david in sweden

I'm with Alpine on this one ...:smt024 well you may be better than the TV pundits, but just watch out for those " dubious offside/ penalty decisions " and "disallowed goals " that are really OK, and which would upset the balance of power.:smt077 -if they were allowed. Why do you think that FIFA / UEFA continue to oppose the use of cameras when many other sports - even cricket - have accepted it years ago. When every other business, organisation and even transport authority is willing to put in CCTV to monitor situations, we still rely on the eyesight of slow-moving, sometimes biased refs. who are 20 meters behind the play, when a TV camera can highlight a nudge in the ribs or a shirt tug from 100 meters away.:mad:and yet are ignored. I'm fed up with watching TV matches where I see one thing happen .(.in close-up or umpteen replays) and yet the ref. has his own Hollywood script. Moonlanding ? .yes, its all a conspiracy.

I think.... you may find Frisk was Swedish. (to avoid everyone getting called Svensson or Johansson many Swedes change their family name, and FRISK mean " to be fit, or healthy) " Anyway, he was a bit controversial and made a few " Fan-Angering" (wrong decisions) in his time, but I think ? he retired a few years ago after he refereed a match ...in Italy... and in the crowd riot afterwards he was hit by a bottle or a coin ..or something (memory not clear on the precise details). Being a security-minded Swede he decided to pack it in. Good riddance, I say !

I wasn't aware of the fact that they were playing each other..I only took a quick look at the table

a lot more than that ...if they lose their last game and Sheff Wed. win theirs then Wednesday stay up and Palace are relegated, and we are one team short in L1. IF palace win they are still in the CCC ...and it's a CCC problem to get the numbers right, but if Pompey fail to get their act together then they may not retain a place in CCC.... likewise Hull who are about to go bankrupt having been relegated from Prem already. Last I heard ...Cardiff (now in a play-off place for the Prem) also had problems with the Revenue. Interesting ..'aint it ?.

As I recall the start of this (now 4 page thread) realted to whether or not B' mouth was a "derby" match or not ... and especailly as we haven't played them in a League fixture since 1959-60 ! However, we have discussed what constitutes a "derby game ?..if its the same city then we don't have any derby games - not even Pompey, however, a local game (derby or not) must relate to : geography, ease of access. Date (saturdays or midweek) and travel costs, and how well WE.. or "the opposition" are doing at the time. Looking back at this season, away fans stats. aren't always published and they may only reflect ticket sales or coach bookings and fans who travel on their own or who live/work closer may go and pay at the gate. ..but here are some for interest sake; L .Orient gate 7544..... saints fans 3200 Northampton 4858..... 2013 Millwall 11524.... 1959 Walsall 5681..... 1791 Brentford 6501..... 1783 Bristol Rovers 8607..... 1746 Mostly southern based clubs here. lowest away fans quoted. obviously much further to travel to... Hartlepool 3818..... 635 Oldham 5341..... 924 Southend 8281..... 1050 Most away games provided better than average attendances and in some cases ...best of the season for the "home side " SO.... I wonder how many B' mouth fans will come up to SMS ?

you may be right ! I took the stats. from football 365 site and maybe they haven't up dated since the millenium ....:confused:

Back in the days when we had Div.3 N & S, the champions from each moved up from the regional leagues into the lowest "national" division and played everywhere, but with finances being difficult for all clubs (well almost all) nowadays, it would save a lot of money both for clubs and travelling fans. Very few problems - even if you have two or more southern / northern teams in the relegation pack, the lower league can be easily re-organised. I think this occurred a few times back in the 1940's /50's and was simply resolved by "moving " a suitable Midlands side like for instance Peterborough, Mansfield, Crewe or Port Vale who could just as easily play in the Northern section as in the Southern.

some good observations Professor but when you write about specialist strikers you surely must admit that even Ricky's 30+ goal tally would count for little in the Prem. where against considerably better opposition Drogba's 20 goals look very impressive, as does Lampards tally. Dare I mention it... but our FA Cup game v. Pompey surely proved the point that even a team at the bottom of the Prem. has quality strikers who can finish. We have to applaud the efforts of Lambert, Barnard and Lallana but I doubt if any of them would make the grade at Prem. level. I look forward to them scoring hatfuls again next season, but don't expect them to be as successful when we get to the top of CCC.

I don't mind a bit, while other clubs have relied on Third World sponsorship and Middle East and even Russian oil money ..(why does our petrol cost - so much ?.).and at least we have a European owner, and Germany isn't such a bad heritage really..after all OUR Royal family has its roots in Saxony and we've always had good relations with them ...except for the two wars, that is ..but all that aside... I welcome ML .. and his money. If he comes to SMS every game and wears red and white ..he's one of us !

Crab Lungs ! ..having read some of your controversial and even vitriolic contributions in seasons past, I am really moved by this wonderful testimony to peace and harmony. Well Done.=D>

Do you wanna borrow some ..or are you considering buying him out ?

well I was actually responding to spy in the sky 's posting where he used the word " hordes " , and I can believe that a lot of Saints fans live outside the city boundaries - even as far away as B'mouth, but I thought we were referring to the Cherries fans. B-mouths capacity is 10700 but the highest they've had so far this season is 7626, and they average 5568 per home game. I don't know what % of Cherries fans' travel away... but it's sure to be a few more when they come to SMS: Most of us know SMS capacity is 32K+ but we 've still managed 20787 AVERAGE per game, thats only third behind Norwich and Leeds who average 24K+. The whole debate is about " what is a local derby " (and the +/- arguements) is perhaps decided by the number of travelling fans. Certainly fans from further west... Plymouth / Exeter/ Yeovil would be more likely to come to SMS than say travel to London / Midlands opposition, and that swells the attendance, plus such games being played at Bank Holidays is purely a compromise to fit in with the reduced train/bus traffic available on Public Holidays (which of course gives more freedom to those who can travel shorter distances).

Down on the coast we don't have so many clubs " really close " ..it's not like Brum or London where you have good local communications. I thought the idea was to have clubs who were closer geographically to play at such times ..bearing in mind the reduced travel services at Bank Holidays. Carlisle ... on Boxing Day anyone ...?

baed on the first 20 replies ....you seem to have the favourite two Colinjb, but is it perhaps time for the FL to re-consider that old suggestion for Div.3 North and South again .. for teams below CCC ? the Conference does it, and teams at the bottom of L1 would would do down automatically, and the better Conference sides would get a good chance of better football. WHY ? .. well nowadays it's environmentally friendlier (cost of travel / food, fuel and time-saving. Some cash-strapped clubs have huge bills for travel/hotels all over the country, and this would be a big saving for them. More fans able to travel shorter distances. ....or do people enjoy going to Carlisle and Hartlepool ? THOUGHTS anyone ?

I find it difficult to think that too, but WHY 30 MILES..why not 40 ..or 50 miles ?

why ..30 miles.? Aldershot must be further away than that and they are in the county. B'mouth might qualify for yr. 30 mile limit...but not Yeovil...!

:smt038 nice one, mehball !

However back to your original post. Rather like the Hartlepool monkey hangers who'd never seen a Fenchman, I've never met a Pompey fan (no seriously) ..I suppose they do exist :confused: but those I have seen on various cable TV matches don't impress me at all for courtesy or sportsmanship. Having suffered the pangs and arrows of outrageous ....administration (sorry different author) ..I really do not wish that club any real harm, but like St.Paul we may desire to be forgiving towards their fans ..whilst they still relish the thought of giving us forty lashes...it's not always easy to turn the other cheek. IMHO I don't wish them ill - not really, especially as they may well incur extra points penalty (as did Luton) for some of their dodgy transfer deals, and just as long as they don't beat us at any time in the future. Let's not resurrect that terrible fans revenge on unsuspecting players who are unfortunate enough to play for BOTH clubs at some point in their career. Aside from those slight reservations ..I'm with you in spirit !

I'd tend to agree with that, but B'mouth will be the closest geographical opponents next season. :smt028

what a lot of questions about this... I DON'T KNOW, but going back far enough before the days when people had easy access to cars and there were no motorways or buses to travel on them, many people used the railway for travel outside of their own area. Prior to the massive down-sizing of British rail in the 1960's by Dr. Beeching - almost every village and small town had its own / several stations. Railway buffs will recall railway companies like the Great Western and the Southern Railway which made travel within a geographical area easier than traveling by road. Thus if you look at old records of games played upto and after WW2 you see that matches had much larger gates than average - if they played clubs within the region. Today travelling not so difficult but was a severe handicap for away fans travelling north of London or Birmingham. Today you can fly to Tyneside in less than 2 hours, but it was half a day on a coach /or train at that time. Though we never played Pompey as often as many people think, my late father always regarded Pompey as a derby game ..but less so B'mouth - especially as we were rarely in the same league as them (except for a shorter period in the 1950's.) At this time Saints were lucky to get 15,000 gates (often only 10K) but home games v. Plymouth, Swindon, Reading even Brighton and Torquay could easily draw 20,000+ especially if it was a Bank Holiday fixture. It's hard to define a derby - unless one expects us to play Eastleigh or Salisbury in the near future, but one definition of " Southern / South Coast Derbies " is anywhere between Brighton and Exeter, and any clubs in the West Country. Although the distance maybe less to the South London clubs, IMHO none of those mentioned would rank as a derby game, but Aldershot (if promoted) might as they are also in Hampshire.

at the moment only Norwich are certain of promotion, so WHICH of the remaining FIVE sides would you like to see promoted to CCC and make our promotion push a little smoother NEXT SEASON..?

Agree +1

..do you have a source for that story ? ..or are you psychic /psychotic or just having a laugh with us ?

As reference - you can have a quote from the late Paul Getty who once said ..if you can count your wealth - then you are not rich .