Verbal

Oh, not 'green shoots' again! It's an old Tory scam to be the 'first' to call a recovery - aka wishful thinking which they hope others will buy on the flimsiest of evidence. And some of those listed above are clearly anything but optimistic. The growth in online advertising, for example, is at the expense, and worse, of 'offline' advertising in newspapers, TV, radio, etc. Financial services is less gloomy because it floats on a sea of taxpayer loan guarantees. Pret (aka McDonald's) is displacing independent sandwich shops in a classic 'clone high street' expansion. The economy is officially back in recession. And UK manufacturing is 'enjoying' a brief respite from a crushing low. Happy now?

She is starting to sound silly to many Argentinians, which counts for more than any appeal to international law. The invasion was carried out by one of the most brutal of modern dictatorships, and is forever associated with those murderers and thugs. Plenty of commentators in Buenos Aires have been making sure no one forgets that connection, and it's having an effect.

True enough, but it was a failure in some part because of the limitations placed on the British by the Reagan administration - even though the damage being done by the Super Etendards was there for all to see.

If we're thinking of the same cock-up, it was after Reagan's prohibition, which was why it was launched from Chile. Didn't stop the Super Etendards, and was a bit of a sad mess by all accounts, barely registering a scratch.

With Reagan's permission, and on the strict understanding that the Argentine mainland was not to be attacked.

I missed the Len Goodman programme, unfortunately. Belfast built the Titanic certainly, but with a host of design and construction faults that ought to add up more to embarrassment than celebration. The cost-cutting and flaky iron ore composites used in the rivets, for example, directly contributed to the domino-effect that ripped open successive supposedly water-sealed compartments. As bulkhead doors were slammed shut in a futile attempt to contain the onrush of water through the ship, dozens of engine crew found themselves sealed in, and would have been carried to the bottom of the ocean. Southampton, from where the engine crew was predominantly recruited - and many from the streets around where St Mary's now stands - was the city that took the full brunt of those design, engineering and construction failures (leaving aside those to do with navigation and egotistical hubris). To answer delldays' point, yes, it was stigmatising to be a single mother in working class communities after the turn of the last century, but much less so to be a widow. Besides, the bereaved families were looked after reasonably well by the standards of the day by a trust. There was also, by all accounts, a great deal of civic solidarity in the city - a source of genuine pride. There are no records that I'm aware of, at least, of families being left destitute by the sinking (happy to be corrected). So a well-designed memorial that highlighted the sinking as a tumultuous event in social history - with fascinating detail on the lives of those who lived, survived and died on the ship - would have made a great and fitting tribute.

Pasty eaters of the world unite!

The team has an off-day and it's suddenly an all pervading 'malaise', as if all the other games that led to where they are now are to be discounted? Bonkers. It IS a failure of imagination, and a failure of an understanding of what was, for the city, a peculiarly working-class tragedy, that led to Belfast stealing a march on the city council. That has NOTHING to do with losing to Blackpool!

Here's a full list of the engine crew that night - note how many are from Southampton (many from the streets around the club)...and how many just disappeared. http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-engineering-crew/

Homeland. Singular. And so far, yes, although the wife is oddly miscast.

Lowe's self-proclaimed attempt to change the laws of football physics meant that, PLC aside, he'd created an especially fragile species. Things would work on his sustainability model only so long as all the important decisions were right. And for a short time, they were. But when bad decisions were made about managers and squad (quality and quantity), the whole thing came crashing down. Lowe was just not good enough for Lowe - and we almost lost our club as a result.

We'll never know, because we got so lucky. My point though is that tommac was a hopeless 'freelancer' who thought he could make a quick buck brokering a mega deal with the employer of two lawyers shooting the breeze on one of his company's lease jets. He had no connection to anyone until he dazzled the board with his 'brokered' Allen deal. Lowe, of all the 'big three', was apparently the most sceptical.

You can see it that way if you want. But don't forget how the same antics almost led eventually to the club's extinction. It was that close.

You're being too modest about your own ITK moment, DP. Must be photocopied on your brain surely?

No you wouldn't. You'd vote for George. You're just trying to get his attention so that he can woo you.

Well at the time he WAS believed - not just by gullible ITKs on S4E, but by the board. Leon even blurted out a press release or press quote about it.

I remember your embarrassment well, Frank. The fact was, though, that the ITKs were created because too many people in the club and sniffing around it got it into their heads that S4E had a powerful leverage on fan opinion that would tip the balance one way or the other. I especially remember tommac coming on to S4E making his opening grand post, only to have DT take the **** out of his appalling spelling. Not quite the acclamation tommac was looking for. But it was then followed by a post from Weston saying (I think to Um pahars): 'Is this who I think it is?' Nudge nudge. And on it stupidly went.

If you knew the ins and outs of the tommac business - a loon who had no connection with the club before or since - you'd be less willing to believe the 'big player' idea.

No, there really wasn't.

There was no WHY. Tommac said Allen was taking over to trumpet his own supposed role in the whole thing. He expected shortly to receive his cut as broker. All he actually did is send the SP through the roof on a false rumour.

With a little help from some notoriously ill-informed ITKs. I remember the ticking off I got from Weston for winding up tommac, on the grounds that my posts might lead to him to 'withdraw' (!) But those were certainly the days for fan-in-the-boardroom power-trippers, whose antics lent some kind of credibility to the loons sifting through the entrails of the club. I still have a recording somewhere of Mary Corbett recalling her desperate search for the truth about the Allen 'bid', only to realise that she and the rest of the board had been completely had by tommac.

Who WAS that? Always signing off gnomic and knowing posts with 'IMHO'.

Not bad for a plumber.

You just know trousers will resurrect this thread in seven games' time.

Indeed. Quite a few of us (I used to post as Roman on S4E) somehow managed to wind him up into a pitiable state each and every evening. We were only trying to help, but he didn't see it that way.