rallyboy

I would give full marks to the new owners. A quiet but thorough takeover, a similar hunt for a manager, the season ticket system was up and running immediately, we are still against the clock but everything is happening. Taking over a business that was on life support can't have been an easy thing and I am impressed. Right Mr P, you need to bring in approx fifteen players, you have a week or two, get on with it, there's a good chap!

I just checked my account too and it looks like most of us were overcharged for the last four or five seasons... Hopefully value for money is the way forward.

could we just clarify that their takeover hasn't collapsed and people should stop posting on here, all you are doing is adding to the thread for no reason other than filling space. And some people write far too much to explain that simple fact. They don't need to. So it must stop. Soon.

didn't follow every legal detail but got the idea! An interesting read, one might observe that he makes Ridsdale look like a shrewd character who made a decent attempt at running the club. And presumably just as Leeds are trying to rebuild their finances they will be saddled with an additional £1.5 million legal bill that could have been easily avoided. I'm not sure that Leeds have hit rock bottom yet, and the longer time goes on the less their glorious history will count when it comes to bringing in funding. No one will do that under Mr Bates' tenure, and if he keeps on doing business in his distinctive style, he might one day meet his match - swimming with sharks ain't a hobby for the faint-hearted. When people say there are no longer any characters in the game, they only need to look in some of the boardrooms, and I don't mean 'characters' in an affectionate nostalgic way, more the Lock Stock style.

sorry Alain I must have missed the second occasion when he showed everyone what a great leader he was, do enlighten me. I agree that we can learn from other sports but not at huge expense and as one of several disastrous experiments that took us to the brink. Diet, fitness and correct training have always been key since the beginning of time, even though it took British football a few years to embrace that. Teams have worked with sprint coaches, even used ballet to improve balance, shrewd football coaches have always looked for an edge, this was not new stuff and he wasn't the messiah. Woodward wasn't a rocket scientist introducing football to revolutionary practice, he was offering expensive left-field experimental ideas that didn't earn Southampton a single point, and this sporting lab work was financed by us. And with the other failed jobs and his rugby legacy with England and the Lions, sadly his great achievement in 2003 now looks like a small oasis of good fortune and timing, in a vast desert of mediocrity.

I was only reading today how many of the 03 players rated his people skills as zero and within the rugby squad he had a cowardly approach to selection - not a good combination unless you are a sporting giant, which he isn't. Beyond running up huge bills at Staplewood on crackpot ideas and being at the helm of a debacle of a Lions tour, his last great success was gathering the right people around him six years ago. Olympic-wise I am sure the coaches of the cycling and rowing teams must have welcomed his input on where they were going wrong, or maybe they recognised him as a weirdo chancer who had got lucky, just once. He's just a comic footnote in the soap opera that we became for a while, it's funny now, but it was ludicrous at the time.

Wotton talks the talk, maybe he's found his level, let's remember at this time we need players to get us out of LgOne not to the Prem. If he needs any motivation from within, when that final whistle went in the last game and we were relegated it must have been like a kick in the teeth for him.

RonManager is indeed correct, that goal was so impressive that several maidens did faint and required leech treatment, while I was so overcome that I instructed one of my footmen to nod in modest approval on my behalf. Furthermore following a witty song by Lord Hansen on the subject of zonal marking and the inability of the Corinthians' custodian to dominate the pomo, the blaggard was horse-whipped for his trouble, and rightly so.

The future is bright, the past is a different country, very funny attempt at dragging the last ounce of life out of a dead subject. Rupert who?

heart says they are heading for oblivion, but head fears it will go through eventually. Maybe - 1. He can't raise all of the cash without some dodgy backing - he needs more than £100million immediately, then a further £20-30M for the team, £100M for a stadium, training ground, big wage bill etc - this is not a great investment, Newcastle looks like a bargain, you would do better finding a well-structured and supported club with a good ground and huge fanbase that has fallen on hard times, you can get them for under £15M and they are great! or maybe 2. They are haggling over the price because the landscape is changing by the day - players going, debt repayment due, difficult to nail down what they are buying. 3. He has the funds but is holding out for a price knowing they are desperate to sell. 4. He has the funding but the league will give him the big thumbs down. 5. He lives with his mum and dad in Barnet. Next four weeks will decide their next ten years, wouldn't want them to go out of business. But would like them to plummet down through a dozen divisions.

thankfully Mr Serious-Help himself rode into town this week. I wouldn't fancy starting the new season without a billionaire on board, it's kind of comforting, and on a fashion level, not having one would be so last year...

just seen Wotte interviewed on the way out of the club, came across really well, wished the club luck and finished with a good gag. He couldn't manage a bunch of misfits but a promising cabaret career awaits. Good decision to get a new man in, but good luck to him.

We have suffered six years in the wilderness. It really feels like a corner has been turned, the future won't be easy but the depression we have had to endure is surely lifting, didn't we finally discover where rock bottom was ten days ago? And let's not forget that there are plenty more teams on the brink, they might have to dish out three more points penalties that will lift us up the table before Christmas, and the way our luck is going this week, maybe earlier!! It's a great week to be a Saints fan, and when could you last say that - 2003? Life is good.

What Mr L has done today buys a HUGE amount of fan support and a decent honeymoon period - or it should. I am 100% behind whoever he appoints because we all want the same thing, and he is financing our dream. Though Gary Glitter for youth development could leave the club open to criticism.

Mr Liebherr, we love you! X I always knew Fry was a top bloke who would sort us out good and proper... Big party, then let's not forget that we have a squad to build in no time at all and we are starting the season as relegation favourites, BUT this should give us every chance of climbing out of that and showing Mawhinney he can knock us but down but like Chumbawumba, we will get up again! We are back from the brink, we have looked the grim reaper in the eyes, stared him down and now we are off to give the likes of Yeovil and Northampton a good pasting!!

when the new owners come in can we introduce a system where no general threads are allowed to be hijacked for Lowe/Crouch/Wilde/Askham etc, support/attacks/spin? If people want to harp on about the past they can do it in one thread, call it 'obsessive hatred/luvvies corner, 'the inquest'', or whatever. That would leave the rest of the forum to discuss football and the future and anyone who really wants to waste more time on debating ALL of the to$sers who have gone before have their own little thread. It would be cleansing and good therapy for all and would mean the majority of fans wouldn't have that sinking feeling of 'here we go again' whenever we stumble across someone's personal take on history. It was bad enough suffering the dark days without having to relive them all over the forum like a war crimes tribunal. Most of those involved were to$sers, they are NEARLY history, let's look forward and UP, and argue and disagree about stuff that actually matters - like tactics, girls, and pies. COYR

I think that's the first time I have EVER seen a man dressed as a Swiss army knife so it is worth it for comic value and rarity! Though I suspect the health and safety officer will not be pleased to see a man running round the ground on matchdays with a tin opener for genitals, so we may have to think again....

what did Barclays hope to gain from launching administration at that specific time? They risked losing the lot (90% ish). The casual observer could suggest that perhaps the bank manager who made the decision wasn't too concerned about Barclays getting their money back and had other fish to.....er, grill? From being a simple handover of power, the administration period has turned into an era in its own right. Let's get the Swiss in and then worry later about delving through what looks from the outside like a proper Fry-up from start to finish.

the poor bloke has just spent a year at the end of a firing range surrounded by idiots. He must be shell-shocked and have the Nam stare, so a few months sat on a bench, a Premiership wage and the occasional run out in a big game is a no brainer. Ditto Surman - he couldn't say no. It is when players go on strike/depart muttering about going to 'a big club' that they deserve abuse - imo. Good luck to him.

Lordswood gets the prize for Swiss roll into town! I was going for Toblerowners. How long before either of these make it into the Echo via this site? Our lawyers are watching.

family business? Does that mean they live with their mum and dad in a 3 bed semi in Barnet? And if the Echo are hunting them down, the company car is parked out the front, you will know it when you see it, its the house in the shadow of the truck... No one is going to be kicking tyres bigger than that, and for that reason alone it must be true.

I have always felt that as a club we abandoned Jones, and with hindsight we let him down when he needed support, the resultant illness for his father was an added aspect that would have made most people very bitter - Dave has shown incredible dignity. I'm not a luvvie! But Rupert was in a difficult position, I recall at the time hearing that the police were certain they had a rock solid case, if the club had that same false feedback I can understand the decision. There is a thin line between supporting an innocent man and finding that you have been defending a pervert. I would like to think that the officers responsible for canvassing the charges and trying to smooth over the inaccuracies were charged/sacked and that the accusers were charged.....but I fear not. Dave's quiet approach contrasts a bit with post-cancer Lance Armstrong when he returned to cycling and won a stage. At the finish he went looking for his former team managers so he could say to them 'aren't you the ****ers that abandoned me when I was dying?' Thankfully Dave has shown no such thoughts about Saints and I hope the majority of fans will always welcome him, should he ever make it into the Conference!

The more financially-minded may be able to confirm, putting individual consortiums aside for a mo, in simple terms are we locked in a circle of no progress? No one will buy a club that isn't assured a league to play in, and to even establish a value for the club there needs to be confirmation from the authorities about the penalty situation. No one will risk millions without those assurances, and the league won't give them. Without them on the table, Fry's hands are tied, he will have to give the club away and the creditors he's serving will lose so much they won't accept it, so in turn the league won't give assurances about our place, so Fry will have to give us away, the creditors won't be satisfied, the league won't be happy with that, the buyers won't pay much, and round and round we go. The only way to break the circle is for the league to clarify their poorly-disguised caveat about sporting sanctions, or for the buyers to trust them (!) and risk millions on what could be a league two club at any moment. And has Kevin Keegan arrived yet? He was coming in on Rod Stewart's yacht within 48 hours I believe.

so many Saints memories - there was the day that Fialka drove his little Metro to the cashpoint for a tenner to pay back his mum and the machine took his card, that was poignant. But it has to be Matt's final goal at The Dell - if you weren't emotional you weren't there. Perfect football theatre.

'I've just had a thought, supporting Saints seems like a good idea.'