david in sweden

Agreed ...but that didn't happen overnight either, and their manager is ain one-off situation. Despite all their enormous investment Chelsea's recent record is not so impressive. It's stretching credulity for me to picture us in the top four in the present Premiership set-up, as well. But... 27 seasons in the the Prem / Div.1 wasn't so bad... was it? Even in the period when Liverpool were champions 9 seasons out of 10, we still gave them a good game now and again. I think most people realise that the consistancy of the " top four " will always put them in " another league " in Europe, but I wouldn't mind another 27 years in the Prem. - even if we never made the top four / Europe quite so often.

whilst I agree with your comments, I don't think we could be said to be guilty of expensive forays in to the transfer market in the past at least..since the 10 year old transfer record for Rory Delap is still our most expensive single outlay... the problem has been in allowing successive incompetens the key to the managers office and giving them a player budget that was unsuitable for the task. We were relegated to L1 on the back of the " Double Dutch " experiment where the " managers" concerned weren't given any budget when it was needed most. I think Nicola Cortese is more realistic about money than that. We have a (former?) bank manager as Chairman in this club.

Sadly, just what I was thinking, too. Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned the money part, but no-one who has read this far... has answered my question.. ARE WE MORE AFRAID OF SUCCESS THAN WE ARE OF FAILURE ?

looking at the past fees we've received ..and the latest £12 million + for Alex, another couple of talents like that will reach £20 million without much difficulty. But are you saying we are running the Academy as an auction house without any desire to have them play in OUR first team? Let them play half-a season..then sell them off to the highest bidder to stabilise a CCC life style for the coming years?

OK ...should we get the £20 million by regularly selling off our best Academy talents instead.... dell days ?

yes... but they didn't get there in the first season either, it requires patience. otherwise... we steadily sell off the up-and-coming talents from the Academy.. as we have done with Walcott, Bale and AOC..and see them play in the Premiership .. for some other club.. so why not us ?

OK ..let's reduce it to 15-20 million.. at least that might buy a few Prem.type players. Enough ?

Having read the thoughtful and well-written item from colinjb on the opening side, with the warning call... ..don't get promoted too soon.. I really felt constrained to ask myself. WHO... is better-prepared than SFC for promotion this season ? Some other clubs presently " in contention " for a promotion spot aren't the most stable concerns off the field. Few can doubt that if we are still at the top came January that the Liebherr family wouldn't give the nod to an extra 40-50 million out of their coffee money to give us the edge in the transfer market and seal promotion in obedience to Marcus Liebherr's dying wish to see " his club " get to the top flight, and a recent survey suggested than SFC are " potentially"... because of Marcus' legacy ...in the top 5 richest clubs in the country. Certainly everything we read only goes to underline that we have the best Academy in the country, the best training facilities and staff. A competent Chairman and a manager who sounds enthusastic enough to win the Champions League next week ! ..so where's the problem? Surely the coaching staff and players have the right mindset for promotion, but still we read gloom and doom from some of the fan-base on this site almost every week...what's wrong with OUR mindset ? ..... ARE WE MORE AFRAID OF SUCCESS THAN WE ARE OF FAILURE ?

Yesterdays game, Sweden v. Finland saw the Swedes end up 2-1 winners and set themselves up for a runners-up place in Euro 2012, but also saw a record-breaking 119th. appearance for Anders Svensson who became the most-capped outfield player in Swedish football history when coming on as second-half sub. when he steadied up the shaky Swedish midfield as they hung on to a 2-1 lead against the " old enemy " Finland. Like David Beckham chasing Shilton's 125 cap record, Anders stands little chance of reaching former goalkeeping legend Thomas Ravelli (who got over 140 caps,) but nevertheless there are a striking number of similarities between the two players. Sweden (pop. 9 mill.) of course, is still regarded as a " minnow " in the footballing world and Anders (was once referred to, rather cynically, by a journalist)...as Sweden's David Beckham. But looking at stats. there are quite a few similarities (at least in the footballing world). David Beckham born May 1975. League record (Europe)... 487 games and 90 goals. England...115 caps. 17 goals. Anders Svensson born July 1976. League record (Europe)...420 games and 70 goals. Sweden ...119 caps. 18 goals. ..though both players have passed 35, neither looks like retiring and may well continue for several seasons to come.

I always got the impression that part of his success with Rugby was that he was already using the "formula", and it was a few " un-informed " types who criticised him when he tried to start using it with Saints. Five years on Nigel & Co. are making a success of it.

Mmmm.....judging by some of their results they haven't quite got it right yet ....

OK ..we're not Premiership ..YET ! but this type of fitness development really is state-of-the-art as far as English clubs are concerned although it's not uncommon for top European clubs. Gone are the days of a night before the match binge-up, or late night party and a pie and a pint before the game. They can analyse players' body chemistry and create special individual diets for each and every player. .. talk about the " 6 million Dollar Man " - ( relax we aren't going to sign anyone yet,)... but older fans will remember that TV series. What a great investment - no wasted spending here. We'll have a team of bionic men who are still going strong at 95 minutes !

SMS still looks a whole lot better than the vast majority of other League grounds around the country.

tbf..Spurs have often bought some of our best players over the years, and all we got in return was sh*te.......

.....and same old Leeds also....FOUR red cards already and it's only beginning of October... remember the old 1970's war cry ..Leeds United ..HARD ..but fair ..(?)...times must have changed a bit .

INDEED ! ..gone are the days when subs. were only used in the direst emergencies to keep the same numbers of players on each side. Nigel's " problem "..a very nice one..is to have (at least)..16 players available to compete for the 11 starting places every game ... AND to have a group of hungry youngsters pushing them all for places on the bench.

P.S. ....and by the way ..you'll be charged for all that toilet paper you've used since we started these negotiations !

He did nothing outstanding at Middlesbrough except to further the career of Stewart Downing (IMHO also a very over-rated player) and qualified himself for the England managership only because of his previous association with Sven-Göran Eriksson, from whom he seems to have learned very little when he took over the mantle of England manager, and produced some of the worst results of any England boss in history !.

Anyone who doubts Eriksson's ability as manager should take a breath and look him up on Wikipedia. His successes with European clubs, and Italy in particular are almost second to none. Apart from those deadly games in the World Cup, he had a V.G. record as manager, and the majority of the lost games were " friendlies " where he tried out 18 players in the same match in an effort to test players and find new systems /combinations and those chosen weren't up to it. His distasteful dismissal was (IMHO) the result of the double-standards applied by the F.A., and their knee jerk reaction to the "over-publicised " revelations about his private life from a media gang determined to get him out and employ an ENGLISH MANAGER..(pause for a chorus of God Save the Queen)..and in the end they got one ....STEVE McCLAREN. Eriksson is still a very good manager, as will be proved - if Leicester are patient enough with him - though I do think that he has taken a lot on board in signing TEN new players and starting from scratch again and is struggling to get players on the same wavelength..something that NA has already succeeded with. I expect to see Leicester in the play-offs come April.

Who's next I wonder, don't things usually come in THREE'S ?

the only positive is that your players get a rest for a week (not always a good thing if it breaks continuity), but tougher on teams with many internationals who end up playing more games anyway. Your regular players can train and recover, but your best players (internationals) end up kn*ackered by the time they're back !

i recall both players, but unfortunately..IN THAT NUMBER doesn't have the same facts as you. Crabbe played a few sub.games . but never scored (not at first team level anyway.) SORRY ! Likewise GERRY O'Brien scored a handful of goals in his short career but never as as sub. Sadly he never lived up to the reputation of his earlier namesake GEORGE (1959-1965) who netted 180 times in 5 years in the old Div.2 days. Subs. first introduced after the 1966 World Cup, were initially only ONE extra player and only allowed to be used in case of serious injury. Later as a tactical move and after that it was increased to 3, although you could only use ONE of the three. It seems that (unlike the headline of this thread,) that subs.didn't seem to affect games much in the beginning, not for Saints at least. The first sub. player to score after being brought on was Martin Chivers in April 1967, and then later Mick Channon in Aug 1969. By then the title " super sub " had been specifically applied two teenagers; Liverpools David Fairclough who got a goal or two regularly when coming on, and a precocious 16 year old for Birmingham named... Trevor Francis. Our own "super subs." began with the appearance of Tony Funnell who came on in a game in March 1978 and won the game with TWO goals. Then teenager Steve Moran started his goal-scoring career in the early 1980's from the bench, as did David Puckett and George Lawrence amongst others. It was only the emergence of Matt Le Tissier that began the theory that an oncomng sub. might actually change the game, which he scored twice when we beat Man.Utd 4-1 in the League Cup tie at the Dell in Nov. 1986? (the (then) Man Utd manager Ron Atkinson was sacked two days later). In 1992, young Nicky Banger came on in THREE successive League games and scored each time, but sadly never made a regular first team spot afterwards. Le Tissier has, during his periods of exile on the bench, come on and scored at least a dozen times in his career, and later signings like Egil Östenstad and Marian Pahars did also... along with the much under-rated Jo Tessem who also scored a few when coming on as sub. and won us quite a few valuable points in the process. This season we seem to have set a high standard with 7 sub.goals already by the end of September. How many more will we see score before seasons end, when only coming on... I wonder ? Certainly Lee Holmes goal was one of the quickest sub. scorers we've ever seen at SFC. SOURCE : (again ) thanks to... IN THAT NUMBER

should I cry, or ?...it's just at the moment, I can't get the smile off my face ...

Hey Adrians, YES Jake Sinclair.....are you one of the guys who said ...Theo ..who ? ..a few seasons ago ?