St Marco

Sorry but I strongly disagree. The thing that Guly does is he can run back to defend. However he isn't very good at that imo. Today he was dire and gave away the ball so many times. Gaston came on and caused havoc on the counter. He was a big reason for us getting a draw. He did good at Villa too. Gaston's pass ratio is a lot better and has the ability to mix it up. He can get into good positions i.e Arsenal. Have to remember he is still young and is still settling in. Anyone who thinks Guly is better I think is having a laugh imo.

Going to be a tough game but we have a decent home record against them. They have won only once at our place since 1993. Would go with -----------Boruc----------- ----------------------------- Clyne--Forren/Jos---Yos--Shaw ---------------------------------- ---------Morgan--Cork---------- ---------------------------------- Puncheon---------------Gaston -------------------Lambert----- -----------Jay Rod------------- Would not let Guly anywhere near the first team after his last few displays.

Just got back (went for a few afterwards with mates). Great result and I think it was the least we deserved from our peformance. They had a lot of shots but they were either long shots that went miles wide or scruffy shots with hardly any power. First half I felt we were a bit edgy and were our own worst enemies. The two goals came from mistakes and should have been dealt with. Ba's goal was good but he should not have had that space. The second goal I thought Boruc should have saved but again it should have been dealt with before it got to that. Davis and Guly were just terrible. Second half we were much better and looked more involved in the game and caused more problems. When Lambert came on I thought we were by far the better team. They just went to sleep and thought that was it. Gaston was a big influence too and they didn't know what to do with him. Our two goals were awesome especially Jason's. Watching the replay makes it look even better! All in all very happy with that. MOTM was Morgan as he put in an imense performance and was everywhere. Shaw also deserves another mention as he was superb. I can't believe how good this kid is after so few games. I am starting to think maybe he will be a left winger eventually sort of like how Bale grew into that role. Another note is that when we played them in the cup the atmosphere was **** and a lot of people complained about it. In this match their fans were no better then we were. They were quiet for a lot of the match and only seemed vocal when we got back to 2-2 and Torres came on. Seemed more concerned with having a go at their own team and manager then supporting them. Was a very weird thing to witness.

Heard some rumours that both Microsoft and Sony will be having a closed event for press prior to GDC (Games developers conference) then Sony will be having a Playstation event just after it for the public. So maybe they will reveal by end of March. Which would then give them time to work on the E3 presentation a few months later and then release end of september/october. They won't release in November as that is when the new 360 will get released and they will want to be first out this gen. PS4 will in my opinion make or break Sony as a company. Another bad launch or a botched product and it will be over.

Pretty sure most clubs draw up a group of transfer targets and it is then down to the chairman to sign them. The question is who are the people drawing up that list? I think the days of a manager doing everything themselves is well and truly over and has been for a longtime.

Game of opinions and that but I totally disagree. It was going so slow that he would of been aware of someone lunging in but there was no lunge. The guy did a toe poke attempt at the ball and was nowhere near Jay Rods foot. He went down before the guy had even fully extended his foot. I don't see how he could of planted his feet when they were both going so slow? If penalties were given for phantom tackles then you would get hundreds a game. Puncheon getting taken out by the keeper could of been a lot worse. One is being brave and taking a bump like Puncheon did and the other is falling over with no touch or foot near you. Can't really call that one brave in my book.

I don't understand this point of view. There was no fast sliding lunge for the ball. If that was the case then you could understand it. But they were at very slow pace and the guy just tried to get a toe poke in from a standing position. No different from nearly every tackle you see everywhere else on the pitch. Football is a contact sport... It was a clear dive. His movement was not natural and there was no danger to him. If he thinks there was then he needs to quit football for his own safety. Puncheon getting taken out by the keeper was far more dangerous and that was good keeping.

Seen it about 50 times and it is still a dive... I can understand people ****ed off at what the BBC said but it was an obvious dive. Keeper got the ball ahead of Puncheon and Jay Rod just fell over. He thought a tackle was going to come in and it didn't. You could understand if he was running and wanted to save himself from a tackle but he was walking and there was no tackle. If it happened to us I'm sure those saying it was not a dive would of said it was.

Nope. Cheating is wrong and needs to be stamped out. I think as others have mentioned there needs to be rules brought in to prevent it. If you dive a video panel should review it and give out suspensions/fines if guilty. Three match bans will encourage managers to stamp it out in their teams. I hope Adkins has a go at Jay Rod for that and tells him to stop or he wont play.

Pompey fan talking about who they should sign in the comments section on the news "I bet Henry would play 1 game for us if asked. Well why not ? He loved us fans and put our shirt on" /facepalm

If Adkins got sacked then I would welcome him. But I would rather stick with Adkins even if we do lose at Villa. I think continuity is the key for us this season. If we go down then fine sack him. But if we do lose he will be under huge pressure and if he is given the sack I don't think anyone would be surprised. Three wins in three months is not a good record. Winning only three games out of eleven at home will always put you under pressure. Especially if you lose to sides around you i.e Sunderland and Wigan. Our away record is awful too with only one win. I hope we keep him. Especially if the alternative is Di Matteo. But you can't have a 50% loss ratio and expect to keep your job forever.

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Nope. These are the games we should be winning. Villa are possibly the worst side I have seen this year. In the game against a 4th division team (Bradford) they were awful. They have a dire home record and only scored 9 goals. If we cannot win these types of games then we will not stay up.

They should report whatever they want. Both good news and bad news. But if the club have something to show the public and gave The Echo a tour/pictures/information under the instruction of with holding that info until a certain time (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_embargo) then they should honor it regardless of what others have done.

You see this was what I was talking about in regards to your parents. They won't look on the internet for football news and fair play to them. But your find that 82% of the country use the internet daily and of that number the age group of 65-74 51% use the internet daily. Of the 55-64 group it is 69%. (2010 ofcom numbers) That means more older people use the internet then those that don't. So the question I was trying to highlight was if they are someone who has access to the internet and use it daily but don't look at certain things i.e football then how much of a fan of it are they really? My grandfather who is about 84 loves gardening, plants etc. Whenever I see him looking at the net he is looking at places that have news about it i.e bbc gardening. If these people have little interest in the topic then as I said above I doubt they bought the paper to read about it.

Of course. But like I said above it was basically asking them for an embargo. It happens in the press almost daily. Some will break rank and run the story and then won't be given the same access as they were before. That is normal in business especially something like sport/entertainment based. The Echo broke the embargo and thus lose out on access. That is how it is all around the world. To try and imply the way we have acted is somehow uniqe is just wrong.

It is a local newspaper.....a community paper that is supposed to report on local things. It should be reporting about the club both positive and negative. I don't think anyone has issue with that. BUT if the club asked them to delay reporting something for a few hours so they could say it first on their own site then personally I think they only have themselves to blame for doing that. If it was a story about Cortese banging a plyers wife then go for it, if it was a story about Adkins headbutting a little old lady then again go for it. The report was none of those things. Is it really against journalism code for a company to request a positive story be postponed for a few hours so they can break the story first? A local newspaper? From a business point of view not one bit. Have you not heard of press embargos? It would be like someone at Empire (film magazine) going on a set of a movie and seeing behind the scenes stuff and then giving spoilers about the story in their magzaine. Do they do that? No they don't. Are they told to keep quiet on what they see when on set? yes they are. Would they be invited back on set if they were asked not to tell their readers what was going on but they did anyway? Of course not. So what is the difference here? The last bit about the club shutting the echo out is contempt for fans is just stupid. Most fans do not give a **** about The Echo. Seriously if you did a poll on here asking people if they buy the echo just for Saints news very few would say they do. What annoys me about this whole argument is this perception that somehow fans ("ordinary") don't have access to computers, they don't have access to the internet and best of all don't know how to use them. It is a load of ********. Old people and young people all know how to use computers and if interested in any topic will find it. Wether that be local news, porn or football news. Trying to imply that "the ordinary fan" is someone who has zero access to those things is laughable. Let me put it to you another way. When something happens in the world of football (lets pick something small and recent i.e Appy wanting to speak to Blackburn) how did you find out about that? Did you find out on the internet? The tv? Or did you read a local newspaper? Pretty sure it was not the last one.....Point being the world has moved on and people know how to get information if they want it. We know just as much about other clubs because of it as we do our own. The viewership of The Echo just like every other print media has declined and will continue to decline. It has nothing to do with freedom of press, nothing to do with propoganda or some ceo at a company. It is to do with the shift in how we get our information. These ordinary fans that you talk of are not as dumb as you like to think they are.

Who has said that? Think you must be the idiot if you honestly believe a company will continue to get exclusivity/special treatment after it has gone against that companies wishes. No company would do that regardless of what business it is in. Has nothing to do with propoganda or any of that ********. Nor thinking everything the club does is right. It is about money. The Echo decided to cash in on an annoucment by announcing it before the club did even though they were asked not to. If the company comes to you and says please delay mentioning it for a few hours until we have it up on our site that really isn't asking much is it? It isn't like they have a story on someone being corrupt, having an affair or anything like that. Just a story about the clubs expansion/plans. To think they would be all like "Hey I know you went against our wishes and printed a story anyway but we just wanted to let you know it is all cool between us. Here have some all access passes to the players lounge so you can go get some stories to help sell your paper and make the owner a bit more money, and here is a special area where your photographer can get some photos, you have the best place to get those shots! No hard feelings, it is on us!" Yeah to expect something like that is a bit more "idiotic" I think....

If you said that 10 years ago then I would agree but we live in a different world now. There are many different ways to get information out to people i.e websites, twitter, facebook, sms, news 24 channels, sports radio and of course things like newsnow. The club has not been affected at all by not dealing with The Echo anymore. Look at what has happened in three years. Where as by all accounts The Echo has changed a lot internally. For fans it is a shame but I don't think you can blame the club for the stance it has taken with them. If you bite the hand that feeds then it is your own fault when it no longer feeds you anymore. It happens at other clubs i.e Fergie and bbc.

I don't think it is. The Echo over the years were given exclusives nearly every day .Had complete access to the club and staff/players. Which in turn makes the paper more desirable by fans. Which thus get's them more money. They benefit more from having a close relationship with the club. They were asked to delay releasing some info for a few hours by the club and they didn't. If I was told some information by a company but was told to not tell anyone else and then I told someone else I would not expect my relationship with the company to be the same. It shows you can't be trusted and you would happily sell any exclusive information you have. It broke the trust the club had with them.

Switzerland seem to do alright? Personally I think the reason people want out of the EU is because they have seen their local communities become affected by it. Have to remember the majority of our nation are old bastards. It isn't so much to do with trade and stuff like that but more to do with immigration. Right now it appears we have an open door policy where you can come here no matter where your from. The press doesn't help as they know it is an area that ****es a lot of people off. These are just a few examples http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/4323814/Meet-the-Romanian-gypsies-defiling-Londons-prestigious-Park-Lane.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/9670141/Britain-powerless-to-stop-tens-of-thousands-of-Bulgarians-and-Romanians-moving-to-UK-next-year-Theresa-May-admits.html People read stuff like that and it gives them the belief that the reason these people have flooded into the country is because of the EU. However you look at it you have to think as an Island Nation we cannot continue with our open boarder policy because one day the population will be horrendous here. Right now we have a record 7% growth rate (at last census). With the amount of jobs being created reducing and unemployment rising (especially youth unemployed) I think it does not take a genius to work out that you cannot sustain that growth. It has to stop. So as I say I think for a lot of people it is down to the EU pretty much allowing anyone to move here. We in Southampton have experienced the changes over the past 10 years. Look at the Polish population here now. It isn't a question if you want them here or not it is a question of how many you think should be allowed here. Is 10 enough? is 10 million enough? The culture of the country has changed a lot and in many cases not for the better. The other day a friend was in a car accident with an Arab guy. He didn't speak a word of English even though he was driving a car. Apparently he had lived here for 3 years. Just something so simple as changing details was hard to do. Do you not think maybe it is common sense to at least have some rules in place where people should at least learn the language of the country they are living in? So when these people get to vote I am pretty certain they will be doing so on the basis of immigration rather then trade or economic things.

I'd be interested to see your proof for above statement as it would be against current media trends. Plus also if you take in the fact that people buy their tickets through the website that makes it even more remarkable...

I think the villa game will go a long way in deciding his fate tbh. While we have had a bit of improvement results wise it isn't that much really. Still only one win in eight. The next 4 games on paper look brutal. We can forget about getting anything at Man utd and Chelsea but Villa and Everton will be big games. If we come out of January with one draw and 5 losses he will be gone. Only Saints fans would turn their noses up at a guy who won a European and domestic cup...

Time for popcorn

Any new info on when St Kanu will be taking them to court to get his cash?