Minty

Have there been any mentions of it all so far? Apart from a few: "Here is Southampton's new kit... looks a bit like [insert one of the many cited example already used here]." Does anyone outside of Southampton care much beyond the above sentence?

Wouldn't have happened in my day.

Mischievous thought of the day: Trevor Birch is actually a Saints fan and all of his actions have been with the express intention of putting Pompey out of business. Nah, course not.

Jim Stannard. Adkins namechecks him in the OS article... and, coincidentally enough, he was at Gillingham from 1995-1999 so I imagine he probably still has contacts up there?

Yes. They didn't f*ck it up THAT much.

Nice try, I'm not getting dragged into it... all I do know is that all this constant off-topicness (myself included) certainly doesn't help. If people could learn to ignore posters they don't like, life would be so much easier, and this forum much better.

My eyes just stopped working whilst scrolling down that list...

And the oft-quoted defence of that policy, being 'the right to defend yourself' would've made f*ck-all difference in this (and many similar) cases.

I dunno, there are usually a few candidates for that award each week.

Don't worry, I know what I was paying (or rather I can look it up on my old credit card statement), it's just the fact they sent out three different emails that I was highlighting. I can only assume that different clubs have slightly different pricing structures, hence the different emails.

Seriously you two, can't you sort this out elsewhere? It bores the f*ck out of me and probably a lot of others, especially when I personally think you both make some good contributions to this forum and this kind of thing just detracts from that.

I have no doubt you'll be right, there are always some who are quick to jump on the managers back if things don't go perfectly. Leaving Cortese to one side, I firmly believe Adkins has earned the right to do his job without any doubt or pressure being brought to bear from fans, and I sincerely hope that the success of the last two years doesn't breed impatience amongst supporters. I live in hope. As for Cortese, I also sincerely hope you're right and that he will have patience. On the one hand I think someone of his intelligence will recognise the value of continuity, even in adversity, but there is always that doubt that you just don't know what he might be thinking...

I think you'll find that Kelvin is first choice still, and Gazza will initially start at #2, but he'll get his chances.

Indeed, it was the thing that I liked the most from that video... intelligent and accurate distribution. Obviously not all is like that but it looks like there's a good brain at work. And he can quite some distance on his kicks too...

I had three emails. Each one stated a different price difference. 1 - As of 01/08/2012 your subscription will start to be billed at £42.99 per year, an increase of just GBP 3 per year. 2 - As of 01/08/2012 your subscription will start to be billed at £4.49 per month, an increase of just GBP 0.20p per month. 3 - As of 01/08/2012 your subscription will start to be billed at £37.99 per year, an increase of just GBP2 per year. So, which is it to be then Saints...?! lol

Probably easier to have a list of people who don't/haven't.

Easier said than done these days, especially if you don't know a poster. Most regulars will know adriansfc, but many won't. All part of the 'fun'. Where is Turkish today anyway?

I disagree. At a very basic level, it's all the same: If the ball comes towards you, you have a responsibility to get to it first to clear it. That doesn't change in zonal or man-marking. If two attackers enter your zone, you still have the same responsibility to get to the ball first. I'm there's plenty more to it than that, but it's just a system to try and negate a threat as best as possible... defenders still have the same responsibilities.

Agree with all your post and the above sums it up nicely. Just like with players, or managers, or clubs as a whole, judging anything or anyone on one incident, one goal, one match, or anything less than, arguably, at least 20-30 games, is not going to provide you with a balanced judgement.

How do we play? More importantly, how will we play this season? As I alluded to above, Adkins is changing things and working on new tactics, so for anyone to say that we need *anything* too specific is a bit pointless. Obviously we all have ideas on how WE would like us to play and the types of player we want to sign but it's a little too black and white with some people. (Just like everything else regards SFC!)

Some assumptions being made about our formation in the thread that need addressing... Adkins has made it perfectly clear in recent interviews about our pre-season games, and training, that we've been working on tactics, and we have played 4-5-1/4-3-3 formations in games so far. To quote him directly: So I think fans need to get their head around the the fact that we don't have *A* formation, or *A* way of playing... we are developing several. Just like last season saw the Diamond formation used increasingly towards the end of the season, it seems the 4-5-1/4-3-3 formation is being introduced too, to give us even more variation. So, a player like Lens could probably play wide in a 4-4-2, at the tip of a Diamond, or in one of the wide supporting positions in a 4-5-1/4-3-3.

I wouldn't get too excited, Palace have got 53 pages on him: http://www.cpfc.org/forums/showthread.php?t=232581&page=53

Well clearly G4S don't have any either, hence we're a bit buggered.

I guess there's two parts to this: 1 - I fully agree that it shouldn't have gone to the private sector in the first place. But it did, so: 2 - The gargantuan size of the contract made it even MORE important to monitor their preparations IMO. Let's not start heading off down the NHS route, I'll start getting all hot and bothered.

Quite. In any commercial scenario, I would always ensure that the contractor has sufficient contingencies in place to ensure they fulfil the terms of the contract, especially where it is one where postponement or cancellation is not an option. I would then monitor the contract and expect reports at key milestones to ensure compliance with the stated timescales. As the person commissioning that contract, I might not be responsible for the contract, but i am ACCOUNTABLE for the outcome, whoever gets that contract. The grilling that the G4S boss is getting is fair enough to a point, but it smacks of a PR exercise to divert from the fact that the Govt weren't monitoring the contract closely enough themselves.