benjii

On the contrary, I think he is. How do you think we're financing a major development of the training ground? That's not going to be paid for out of our revenue which probably barely covers our costs. We could finance it through debt but Cortese has already said Markus would be taking care of it. He's already put his hand in his pocket to the tune of at least £12-15m (reportedly). He knows that if that £12-15m is ever going to be worth c.£100m he will probably have to spend a bit more. He bought a business with no cash assets and was willing to spend £1m on his first major transfer. If Saints became a Prem team with a first class infrastructure and debt free we would be worth somewhere around the £100m mark (assuming there is a buyer). I think it is naive in the extreme to think Liebherr wants to run a modest self-financing business; all the signs are that he wants to do whatever is necessary to grow the business, but within the parameters of being debt-free and not overly extravagant.

Suggests we are on amicable terms at the moment... Antonio deal sorted...?

It was clearly not a goal.

Diop and Boateng should have both been sent off by now. Bet those cheats still think they're being hard done by though.

I agree. Just postulating.

Good effort. You forgot Xavi though.

Exactly - no idea why Pardew didn't seem to rate him more. Maybe Papa has made it clear he doesn't want to stay?

Bit of afternoon sex is always welcome.

I would love us to sign both of them.

You have to be a sad case to decide to post balls on a football forum just to try to get noticed. What a drip.

Surprised Semi is off. Expected him and Calderon to be competing for RB. Can't have any gripes with the rest of the list apart from McLaggon. We should exercise the Waigo option IMO but I have a feeling we won't.

It's utter nonsense to say that Solent started this with the "Liebherr isn't happy" comments. And because Solent have a commercial tie-up with the club with repsect to online radio commentary it means that every word they utter is indubitably worth repeating ad nauseum? The first recent press articles predated that and were rehashes of the ones that appeared around the time of the interviews earlier in the season.

Agreed. They needed a lucky goal, a dodgy penalty decision and a wrongly disallowed Spurs goal to beat a poor (on the day) Spurs side. There is no way they will get all that against a much better Chelsea side.

That is lovely. Maybe we should all email the link to the club. If anything it will show that we should look for something better next time, even if it is too late this year.

Spot on. We are lucky to have someone as professional as NC. You don't need to look far in football to find a few examples of a CEO who hasn't really got a clue about running a business...

That is great. Different, atmospheric and imposing

Oi! Photoshoppers... can't believe no one has done the honours yet.

£6bn is not a lot in the context of annual government spending anyway. As to the point someone raised about the markets - when you are beholden to them to the tune of hundreds of billions of pounds you have little choice but to take notice.

It's the infantile and partisan-at-all-costs glee based on nothing other than pure prejudice that offends me.

I would have preferred that too.

Well, I am affording you some latitude at the moment. It is very much a watching brief though.

Exactly!

Well, what exactly are they reporting anyway? He is unhappy at not making the play-offs. No shizzle Shurlock! I think we all are, along with Pardew and Cortese. There is no doubt the local media have made themselves look silly lately. First there was to be a meeting at which Pardew's job was under threat on Wednesday. Then the meeting was to be postponed to Thursday. Then what actually happens is that it is confirmed on Thursday that there was a meeting on Wednesday and it was a straightforward review and planning meeting, as most normal people had predicted and which you would expect any competent business to hold regularly.

I'm not doubting that but it would be a logistic and commercial nonsense.