Wes Tender

Me too. I certainly hope that there will be a good turnout of people who will see the match as the first one of almost a rebirth of the club, interested to welcome the new owner/s, manager and some new players.

Art, I recall your post a few years back when it seemed that we had rid the club of Lowe. You urged caution, pointing out quite rightly that Lowe and his cronies still held around 25 % of the shares and that until somebody else bought those shares, it was always possible that they could return. You were proved right about that. On the face of it, that is not a realistic possibility this time around. Yes, we need to dot the "i"s and cross the "t"s, but the wave of optimism is certainly understandable after what we have endured and it will be difficult to dampen it with a dose of reality. Let's hope everything goes smoothly.

Fair enough Draganov. It was that post and I fully understand the sense of frustration and fear that you underwent when things really did look bleak at that moment in time. I was also very nervous then, but I had a quiet confidence that something would happen to save us at the last moment. Apparently, even if Pinnacle or the other groups had not saved us, I understand that there were others prepared to step forward as a last resort.

Look, children, let's put all of this behind us. The sun is shining, the bad people have all gone, we can now look forward, not back.

Me too. I've waited over a decade to be rid of him and his cronies.

I don't see any comparison between Gavin Davies, David Frost and Anthony Salz. We will never know whether Davies and Frost and their consortium would have taken over the club and what would have became of us had they done so. Neither they, nor the other couple of consortia, as that c*nt Askham and the other charlatans on the old board acted with undue haste IMO to secure the reverse takeover. Once Lowe and Cowen had got their feet under the table together with those other toadies, a takeover was an entirely different kettle of fish and there was hardly any external investment club because nobody wanted to sink their money into the club without having control. But Davies was the man with the wealth, whereas Frost was the front man, much as Le Tissier is now. Salz is not in the league financially to be able to take over the club, but would be the perfect choice as chairman for reasons that I have already given. As one of the top legal brains in the UK, he is also the perfect person to decide whether we have a case to overturn the -10 penalty and to pursue it on our behalf. A few days ago, you were running around like a headless chicken accusing people of killing off the club through their boycotts, but here we are in an entirely different situation. We are not out of the woods quite yet, but with luck we will soon have reached the point whereby we can put all of this disunity caused by Lowe, Askham and Co behind us and start to rebuild the club to return us to where we were.

Furthermore, in addition to Hypochondriac's point, at the time of the initial announcement of the administration, there were over 30 groups or individuals who had expressed interest in buying the club. Those were whittled down to 3 or 4. Many may well have felt that one or other of those were likely to buy us and so it proved. So your point about this fund raising initiative is actually quite pointless.

Agree 100%. Whoever has taken over the club, if they needed to have a top class chairman, then I could not wish for anything more than Salz to be that man. He is a big hitter, has seriously influential contacts, is widely respected and any company would be pleased to have him on their board.

Can the number of visitors be easily researched? If so, why not do it for us to make your point? Presumably, you are going to separate the numbers who just pass through the port as passengers on the ferries and compare the million or so that arrive in Southampton as Liner passengers. Then, of course, you'll have to consider the number of passengers embarking or arriving at our International Airport. Yes, you have some historic attractions, provided that your visitors like looking at old ships (which they can do in one day) but beyond that and a kiss me quick / fish and chip beach resort with pebbles and lots of tatooed fat ladies in abundance, what else is there? Southsea and Old Portsmouth is reasonably attractive, but the rest of the City is a dreary little Southern version of Coronation Street. Geographically, Southampton is better placed than Portsmouth, the major industry of our city is growing, whereas the major impetus behind Portsmouth's port is dying. Being an Island, they are running out of space, whereas we still have much potential for development and expansion. Both Cities have been forced by circumstances to make changes since the war, but in the mid/long term from now, we are far better placed to grow and develop.

Norwich were also very astute at having special concessions for the young and the older fans too, having bands for the younger fans giving cheap seats up to age 21 and older fans getting a concession from age 60. That encourages fans from an early age, keeps them until they out of their teens and then encourages some grandparents to take the grandchidren too. We ought to do something along similar lines here. http://www.canaries.co.uk/page/SeasonTickets/

Fair comment to talk of shipping movements, rather than actual volume. From that POV you are probably correct. But the number of passengers passing through the port is probably greater and they are the ones who bring revenue to the City if they can be encouraged to stay awhile and spend in the hotels, restaurants and shops. They are probably one reason that we have a 5 star hotel in the city and also a Hilton. The larger number of ships entering the port probably meant a larger number of dock workers, but the trend towards the bigger ships, containers and huge cranes has meant that numbers of workers has declined in the same way that mechanisation has reduced worker numbers on car assembly lines and employees behind bank counters. I wonder also whether your perception of the City is somewhat clouded by the environment that you live in in Western Oz? If you live in either Perth or Freemantle, then from what I can see, both are modern cities with tall skyscaper buildings in their city centre. I know from travelling to places in the USA, Canada and the Far East, that most have modern city centres with skyscrapers, so that even London with its titchy Canary Wharf looks somehow dated and of another era, which is of course its charm to those visiting it.

No. I won't buy one. I'll buy two.

I'll happily join the happy-clappy feeling that permeates most of us on this forum now that we have replaced the charlatans and the PLC. It's encouraging to see that apart from one or two sourpusses, this optimism is pretty widespread. But if those sourpusses believe that they are far too intelligent for us, or that most of us are weirdos, then perhaps they would be better off on some other forum if they can find one that caters for their special attributes. Personally, I found Mr. Nice's claims to intelligence somewhat lacking in credibility because of his inability to express himself cogently in English. If it isn't his first language, I'll be happy to apologise.

It is hard to make comparisons between the liners of today and yesteryear. For one thing, it would have been forecasted that the liner trade would have been killed off by air travel and yet here it is actually growing from a decade or two ago. So we'll never get back to the days of the Queens, eh? Well, until a few months ago, there were actually three Cunard Queens in service from Southampton and although the QE2 has now gone, there will soon be another QE to replace her. But apart from the Cunarders, there are many other liners who use Southampton as their home port and all of these ships are much bigger than those you mentioned above. Apparently, there has recently been a record number of passengers using the port, around about 1 million people in one year.According to this site, the port has never been busier. http://www.discoversouthampton.co.uk/sections/History%20of%20the%20Port.aspx Happy to correct your misapprehension about the port.

I think that it is time to draw a line on all those new arrivals from the blue part of Hampshire all of a sudden finding this to be a far better forum than their own one for some reason and ban them. Up until comparatively recently, the glory years for the Skates were around the time of my birth, 60 years ago. Until recently, we had been in the top flight of English football since around the time of my son's birth, 28 years ago. Fortunes of the two clubs have changed because we gained a chairman worth 2/6p because his titchy retirement home company took over the club under dodgey circumstances, whereas you lot gained a succession of dodgey multi-millionaires who bought you success. The wheel could easily turn full circle again within a few years. In the meantime, bugger off back to your own forum.

He'll soon realise that the Fratton area is a ****hole. His mates can park their yachts in the Hamble, in our backyard. They won't have to travel far to Goodwood or Fontwell or over the water for Cowes week. But there really isn't much to interest him in Skatesville in the winter or during the football season.

Reminds me of the joke about the woman telling her friend that her little nipper had been thrown out of the swimming baths for peeing in the pool. Really?, her friend asked, incredulous. Surely all the little kids did that, she said. Not from the top diving board, her friend replied.

They own the horse racing interests because that, football and motor racing are all ways that they can showcase their wealth by being in the winners enclosure, being in the directors' boxes, entertaining the other high-power business people who inhabit those environments. They own the prestige hotels to gain prestige, but also to make money from the wealthy people who stay there. They have mega revenue from their oil and they need to invest as much of that income into other fields in readiness for when oil either runs out or is replaced by greener fuels less harmful to the planet. But blowing the cash on sporting activites is purely down to egotistical reasons, not for financial gain. As others say, Pompey is merely a target because it is in the Premiership, no other reason. The bigger clubs have already been bought and cannot be picked up as cheaply as Pompey. We would even now be the better buy from the perspective of stadium, potential and price, but it would require two or three years to get back to the Premiership, which in itself is suggestive that the current status of the two clubs is relevant.

So if what you say is true, then why do the arabs own race horses, studs, stables, etc? It's exactly the same reason why they are buying football clubs, World renowned hotels, huge gin palace yachts, etc. It's all down to prestige, ego and recognition.

Yes, you hit the nail right on the head. The stuff about buying because of potential growth is probably either some bull**** sold to him by Gaydamak, or go-between agents, or else it is guff spouted by the new owners to give the fans orgasms. I doubt whether the new owner has any particular real local knowledge of the dump, apart from a smidgeon of knowledge of its Naval connections and that they won the last FA Cup, had a manager well known in the game and one or two names in the squad that would have been well known in World football circles because they used to play, or still play for England. He probably knows as much about Portsmouth as a place as I do about Dubai. As others have astutely realised, he is buying a Premiership Football Club just for kudos amongst his friends and business associates. Exactly the same reason that Lowe got involved in Saints. Whenever there is a report in the World's media, it will list him as owner of Portsmouth, Premier league football club. He will soon find out that growth potential will be limited, but provided that they stay in the top flight, he couldn't care a toss.

And what is the potential for the Skates? They will have to be able to build the stadium first, which is something that they had extreme difficulty in doing within the city hinterland so far, even though Mandaric and Gaydamak both were wealthy men. Even if the stadium were to be built, where is the fanbase apart from around the city. Although they have taken some plastics from our area, we are still an obstruction to them mopping up many more unless we go out of existence. As we are up for sale and this Arab doesn't know who might buy us, he has no idea how we might redevelop ourselves. We already have the stadium and the better potential to mop up fans between here and Bristol if we rose from the ashes. quote:hughieslastminutegoal: No. I am looking a bit into the future. The long and short of it is that Portsmouth's main reason for its historic growth was as a Naval port. That is in decline, as will be their ferry port business. Southampton's growth was as a commercial port and that is increasing. Look at our geographical position and it is far better than Portsmouth, who are also restricted in their growth as an island.

Apart from the Factory outlet shops at Gunwharf and the restaurants, the rest of that development is flats too. The fact that the Gunwharf site was HMS Vernon Navy base just highlights the decline of the Royal Navy. When that declines further, they might develop on those other bases, but where would the strategic importance of Portsmouth otherwise develop? Even its business as a ferry port is threatened by cheap flights and we have an international airport on our doorstep. Looking longer term, it is thought that the Fawley Oil refinery will close within a decade and there is massive potential for development on that side of the river too.

Spot on. The comparison between the two cities is a complete red herring, as Portsmouth is the biggest **** hole in the South. Saying that there is no development potential along the waterside is total rubbish. The development can start around the old TV studio site and continue along the river all the way to Ocean Village and on the other side of the Woolston Bridge. All that industry along the river bank can relocate if somebody had the money to develop it. The long term future favours Southampton, as Portsmouth relies on the Navy which is in decline, whereas the passenger liner business and container port operations mean that Southampton is increasing its business. Southampton also has better transport links to other major UK destinations than Portsmouth too, via the M27, M3, A34 to the M4 and M40. As an island, Portsmouth has used virtually all its land and outward development is hampered by Leigh Park, Paulgrove, Cosham, which are also holes. Agreed we need to do something to update Ocean village, but otherwise, he city is a far more attractive place than Portsmouth, with better parks, better historic buildings, better shops, etc.

Funny that; I made the same connection. New Orleans Saints are viewed in much the same way over there as we are here; perpetual underachievers, but many have a soft spot for them.