Guided Missile

I seem to return to Kipling's poems more and more, lately. When I returned from Mumbai, where he was born, I posted on TSW, how genuinely friendly and helpful the low-paid workers were that populated the hotels and restaurants in that great city. It was not 'till later that it transpired that many of these workers sacrificed their lives for the guests that were trapped in the hotels. Kipling's poem, "Gunga Din", came to mind. 'E carried me away To where a dooli lay, An' a bullet come an' drilled the beggar clean. 'E put me safe inside, An' just before 'e died, "I 'ope you liked your drink" sez Gunga Din. So I'll meet 'im later on At the place where 'e is gone Where it's always double drill and no canteen. 'E'll be squattin' on the coals Givin' drink to poor damned souls, An' I'll get a swig in hell from Gunga Din! Yes, Din! Din! Din! You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din! Though I've belted you and flayed you, By the livin' Gawd that made you, You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din! Every time I hear of our servicemen being dishonoured in their own country, by the general population, I recall the poem he wrote a hundred years ago, entitled "Tommy": We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too, But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you; An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints, Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints; While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an` Tommy, fall be'ind," But it's " Please to walk in front, sir," when there's trouble in the wind There's trouble in the wind, my boys, there's trouble in the wind, O it's " Please to walk in front, sir," when there's trouble in the wind. You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires, an' all: We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational. Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace. For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an` Chuck him out, the brute! " But it's " Saviour of 'is country " when the guns begin to shoot; An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please; An 'Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool - you bet that Tommy sees! In my opinion, Kipling's greatest poem was written for his son, John (Jack) who he had pulled strings for, to get him accepted into the Army during the First World War, despite his poor eyesight. He was killed on his first day of action, at the battle of Loos, unable to see a thing in the torrential rain, aged 18. Kipling never forgave himself for his influence in getting his son into the Army and his son's body was never found. He wrote "My Boy Jack": HAVE you news of my boy Jack? " Not this tide. "When d'you think that he'll come back?" Not with this wind blowing, and this tide. "Has any one else had word of him?" Not this tide. For what is sunk will hardly swim, Not with this wind blowing, and this tide. "Oh, dear, what comfort can I find?" None this tide, Nor any tide, Except he did not shame his kind--- Not even with that wind blowing, and that tide. Then hold your head up all the more, This tide, And every tide; Because he was the son you bore, And gave to that wind blowing and that tide. He even had a verse for the Lowe haters amongst us: All Power, each Tyrant, every Mob Whose head has grown too large, Ends by destroying its own job And works its own discharge;

..I always have. Mostly, I loved playing it, as much as possible, for as long as possible, until my body gave up. When I wasn't playing, I was watching. In the early days, I went to the Dell for the gang warfare, to be perfectly honest. Peer pressure, too much testosterone and not enough money to have alternatives that would provide the required self respect caused that. Without that need, I would have played on Saturdays as well. Now, watching football is simply a poor substitute for playing, but it will have to do. A football career is too short, whatever standard you play. FFS, life itself is too short, but there are very simply two reasons people go to professional football games, to watch a club that represents the area they are connected to. A tribal need to "belong" to a group and live a fantasy of combat through men that are far better equipped to participate in such combat than the spectating tribe themselves. An interest in the game being played, an appreciation of the skill involved and an enjoyment from watching skilled athletes perform. Since my tribal instincts have been dulled by age and experience, I have graduated from 1 to 2. I enjoy good football played by either side. Don't get me wrong, I still want Saints to win, but I have the ability to detach the loss from a tribal failing, because I am comfortable with who I have become and am no longer in need of a football team to provide me with reflected glory. The point is, whatever the score, whatever the sides involved, I had great value on Sunday and appreciated a lot of the football from both sides. I looked around and thought that most of the football fans got great value as well, apart from those that need a Saints victory to bolster the tribal fantasies that give them the self respect they lack. If the same number turn up every home game, we will get the players that will satisfy everyone's needs. If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; ....Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

I was told that Wilde is keen to sell his shares and will take 30p a share.

It wasn't that hard to figure him out:

I was thinking the same, when I read this. I particularly liked this part: "He is treating the club as if it were a start-up company. The management group is in place and a decision has been taken not to hire any player over the age of 25. Mr Hopp’s scouts are already picking up bargains – their Brazilian midfielder Luiz Gustavo cost €100,000, less than some Bundesliga players pay for their cars." I hate SAP software, though, where the €100M came from, that Hopp has invested in the team...

I would be quite pleased if the club saves itself £250K a year, for another player. I can also wait until the accounts are published on the Companies House website like any other plc. Your contention is totally wrong, assuming that an unlisted company has a lack of transparency. I seem to remember that Northern Rock was listed until it was taken into private ownership (ie the taxpayer bought it). Listing has never guaranteed "transparency" and anyway, what right do the fans have to know the wages that are paid, etc. Just another reason to moan, IMHO...

If we have no prospect of raising investment due to our AIM listing and the market for the shares is moribund, then the prospect of an extra £250K on our bottom line and some hope of dividends in the future should convince the Saints fans that hold shares to vote for delisting. Those institutional investors that want to get out can sell their shares to the Saints fans, to whom a capital gain on their shareholding is not important, but a healthier club, not paying £250K plus per annum to Seymour Pierce, is...

For those interested: Unfortunately, the story is very different for most of the companies listed on AIM, which are valued at less than £20 million. All too often shares lack liquidity and it’s not unusual for a company to have a market cap lower than its balance sheet value. For these concerns, AIM has turned into a form of purgatory. A business can neither go forward or backwards but is paying around £250,000 a year in adviser fees for the privilege of being listed. The credit crisis has compounded market woes. Only 34 companies joined the junior exchange in 2008, raising £537.14 million, compared to 77 companies raising over £2.1 billion for the same period in 2007. Secondary fundraisings are way down too, with £1.5 billion raised between January and May this year, compared to £4.3 billion for the first five months of 2007. Ken Pratt, the managing director of operations and finance for Imagesound, a supplier of in-store music, radio and TV services to shops and hotels, was part of the team who delisted the company from AIM in May. ‘AIM was failing us,’ he says. ‘We floated specifically to raise equity. The company was profitable and we wanted equity to come in and then to match that with bank debt to enable us to go forward with our expansion.’ It wasn’t happening. The defining moment came last summer: ‘We approached our nomad – this was before the banking crisis – and their appetite for raising equity was sort of there but couldn’t be guaranteed. As a result, we went and lost a very good deal – perhaps a life changing deal – because the equity couldn’t be brought in.’ Breaking free From start to finish, it took about three months to delist from the market. To delist from the LSE, 75 per cent of shareholders have to approve the proposal (as opposed to 100 per cent when going fully private). Pratt says that 70 per cent of Imagesound’s shares were held by 15 people, so it was straightforward to know what direction the company could take. ‘It’s not a buy-out. All we have done is delist. The shares are still out on the open market; they are now traded on a match bargain basis by Brewin Dolphin over in Manchester. In fact I went and bought 16,000 shares the other day.’ The costs are not as prohibitive as might be imagined, argues Tim Stocks, head of the financial institutions and markets group at law firm Taylor Wessing. He estimates that for a company with a market cap of £50 million, the costs of going totally private would be around ten per cent of that public valuation. The ‘take private-lite’ option is considerably cheaper than going fully private as fewer advisers are needed. ‘Without any technical bells or whistles, I think you should be able to deliver this all up, including the advisory fees, for in the region of £200,000,’ he says. ‘But you’re dropping between £80,000 to £150,000 straight to the bottom line anyway [in advisers’ fees]. You’ll get payback in the first year.’

75% of the shareholders would be required to vote for delisting. It means that if approved, they would no longer be able to publically trade their shares. (and the share price would drop)

As many of our more vocal posters have suggested for a long time, I think it is time to delist Southampton Leisure plc and admit that the original basis for our listing, first on the main market and now on AIM was an expensive mistake from the outset. Yesterday Sheffield United delisted from AIM, citing economic turmoil and costs. The group was reported in the Times today as saying that the susceptibility of its share price to market conditions was not to the business's benefit and its AIM listing took up too much management time and money, which could be better spent on getting the football side back into the Premier League. Moreover, it said that, like most other listed football clubs, it is unable to raise funds from institutional investors and did not expect this to change in the foreseeable future. Circumstances change and I think it's time to recognise that. The problem is, the main architect of the original listing is running the plc. I wonder if he has the humility to admit that listing hasn't worked, beyond being able to obtain a mortgage at a cost of 6.5% over base for the construction of our new shed. I wonder how many players we could retain with the money saved by delisting?

Has your Mum still got that shop down East Street??

According to the Daily Echo:

I heard that it was Wilde that couldn't work with Lowe, at the time. He had a meeting with Lowe and Cowen, over a cup of tea and told Lowe that he didn't want him as part of the board structure, because he didn't want "toffs" on the board....

I remeber when Leon Crouch first spoke and it cost the club millions in wasted money: Major shareholder Leon Crouch has today announced his decision to side with Michael Wilde at Monday's EGM. The current board had hoped the Lymington-based businessman would side with them or at least abstain. In a statement today however Crouch has revealed his intentions to vote for change. He explained:"I will be backing Michael Wilde and his team of proposed new directors to take our great Club forward.I had hoped that it would be possible for both sides to unite, agree some common ground and avoid the need for an EGM.However, it was not meant to be and I have no wish to blame this on either side."

I was just going to post the same. I can't remember the last time I was invited for a pint and a chat by MFI, when they unveiled their new spring catalogue....haven't see many MFI employees visiting kids in hospital at Christmas, either...

We're supporters of a football club, FFS, not prospective buyers of a flat pack wardrobe. If many of our fans are like you and can't see that there is a difference between a shop selling cheap furniture and a club that is meant to be the heart and soul of the community, then the inhabitants of Southampton will end up with the football club they deserve...

Actually, I know Keith House quite well and he told me that EBC were prepared to approve the stadium and associated sports facilities but it was the shopping/multiplex cinema part that they refused to permit, so Lowe pulled the plug on the application (ie didn't resubmit with amendments) and pursued St. Marys instead. Eastleigh were worried about the effect that additional shops and a cinema would have on the "vibrant" Eastleigh Town Centre.

Independent, The (London), Oct 26, 1998 Plans to construct a new 25,000-seat stadium at Stoneham, near junction five of the M27 and close to Southampton airport, have been under discussion for eight years but last week, Eastleigh Council, the authority within which the proposed site lies, effectively refused permission for the project by rejecting proposals for commercial facilities that would accompany the stadium. "It is all very well saying "yes" to community facilities and stadia if you say "no" to the financial engine to create them," Lowe said in Saturday's programme notes. The council, while not opposing a "community stadium" - for athletics, gymnastics and county sports events as well as football - in principle, have rejected plans by Southampton Leisure Holdings plc (the company that owns the football club) to build a supermarket and multiplex cinema alongside their proposed new ground at Stoneham to add commercial viability to the plan. The Dell - maximum capacity, 15,000 - is simply not big enough to sustain a Premiership football club, with all its attendant financial demands for transfer fees and wages, in the current era, and Lowe, a businessman with a background in the City, is now looking to an alternative site, a disused gasworks, in the St Mary's area of the city. "We will submit a detailed planning application within two to three weeks as part of an ongoing process designed to deliver a new stadium as soon as is humanly possible," Lowe said.

...returned last week from a short business trip from Mumbai. Touched by the concern on this site, but please reserve it for the mostly, Indian victims of the carnage. I'll return to Mumbai when I need to. Westerners staying away, will prolong the damage to the many low paid Indians that work in the hotels and restaurants, that serve the visitors so well. Lovely people who could not be more friendly, particularly when your waiter has the chance to discuss cricket and the fantastic young team they have at the moment.

John, I'll keep this simple so that you will understand. You have made it clear that for one reason or another, you have chosen not to support Southampton Football Club, the main reason being that Lowe is involved in the company that owns the team. You contend that despite choosing not to support the club, you are still a supporter. I have no interest in what you do with your life and money. What I fail to see is why you and other posters should take "offense" when I state that you are not a Saints supporter because you do nothing to support the club. Personally, coming on this site or going down the pub and moaning about the club and it's board, does not, IMHO, count as supporting the club. So, apart from this, please tell me what you do with your life that counts as supporting Southampton Football Club. My guess is you won't get further than the fact that you p1$$ and complain a lot...

The point is that you are not supporting your team. You have every right and no need to justify the reasons why you are not supporting your team, but FFS, don't try and call yourself a supporter and then point out how you are not supporting the team. It's makes you look pathetic.

9 points away from a playoff place with over half the season to go. Thank God you don't give team talks...mine would be about how not one team in the league has looked better than us, with the Wolves fans and manager admitting they were lucky, against 10 men.

I'm not too sure about Final Fantasy on ps3, but here's a story about FA Cup Final Fantasy. The game looks quite expensive: http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/sport/article81810.ece

Explain how spending money on an asset (even an intangible asset, such as a player) translates into a loss on the P & L account????

A number of Saints fans will be standing in the cold, cheering the team on, tomorrow night. A win may be the start of a promotion push. It happened at Crystal Palace and it could happen with us. There is nothing to fear from any other team in this division, and certainly not from any club outside the automatic promotion spots. Am I the only person who hopes that tickets for the playoff final at Wembley are restricted to either ST holders or people that have attended two or more games this season? Because I don't know if I could sit next to anyone at Wembley, who has promoted boycotts and hoped the team lost. I'd rather give any spare tickets I could get hold of, to those who were unable to afford to go...