Sergei Gotsmanov

Very heart warming. What the Saints brand should all be about. I note though that you can't have taken that much Saints stuff over!

You could go to Germany.

At one point alcohol was actually rationed in Sweden. A lot of people used to make their own.

As an aside Buctotim, Sweden do not import their Heineken it is brewed by Spendrups.

It was the season before vthat he blamed the shirts.

It is up to them.

My own view is that the State plays too much of a part in our lives.

In 1970 90% of beer sold in the UK was sold in pubs and bars; now it is about 50:50. That is a part of our culture being eroded and is very sad. In my opinion it is down to supermarkets using beer as a loss leader widening the price differential between on and off trade. We also have more of a BBQ culture now so any hot weather encourages us to invite people round for a BBQ rather than meet in a pub garden. Dramatic improvementsIn-house entertainment has also kept people at home. The pub is also very cash driven and we carry less cash around. The big pubcos have also screwed their tenants and leaseholders so much that they cannot invest in their business's meaning that there are thousands of grubby pubs around the country that nobody wants to go in.

I do not subscribe to that. Pubs are not owned by the local authority they are private business's and it should have been up to the people who run the premises as to whether they implemented a smoking ban. I like the smoking ban even as a smoker but it was a law that hit the trade very hard. As ever it was a law made by people who do not go into pubs.

Well credit where credit is due!

Contrary to my last answer that was my first away game.

Was it not a competition the design of the badge?

40. Nr Winchester. West Brom 1978. 1-1 if I remember. First away game Swindon in league cup 1989. Benali's debut I think.

We differ not on one club's example but on the fact that I believe that players wages have been a major contributor to the fact that so many clubs are in finacial difficulties. Of course some cut their cloth appropriately Blackpool are not the first. You seem to think that salaries are not the main plight of so many clubs. You also do not agree that players and agents do not spare a thought for the clubns they play for when they negotiate their contracts - particularly when that club is relegated.

You seem to be talking about the theory. I am talking about the practice.

Yes a club can say no but then again the ones that have not have been brought to their knees by wage demands. I am surprised you cannot recognise how players wages have brought many clubs to the edge, including our friends from down the m27.

At the time of the Rooney negotiations, the Glazers were at a low point in their popularity; in my book that is holding them to Ransom.

and their surroundings????

So its not players wages then that have brought many football club's to their knees. Do you think that Wayne Rooney had United to ransom or John Terry Chelsea to give two high profile examples.

and Bankers?

I agree that the people who run football clubs are to blame when a club gets into difficulty but how often have players agents held the club to ransom.

how much football does he play?

The answer is Wayne Bridge

I should have asked which English golfer is highest paid?

Player's wages and borrowing too much money to build new stadiums are the two fundamental reasons. The wage demands of agents have quite simply been unsustainable - why do you think there is talk of a cap on wage levels as a percentage of turnover are always being touted. What other major reasons can you possibly suggest. Why do you think Pompey are going into liquidation?