finish above them. If they beat us I expect they will finish above us. I reckon, optimistically, our results will go: Stoke - win Spurs - draw Sunderland - win Leicester - win Villa - win City - draw 70 points and fifth place. If we can make that five wins a draw we could still nick fourth but I think we'll run out of steam (first goal is absolutely crucial for us at the moment and it only takes one long-range strike/set-piece/dodgy penalty to go against us before we score for us to be in trouble in a match). I just really, really, really do not want Liverpool to finish in the top four. I would rather Spurs did.

If Liverpool finish fourth and we finish within three points of them then Kevin Friend will have a lot to answer for.

It doesn't seem as though there is even as much as a YouTube stream for the first leg tonight. I know Blackburn is an insular dump in a time warp but I would've thought there would be some way to view this. Am I wrong?

--------------------------Super Kelvin------------------- Clyne-----------Fonte--------------Yoshida--------Bertie -----------------------Alderweireld----------------------- ------------------JWP--------Schneiderlin---------------- --------------------------Tadic--------------------------- ---------------------Pelle-------Mane-----------------

Very odd that Bruce was not even booked for that challenge (red would have been very harsh given the angle). I guess Friend was too overcome by the gravity of having actually awarded a penalty to think about cards.

One of our worst performances of the season but luckily Hull are useless in the final third. They worked hard and made it difficult for us, although our poor decision making made it harder, but looking at their run in you struggle to see them getting more than two or three points. I think they will go down. We hit far too many long balls. Alderweireld, although setting up the pen, was disappointing at RB. Too many diagonals. Morgan and Davis were below par and Wanyama seemed to be playing within himself to avoid a yellow. Utterly futile since he got one anyway. He should've been on the bench from the start. As usual, our centre backs were excellent. I award the following ratings: K Davis - 8: one shank but other than that rock solid and composed. Got out quickly to snuff out a couple of through balls. Toby - 6: good ball to Long for the pen but general play was disappointing. Much better CB than RB. Fonte - 7: very solid and good leader's performance. Treads a fine line between fair physicality and recklessness at times! Yoshida - 8: what an excellent season from him. He seems to have cut out the nerves and is a real asset. Bertie - 6: didn't really get into the game in an attacking sense. Similar to Toby. Vic - 5: seemed to play within himself. Morgan - 6: got better in the second half but some poor passing at times. Credit for the run leading to the second goal. Davis - 5: injected some decent forward impetus at times but some sloppy passing and missed a decent chance. Attacking CM is an area of the squad that needs improving. Mane - 6: kept them occupied but better through the middle than out wide at the moment. Long - 6: absolutely awful touch at times and, let's be honest, his technique is way below top 6 level. However, his perseverance, physicality and energy can bring results such as the penalty. Pelle - 7: I thought he was really good in the second half. Struggled in the first but not surprising given how poor the rest of the team were. The arm on Bruce was a bit naughty but I think replays make it look worse than it was. JWP - 7: decent performance and great credit for burying a pressured pen. Tadic - 7: obligatory first-defender-hitting crosses aside, he stretched Hull well and used the ball well. Elias - 7: if he'd had a bit longer I think he could've contributed meaningfully. Made some decent runs.

He can obviously see what a potential Mane is and, to be fair, Mane smashed Chelsea twice. As long as there are no setbacks with Mane next season we've got a £25-£30 mill player on our hands.

Simply not true re Lambert - he was poor for most of last season and needed replacing.

Agree with this. Lambert would not have made any real difference IMO. Lallana might have helped in the odd game but he seems to be suffering from the old glass legs again this season. I honestly doubt he will have another top-flight season as good as last season.

Apologies, typo above, NZ would be fine in Jan! Summer there then!

I wouldn't worry about accommodation too much in advance. It might be worth having a few places in mind but I wouldn't book anything beyond the first few days. Unless she really wants to go way off the beaten path then there will always be no shortage of accommodation with like-minded people in abundance (anywhere in Europe, SE Asia, Oz/NZ, etc). The amount of Irish around when I was in SE Asia was staggering! The most important thing will be to get flights and rough itinerary sorted, at least for the first few legs of the trip. For example, you probably wouldn't want to end up in NZ in Jan but that would be a good time to be in SE Asia, where you probably wouldn't want to be in late July or August. So, I would say the most inpritant thing is to figure out which coubtires she thinks are "must dos" and make sure she figures out the best time to be in each one. As someone suggested, a chat with a rep at STA would be well worth it - but don't just buy whatever ticket they try to flog without doing some more research.

This "Island Mentality" thread is odd. I'm not sure what point people are trying to make but there are numerous central European countries with far greater right-wing, separatist leanings than the British. The fact that they have a contiguous land border and we don't is neither here nor there. Does Front Nationale support Schengen?

Putting aside the silly ramblings, I was cheered by the further opportunity for law-abiding self-defence presented by this advert on the page The old credit card knife. A constituttional right. **** the mooslim loving liberals etc....

IIRC, no one realised Berkovic was on loan - we thought he'd been signed. It came as a shock to hear he was off to West Ham. Cracking little player though. Berkovic and Ostenstad were a quality combination

---------------------------------KD------------------------------------ Clyne-----------------Fonte---------Toby-----------------------Bertie -------------------Big Vic--------------Morgan------------------------ -----JWP--------------------Mane-------------------------------Elia ------------------------------Long----------------------------------- Suns: Gazza, Yoshi, Gardos, Davis, Pelle, Tadic, Reed

Probably just as simple as no one applying to have the charges removed. It's not at all uncommon for charges relating to satisfied debt obligations to remain registered. Or, they haven't paid it after all.

McInnes' statement is awful. The sort of amateurish, pseudo-sixth-form standard prose that Neil Allen comes out with. Embarrassing, frankly.

In fairness, Rupert Lowe got a bigger payout than Cortese (circa £660k, IIRC) for doing a far worse job. Cortese had a much bigger salary, mind, but proportionately that makes his payoff even smaller. Back to the news, and it's great to see Katharina providing this level of commitment.

The England team is still pretty crap. As ever, we have easy opposition in qualifying. We would get done as soon as we play a decent team in a tournament. Baines, Jagielka, Jones, Henderson, Delph, Welbeck.... Players like that wouldn't have got near some pretty average England sides of yesteryear.