rallyboy

so not only are they the bestest and most passionate fans who always turn out in huge numbers, they are now the most sceptical in the league as well. So many awards to hold, those extra fingers must help out.

surely you're not suggesting that he's squeezing the last dregs of cash out prior to legging it?? Before their nasty overpaid squad disbands for the final time I wonder if Chanrai mentioned to the Russians his ongoing legal right to the majority of any transfer monies? Or the fact that the surrounding land isn't included. Do they know about the CVA? or the pending court cases? Or the liquidation investigation? At least they have three years of parachute payments to come...... There must be loads of little surprises awaiting the unwary. Hope they got someone better than Al Fahim to do the due diligence. And in case no one mentioned it, Cotterill has worked miracles - he's a coaching genius - not a cheap option in desperate times. Apparently

sorry Nick, don't share your optimism for a change. I fear the away games, more than I did before Saturday. Orient was a battle, Rochdale and Rovers were not much better, the squad is getting battered and I hoped Huddersfield would crack by now. Not normally one of the wrist-slitters but I have a bad feeling about the next seven days and I think we need MK Dons to do us a big favour. I look forward to the physio and then the players proving those doubts to be unfounded. Cheer me up Nige, produce two or three of the injured players fully recovered at the weekend. And on a different issue, I saw the Rochdale manager post-defeat saying his players were exhausted after putting everything into the game on Tuesday. Cheers guys, raise your game for us and then have a breather against other teams. Nice. That's what we have to put up with week in week out, it's not our arrogance, just small clubs in their cup finals.

To take the highest paid XI in the division and coach them to mid-table mediocrity amid chaotic disciplinary problems sets Cotterill apart from most managers. Miracle worker? Maybe not, but he is certainly special... Though I'm still not convinced about his definition of quality in the whole ongoing and disastrous quality over quantity experiment that he intends to repeat next season. If there is one. I've enjoyed the terrific job he's done as much as I'm enjoying the craggy old prossie-botherer's latest relegation debacle. You can't take his spirit, but if you pop down to Upton Park you can have the three points anytime you fancy.

strangely concerned tonight despite a great 3 points.... Barnard's season looks over, we are missing Lallana horrendously, and I was disappointed that Charlton couldn't muster any fight. I'm just a little worried that we are wandering towards a defeat at Brighton and the table will suddenly make scary reading. imo the biggest game next week is MK Dons v Huddersfield. If Udders got turned over there the pressure is off and a point at the Withdean would do nicely. I don't want us to end up battering Plymouth's/Walsall's goal in the 90th minute desperately looking for a vital goal as we did today. Unless of course Davis comes up and heads the promotion-winning goal in the 95th minute of game 46 - then it might be worth waiting for! Though I'm sure someone will still moan about it.

putting the spiritual beliefs of individuals aside, how about we just give some thought to a guy who has suffered a horrendous accident, give him some moral support, and hope he can find the mental strength to adjust to what life has thrown at him. I'm sure he has the best wishes of many people of all different faiths.

Mack, why ruin our fun with some alleged facts? Sadly I can't imagine that more than a handful of people would have taken up that option, never mind. Go on, cheer us up by telling us all refs are against you, the authorities have got it in for you, and a defender sticking his arm out to block the ball on the line isn't a penalty. And follow it up with the hilarious one-liner Cotterill has done a fantastic job.....go on, you know you want to...

20% of their fanbase doesn't pay a penny?????? Just when I thought we were running out of laughs this thread coughs up that little gem on page 765 - hilarious if true! And as for Cotterill's waste of an appeal - defender sticks arm out on goal line, ball connects - that's a card as red as Storrie's ar$e will be after a few weeks in Parkhurst. Idiot.

so does the current business still honour the 'lifetime season ticket' bought before the last two administrations despite several name and numerous ownership changes? Is it in the due diligence that you have to give some people free football forever even though the company their contract is with no longer exists? Not sure I would take on a business with that sort of historical set up, imagine buying a pub where previous owners heading for bankruptcy had arranged for people to have free drinks for life. How about Chanrai sells 10,000 lifetime seats for £500 each as his parting gift to new owners? If only they had that many fans!

well, it seems the Russians are currently attempting the FaPPT and a deal could be completed by the end of the month... That will be the same deal that would complete a fortnight ago, and then a week ago. Time to find out if the football authorities can spot organised crime when it comes and knocks on their front door dressed in smart suits, carrying AK47s and a horse's head in a bag. I suspect you just have to stuff a handful of notes into Lampitt's thong and he'll make a call to the right people and the paperwork is yours. Next hurdle is to provide proof of funds, but if you have registered the name of a couple of banks I guess you have your own headed notepaper so that one is sorted. Finally you have to agree a price with Chanrai based on the amount of debt, cva, and complications on land use etc. That might be the toughest of the three, he'll want £25M in some form and the real business just isn't worth a third of that. Unless you already have an agreement with the arms dealer and this is a complete Russian property development stitch up. Or you plan to launder so much filthy cash through it that the purchase price doesn't matter. Football authorities - this time show us you have some bottle rather than rolling over and getting your tummy tickled. Roll up, roll up, there's still mileage left in the old train wreck.

welcome back Mero. The general thought is that by spending so much money this season it was a final gamble at getting Chanrai his money back. Quality over quantity involves Prem wages and long contracts, there has been little sign of controlling costs and using young players. Outbidding QPR was one of the highlights, but delaying the cva and payments to small businesses and charities to do it made it outrageous. So there has been no real attempt to stabilise the business, the big money paid out is once again future income being gambled. The mistakes of history have been repeated and now the business has to justify the massive outlay for minimal return. It's like Storrie never left. Lampitt and Cotterill deliberately gambled another year of parachute money on getting promoted back to where the big bucks are. They have failed and now the business has to bite the bullet, or bring in new investment. We can see through their spin, I'm sure you can, but many can't. They keep telling everyone how great it's been, how the players have done a tremendous job, how the fans have been fantastic, how the business is breaking even - but we all know that none of that is true. That's why we are amused. Any of the few who say it's been a good season are kidding themselves, much the same as the position we are in. We have spent big money for the level we are at, promotion is a must. If we fail you won't find any Saints fans saying, well we did pretty well, we nearly made the play offs and we did have a bad start, and the refs cost us lots, and we had injuries.... No excuses, both clubs have spent money to go up - not to stay up.

oh well, something to cheer us up on a gloomy night. Cotterill's done an amazing job............yeah, of driving the most expensive bus in the championship over a cliff! Ref's fault again, and isn't that the league's number one convicted sex offender chipping in with goals? How tasteful. When I said a couple of weeks ago they are still very much in it as they have two winnable home games coming up, well it seems I was talking out of my a4se! It isn't going to go down to the wire, they won't be close to the play-offs. Their season is over. Milk bottles on the doorstep, put the cat out, lock the gates and call the administrators to say the cva needs a further delay and that Plan A was an unmitigated disaster. Quality over quantity sounded like a lunatic idea in August, and tonight it was proven to be so, especially when the quality was very poorly chosen. Bring on the Russians, the circus is still in town.

not happy but, beat Bristol Rovers, Huddersfield draw at Charlton, jobs a goodun.

what does a loan shark do if you fail to pay? Well they could just take the business off you, pretend to be your owner and put you into administration for their own personal gain. The next step would be to decide when to sell the debt on, presumably when there's no longer any chance of big short term gain and they see a dim punter kicking the tyres. That'll be now then I guess.

we have seen ourselves how difficult it is to build from scratch and we also know how getting out of a division isn't as easy as you think, so even big Russian money for laundering would be no guarantee of success. There will be three more teams with parachute money, hopefully we'll come up and have funding, Brighton will have extra gate money and look to progress, there will be far more competition in the championship next year. That would be maybe eight teams with better funding than them immediately, and we have seen what the coaching god Cotterill is capable of with the biggest budget in the division. (By the way, I see it was the ref's fault again on sat.) Their business model has to be based on outside investment or massive investment in a new ground, Fratton Park cannot generate enough money to finance promotion campaigns. So panic not me old muckers, there is no quick fix down there. I think it's unrealistic to imagine us storming through the division first time so we might have a couple of years with them, or even get to relegate them. Which would be nice.

he got on the wrong bus.

accurate summary from Chez. Davis takes some stick but he is looking really solid, compare his form with some of our opponents' keepers and he looks world class. The two in front are a formidable pairing. Chaplow is out of sorts and we have struggled in a few games but Nige knows this league and there are no points for artistic impression, we are grinding out results with solid and gutsy defending. I don't care whether we look like Brazil or not, I just want three points each game. As for Orient claiming that two obviously offside goals is some sort of indication of being in the game - we could all run up the other end and score, the art to it is to do it legally, and their second bloke doesn't understand the basic laws. I was in line with both and they were clear cut and correct, pity that linesman didn't have the whistle, we might have had some more consistent refereeing. Was Barnard a bit naughty? Yes, that's why he got booked. Does a bloke swearing and throwing a fag at a player get my sympathy for his poor family getting abused by a nasty player? No way. Try throwing your fag at Rooney and see how long it is before you're allowed in a ground again. Were two searches going in to the ground really required? Pity they didn't check us on the way out, we all had three points about our person by then. Slightly concerned about the way our squad is taking a battering every game but hopefully the rotation will see us through. And thanks to those that found the other half of my sunglasses after we scored - the smoked glass monocle look really didn't suit.

Bearing in mind the club doesn't do any business of this ilk via the media and we have now developed a policy where if you hear a rumour you know it isn't true, the last thing Cortese's going to do is discuss delicate finance issues in public, and nor should he. I see nothing there that concerns me, I'd be worried if they look the same in a year from now, though I think the time has come to get promoted to ensure they don't! As for his wages, my recollection is that in one of the sets of accounts before we blew up it indicated that directors wages and expenses amounted to £14.5M - I'm happy to be corrected on that but it was an enormous amount of money being taken out by those that ran the club (into the ground). Now we are just paying the going rate for someone of that stature, who at the moment is delivering bigtime. Though he is a bit bonkers. Anyway his performance can be judged in the next few weeks, he can either be vilified for sacking Pardew or congratulated on delivering the first phase of the project. Then can we revisit the forum rantings of early season and see who now has an eggy face.

oh he knows exactly what he's after, a shell of a company that can cope with large amounts of cash going in, sloshing around and coming out again. There is little at pompey to attract a serious businessman hence the lack of interest and quality of the last few owners. They need someone who isn't interested in making money - a billionaire fan or a supporters buyout? But they would need £30M for starters which is a lot of tarmac jobs and lucky heather sales.

they could be sold within a week - if the latest blatantly obvious money-laundering operation passes the FaPPT if the potential new owners don't get shot again if due diligence doesn't throw up any past wrongdoing if their links to organised crime are ignored if they don't care about the tax evasion cases pending if Chanrai is prepared to give up on any profit. Yes, I fully expect to see new owners proudly holding up pompey scarves before next thursday. (conditions apply)

Mack makes a good point - what's so wrong with a 41 year old father of four ****ging a 15 year old girl? Doesn't sound pervy at all when you put it like that. If they've left school they are old enough - and she left school at 3.30pm. Anyway, what happens in Paulsgrove stays in Paulsgrove. What he does in his own time is only a matter for him, the police, the court, the prison service, the victim, the sex offender's register, and his wife and kids - what a load of fuss over nothing.

I don't think it's as clear cut as the table suggests - the big games just keep on coming! A draw at Orient and a loss at Rochdale could leave us in trouble, these two games are massive, we need to be injury-free and firing on all cylinders. If Huddersfield beat Peterborough which is quite feasible it could all go wrong from this great position so I'm just hoping we can turn Orient over. From Huddersfield's point of view they are on an amazing run that must be some sort of club record - but they can't shake us off and the pressure is on them. A few weeks back it was frustrating to win and find everyone had. We have dealt with Bmouth and MK Dons ourselves, Pboro have stumbled too, Hudders have drawn too many - Nige has slowly but surely steered us to this huge opportunity - Saturday we need to grasp it. See you there.

Cotterill - ‘I can’t make any summer plans at the moment, I just can’t. ‘I would like to do a bit more but at the moment I can’t. Don’t ask why, that is just how it is. Sinister statement - is he not sure he will be there, or not sure if the owner will be there? They still seem short of a cohesive plan that goes beyond trying to find the next wages. But he isn't as dim as I thought - ‘There definitely needs to be some investment in the playing side, for sure. Oh hang on, yes he is, he still hasn't grasped the concept of a 46 game season. ‘We want quality over quantity. There is no point having players for every day of the week when all they do is play on Saturday. That daft idea for any financially unstable business is one defeat away from being exposed as a mistake this season, yet he wants to try it again. Still gambling.

yeah, he's telling fibs. Unlike Cotterill who is always honest and gives an accurate summary of the game, win or lose. Following their 2-0 defeat at Reading Cotterill said: We were the better team and with 11 men we would have won that game. Other managers must laugh at him - pompey haven't encountered a game this season that they haven't bossed and it's only been poor refs that have denied them claiming maximum points. They really have had some clown managers in the last ten years, long may it continue. We have had two decent ones in two seasons (another debate!) yet I hear criticism of both, even on saturday - but Redknapp, Grant and Cotterill are all legends. Are their fans thick or are we too hard on our own team? If there was a league that ranked how happy fans should be with their lot taking into account all aspects of supporting a club, I reckon that despite the moaning we have moved up from about 85th in the league structure to the top ten? They have gone from top six to about 90th in the same period.

I went off him when he bottled a penalty in Euro 96 and put Southgate on the spot. Venables went looking for leaders and Ince sat on the ground with his collar up hoping the boss couldn't see him. The guvnor? I don't think so. And while we are talking other managers, it was funny to see - a. Peterborough's keeper letting in that equaliser. b. Ferguson being forced to talk about it. No doubt when he becomes the superstar manager that he thinks he already is, he'll be able to tell the media to stick their interviews where the sun don't shine, meanwhile he has to stand there and squirm. And another thing! Blackpool - 'premier league, you're having a larf'...Holloway might have to accept that song as fair comment quite soon unless he can get that great asset Puncheon playing. I see he dropped him yesterday in an attempt to stop the disastrous run that has coincided with his arrival, didn't work. If we can get out of this division we might have a few old friends playing against us next season.