Minty

Careful - i know you've not posted for a bit, but you don't want to overdo it.

In the long run, everything has to be sustainable else it will cease to exist. There was no physical way to make the club sustainable overnight as the income isn't there in the lower leagues to allow the significant transfer fees and wages that are required to push on up the leagues. However I fully expect Cortese to have a long term transition in mind of how he is making the club financially sustainable, and the wage structure will be a part of that. Adkins has also mentioned how they have a wage structure here which I think is entirely appropriate with his 'all together as one' culture. So, are we sustainable right now? Probably not, we'll be relying on investment. But it's all with a view to making things more sustainable in the long run. It has to be. Any other way is virtual suicide.

I remember when all forums were like that... hell, that's how Saints Forever started and my old place Marching In too. But that was also back in the day that Saints were ****e...

Oh come on, if I hadn't, someone else would've...

That just brings me into line with 90% of posters on here then...!

Meh, minor detail.

It will take a LONG time for the 'here we go' feelings to disappear... it's not just a Saints thing but a football thing that most teams suffer at some time or another, we've just had a few high profile ones! That said, we're going about it the right way and it's certainly a lot, lot less likely to happen now than ever before in my living memory. The determination, belief and resilience in the side, whether it's to break down a stubborn defence or hold on to a narrow lead, is superb. In many ways at 3-2 last night was not that different to the last 10 minutes vs Barnsley. We did what we had to do and saw it out... last night we just had more time to actually go and score again which helped no end.

Au contraire, here's one: You're a ****.

The market value is dictated by what he is worth to the team, and how much someone is willing to pay, and whether we need/want to sell him. His value to the team IS his worth as a player, but to the team who has him/want him. Sorry for the boring answer, but it's almost impossible IMO to answer this based on his individual ability. On that basis I think it would have to be stupid money... no less than about £15m for him, because of his value to us and the fact we don't have to sell, and he doesn't want to leave.

Just to clarify, companies can be limited either by share or guarantee, and the liability is either the guarantee (usually £1) or the unpaid value on any shares held. So if you and Baj are shareholders then it sounds like you're a company limited by share. ( See Business Link info ) If it was by guarantee then you wouldn't hold any shares, you would be 'guarantors' only. This doesn't affect anything inparticular, and as Steve rightly says, if people are really that bothered, they can check the accounts for themselves, but in the interests of clarity, thought it worth mentioning.

Indeed. I have no doubt that teams will focus more on our style and it will get harder, but ultimately football is a simple game and if you move the ball quickly and accurately, it can be difficult for any team to cope with you. You can man-mark the entire opposition but you can't guarantee that that will work. Someone like Lallana will find ways to unpick the lock and it only needs a split second for Lambert or Connolly to make their run ahead of their marker and they're gone. I can't help that feel these other managers have got their focus wrong anyway... obviously it is important to defend well, but if you keep possession of the ball and use it well, you need to do a lot less defending in the first place.

http://www.twtd.co.uk/mb.php?m=v&t=147461&r=1219738#1219738

Even ignoring Lallana, I'm not even sure if I would prefer Parker over Cork or Schneiderlin with the future in mind... Parker is a good player but for the future, I think we're better placed.

Adkins knows that as far as structure and resources go, he's far better off staying with Saints and moving up with us at the mo, unless it really was one of the big clubs, but that won't happen. He has an opportunity (which he seems to be taking) to build a whole club in his image... as much as Pardew started the ball rolling with many of the players, Adkins has moulded them into the group we have now. He has earnt (well, I'd like to think so) the respect and patience of the fans who now mostly trust him to take us forward, and has done all of this is less than a year. That's also worth remembering... he joined us on Sept 12th 2010... IMO, what he has achieved in that time, and the culture now prevalent at the club, is nothing less than astonishing and even I, known for my optimism, could not have expected things to go so well. Anyway... Adkins will be courted by other clubs if this continues, I have no doubt. But I firmly believe that he'll be with us for the long term, because we're moving forward all the time and there is nothing he can't achieve with us now, IMO.

At the end of the day, lard, like all of us, is a Saints fan, and is no doubt very happy with our start. The only thing to be achieved by baiting him with this thread is more bad feeling. We're playing some of the best football many of us have ever seen, so why seek out argument and disagreement? We've all been wrong before, none of us are perfect so lets have a bit of humility eh?

For me one of the most important things is that Adkins said exactly that... he knows we can still improve and he is always focused on doing so, not resting on his laurels.

You would be correct. Why, Crab Lungs you cheeky monkey you.

Someone has just added it, haven't they? Come on, own up, whose website is it?! lol

I haven't seen 'We've got a good, honest, hard-working group of players' yet...

Also had a cafe in Hythe, next to the newsagent my Mum worked in. Sold him his Echo every day for about 3 years.

Yes, he did. Good spot.

The Ego has posted...

He was released about the time I used to get to a lot of youth and reserve team games, shortly before I had a stint at the Echo writing articles and Youth team match reports. I think you have most of the others I know of, the majority are in the lower leagues or dropped out completely. Ryan Ashford was a BT local business rep for example, and is now in some other aspect of telecomms sales.

Absolutely. It seems the issues being debated become secondary to needing to pigeon hole individual poster in certain camps. How refreshing it would be if we could stick to the subject and judge it on it's own merits. Anyway, I won't (and can't) go into the same level of detail as Florida Marlin, but agree with the majority of his sentiments. From my point of view, it's quite simply about just how much of 'Football Inc', the brand, the clubs want to allow media and others access to, and therefore how much they want to retain solely for themselves, to extract as much income from. I'm not usually so cynical, but that's the bottom line IMO. Football is not a sport, it's a business. In the eyes of many clubs (not all, although most are happy for Football DataCo to act on their behalf and extract as much money as possible), the more they can control and charge for, the better. However, the implications can often be reduced sponsorship income, not to mention general willingness to work with clubs by other companies etc, because of the exposure. So, to sum up: it's commercial exploitation. And the more fans who think it will be 'better for their club', and back this kind of thing, IMO, means football dies just a little bit more.

Danny Senda - now Barnet, released at the age of 18 (I think) to Wycombe... played in the 1-0 win over Pompey the other night.