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Are we all aware of this in the Guardian? It's open for comments... http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/15/portsmouth-football-fans-save-pompey

Loving Meridian Tonight. Fred looks glum.

Although it is just possible that with Chanrai off the scene and the way clear for the Trust, more people may be tempted to come on board. And, much though I'm amused at Pompey's current, well-deserved predicament, I am in favour of genuine community ownership of football clubs. Even that one. I think if they were to liquidate and start a new club under fans ownership, I'd have to admire that (but, obviously, they'd have to start in the lower leagues like AFC Wimbledon and FC United).

Bloody hell. I didn't see those new seats when I drove past last night. Where have they put them?

Can Anybody estimate what our budget was when we had to play the kids during the Dutch duo? You cut your cloth to fit your means.

It's a fair point. I'm pretty sure it was a planning condition which the council only relaxed because crowds were smaller and the club was clearly in difficulties. Both of those things no longer apply and I wonder if the council is thinking about reimposing the condition. It will probably take a couple of afternoons of traffic chaos to start the discussion. I also wonder whether they will reintroduce the closure of Northam Road to traffic for the period immediately after full time.

I've done it twice - they were both freebies when Southampton had a balloon festival (well done Lib Dems for cancelling this in your brief period in power). The uncanny thing is the complete lack of wind noise as you travel with the wind. On one trip we landed on Winchester College's playing fields and on the other we landed near the air traffic control place in Swanwick. Well worth doing even if you have to pay!

I think, in the old days, when people like Bobby Moore only earned a little bit more than the people who watched them, this was a fair argument. Footballers had to keep working after retiring from the game because they wouldn't have earned enough to see them through the rest of their lives. That's still true for most players outside the Premiership I expect. If they couldn't get jobs in the game they ran pubs, shops or sold insurance (like Geoff Hurst). Nowadays though, as FC says, the sums a player in the Prem can earn should be enough to set them up for life - either through investment or in paying for retraining for another line of work. I think FC is entirely right in his final sentence.

Yep. Just think what sort of season we could have had.

As much as £5.75?

Well probably the ref and linesmen and a few hangers on. Maybe not the ubiquitous, indentikit PR girls that always seem to be there nowadays though.

How would we all feel if, instead of being relegated from the Premiership and then the Championship, we had managed to stay in the top flight? Instead of sinking to the depths and then enjoying the highs of our fight back to Division 1, how would we feel if we'd just kept bumping along finishing mainly in the bottom half, as we did for most of our 27 years there? Personally, the last three years have been probably the best of my Saints-supporting life, but I didn't feel like that when we went down.

To be fair, we haven't done it yet.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/apr/27/southampton-rickie-lambert-promotion-championship

What is your point? You talk about people making "excuses". I was unaware we were compelled to go to every game and had to bring a note from our parents if we didn't. I don't go to every game. I've been to most home games this season and one away (Palace in the cup). Sometimes I have other things to do. Watching Saints is just one part of my life, albeit a quite important part. That doesn't mean I don't want Saints to succeed and it doesn't mean I don't want to witness their final moment of triumph on Saturday. This may, in your view, make me less of a fan than you. Somehow, I'll try to live with that.

Actually, no points could be enough if W Ham lose.

Good luck Alpine. And good luck Saints. We can do this.

Great news. Anything that weakens this coalition of the damned is to be welcomed. Especially if it leads to a general election before the Tories have finished gerrymandering the constituency boundaries.

I got mine the other night online (at least I hope I did). I'd only been to one of the two listed games but it let me book anyway. Did you only have to go to one and not both? Or was it a mistake? And will I get my tickets;-)? (Should do, I have a receipt.)

Honestly, what a pointless thread. Yes, before anyone points it out, I'm commenting on it. I used to think CB Fry made some good points but he seems recently to have sunk to trolling nonsense. Some people may have thought 80 points would have been enough. In the past it has been. But I don't think they were ever a "brigade". God, I hate that term - usually used by fervent right-wingers damning the "PC brigade" and the "health and safety brigade". I can see "80 points brigade" sitting happily in the columns of the Daily Mail. Anyway, 80 points may be enough, it may not. But as John Maynard Keynes said "When the facts change, I change my opinions". To do otherwise would be stupid.

That's right. It's just the odd rotten apple. Leveson? Who's he?

Do we care?

In what way "top job"? Have you seen the new Sainsbury's on the old Portswood bus garage site? Anyway, back to the saga...

It's a game of 90 (well, about 98) minutes. Remember that next time we go behind.

Guly saves us.