benjii

Thank you.

Did you read the quote from the Beeb article? Wotte himself said we had offers for Surman and Lallana but refused to even entertain them. "Refused to negotiate".

Oh right. Ok!

To put this in context, here's something from the Beeb: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/s/southampton/7873058.stm Southampton's head coach Mark Wotte has thanked the club's board members for holding their nerve during the January transfer window. Financially-stricken Saints turned down bids for two of their main assets last month and brought two players in. Wotte told BBC Radio Solent: "I'm very happy that they didn't negotiate with the clubs that made offers for Adam Lallana or Andrew Surman." Saints signed defenders Jan Paul Saeijs and Zoltan Liptak in January. The Dutchman added: "We didn't lose one player during the window, which is a big thing for us. Everyone was expecting us to lose one or two good, talented players." "It would have been easy for them to sell another player because we need the money. But they assured me that the quality in the team is more important than the short-term finance at the moment." The board assured me that the quality in the team is more important than the short-term finance at the moment. Saints' head coach Mark Wotte

I'm not suggesting we can or should do that. It is a fact that we have turned down bids for players though and we are now insolvent due to a fairly small amount of unarranged borrowing that would have been covered by the amounts raised. That doesn't look too sharp. What were they supposed to do? Sell the players we had bids for! If the bank have unexpectedly moved the goalposts then yes, we were stitched up a bit, but nonetheless it seems very odd in hindsight that we didn't sell these players. Perhaps because if we'd done so, it wouldn't have fit in with lowe's messiah-complex total kindergarten philosophy. Who knows?

Good arguable points, but if you want to play Surman in CM and Rudi at LM then who plays LB? Mills? Or do we go three at the back and play Skacel centrally? That's a bit of a departure for so late in the season IMO. I can't think a Mills/Skacel left side is a better bet than a Skacel/Surman or a Skacel/Holmes left side at this moment in time.

Any slating that he may or may not have got would probably have been based on the assumption/belief that the situation wasn't completely, utterly, imminently, disastrously critical. If people had been aware that it was, then they would not slate. There were sound commercial reasons for not making the precise position public and so I'm not criticising over a lack of publicity, more that it seems more than a little odd that we refused bids for Lallana, Surman(?) and Dyer when the situation was this bad. When was Lowe ever influenced by fan criticism in any case (apart from when he wants to cite it retrospectively to excuse his terrible decisions)? We seem to have pinned all our hopes on someone coming in for a late bid for Euell, Saga, KD or Skacel. Given that it was obvious to most clubs that they could pick any of these up on loan in any case, is it not surprising that this didn't happen. Yes, we might have had to accept lower prices than we would otherwise like to for the younger players but if we only needed a few hundred grand to get us through to the summer then surely it would be worth it? The whole things just smacks of lazyness and is as much "head in the hand" style management as Crouch is, rightly or wrongly, sometimes accused of. I can't countenance that Lowe and Wilde's part-time meddlings have been more productive than the efforts of a highly motivated, competent, full-time CEO would have been.

:rolleyes:

I'm inclined to agree. If the answer to the question, "if all drugs were legal would the level of heroin / crack use rise significantly?" is "yes", then I think the continued illegality of drugs could be justified. If not, it seems a woefully misguided policy.

Yeah, I would have no problem with swapping Rudi and Surman around. I do think Rudi is a slightly better left-back though.

He would only have used it to bludgeon trout to death.

Listen mate, I didn't pay a fiver to look to the future and move on. I consider membership of this place a gold-plated licence to moan and I intend to use it to its full potential as and when I see fit.

Great minds think alike. Quiet day at the office mate? Loving the Chelts photos.

Corporate takovers aren't "transparent" though. They are generally confidential. They don't have to say anything but obviously there is a large degree of public interest and there is also a sensible commercial reason for trying to offer fans encouragement that there is a decent future.

Cheers! It actually looks reasonaly strong IMO. Certainly don't think that 11, in that formation (ie, proper wide players), would have spent much time in the bottom 3 this season.

Yes, but in a footballing context it doesn't really work. How do you identify the poor performers? What are the measurement indicators to apply? How do you sack one midfielder but not another? Do you take on-field discipline into consideration? Do you take brand commerciality into consideration? It just doesn't really work. As an industry, it is just too idiosyncratic.

Does making drugs illegal actually achieve anything, at all? If drugs were legal would everyone be monged out? I'm honestly not sure.

Good point. Souness wanted to but Lowe vetoed it. That's the real reason Souness left.

Those in uproar would have been idiots. Actually, that's harsh. Those in uproar would not have been fully appraised of the facts; unlike the board. He's gash anyway. In fact, I'm not even sure there would have been uproar. Everyone was expecting player sales. Fair enough, we hoped it would be Rasiak or John or Saga etc... but it wasn't, so it should have been someone else.

We would have raised approx £1m? Maybe a bit more. The team would not have suffered one iota. To allow SLH to fall into administration was lazy and incompetent and smacks of a half-arsed approach. Not surprising considering the CEO who came back to "save Saints", apart from beng barking mad, worked a two-day week. Not surprising considering the chairman of the football club is a tax exile. Useless, incompetent idiots.

Spot on. I hate waiting for French Fries.

Well, clearly he was wrong. People are allowed to be wrong. Even Rupert is allowed to be wrong. It's the endless repetition of the same mistakes and the inability to recognise that our failings are a symptom of these mistakes that really grates with people.

It's a routine internal committee meeting isn't it, and we happen to be one item on the agenda? That was my understanding. I don't think we're required to plead anything at this stage (although no doubt someone will have been in touch to ensure our position is known).

I agree with the premises; however the conclusion depends on the relevant interested party being of sound mind and is thus uncertain!

Is Billy Connolly involved in the takeover bid as well? Awesome! I like his little beard.