ScepticalStan

Top 10 and win more than we lose is always a good yardstick. The fact that we're not a 'big' club doesn't mean that we ought to expect below clubs with a clearly worse array of talent than we have. Most of the 'realistic' brigade that complain about being accused of being 'bedwetters' were encouraging us to brace for underachievement last season as much as they were in this, and therefore its simply become a case of boy-who-cried-wolf. Our squad for the past three seasons has been very obviously more talented than (at least), half the league. That is not in dispute. There was no reason not to justifiably expect 13/14, 14/15 and 15/16 Southampton not to finish above the likes of Villa and Newcastle despite both clubs being bigger than us. I'm perfectly willing to accept that we can't take for granted having a better squad than all but 9 other teams in England as a permanent state of being, but I'm completely unwilling to accept why exactly we ought to have not demanded the high standards delivered by the squads we were lucky enough to have throughout the past three seasons as an extent of that. Put it this way; how does the fact that we've won only one measly FA cup in our history & generally been a small-ish club mean that a team with a first XI of... Boruc Clyne - Lovren - Fonte - Shaw Schneiderlin - Davis - Wanyama Lallana - Lambert - Rodriguez or Forster Cedric - Van Dijk - Fonte - Bertrand Wanyama - Davis - Mane Long - Pelle - Tadic ... should not be expected to finish comfortably in the top half? Because at the end of the day, regardless of how we do this year, this thread comes up every single season. Do I expect Saints to grow to a club with a fanbase that fills a 50k stadium and regularly qualifies for the Champions League? No. Do I expect the above two teams to beat, and finish above the likes of West Brom, Stoke and Crystal Palace? Of course I do.

lol Saudi Arabia and Assad are direct enemies you dim-dumb.

Because random murders and rapes aren't carried out as part of a concerted effort to overthrow and/or subdue the population of a country to a particular religion/way of life.

How do you know that the terrorists were the victims of Western bombing? Oh that's right. They were Muslims. All perfectly ok to lump them together if we're making excuses I suppose.

You should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself.

Absolutely no-one has ever blamed 'all Muslims'. Biggest straw-man ever.

Blurgh. No thanks. Never once seen him look remotely impressive.

No-one, but no-one, denies that a majority of Muslims are perfectly decent, reasonable people. The problem is that there is a significant, small minority willing to carry out reprehensible violence as part of their religion and a larger minority who, though they won't do it themselves, will defend them. Beyond those groups is an even larger minority who might not defend them, but would nevertheless support the establishment of Sharia law and beyond that, the majority of Muslims who though they might be perfectly secular people, still hold on to dated and bigoted views that run directly contrary to modern, liberal Western culture. https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/may/07/muslims-britain-france-germany-homosexuality Basically Muslims are like Millwall fans. The majority of Millwall fans are peaceful people who enjoy football but that's a complete irrelevance to the clear fact that Millwall as a club & institution has an issue with hooliganism and needs as much stick as it does carrot. Obfuscating about 'there are peaceful Millwall fans (we know) and 'all clubs have hooligans too ya know!' completely misses the point of how the issue can be addressed. Same thing here.

Yeah exactly. Same thing with womens' rights as well. The Cologne mass sexual assaults weren't reported in the mainstream media until a week after the actual event, and even then it was only because it was all over Twitter and amateur footage was shared online https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/08/cologne-attacks-hard-questions-new-years-eve This article and the reaction to it in the comments section sums it up. People are starting to cotton on to the fact that modern 'liberalism' just doesn't know how to deal with it's various 'tolerances' conflicting with one another - and that all it can do is offer denial and obfuscation. This will be particularly interesting: http://www.breitbart.com/milo/2016/06/26/milo-to-lead-gay-pride-march-through-muslim-ghetto-sweden/

Cobblers. The entire belief system revolves around one single, unalterable book. It couldn't be more centralised even if it tried. Can you name a few? Or is it the usual guff about algebra and geocentrism that the Greeks had already come up with millenia before? And was ruthelessly murdered by a Sunni Muslim. The sect that makes up the vast majority of the faith. Oil has given Sunni Islam and ISIS the money and thus, the means to carry out what they have done. The motivation nonetheless remains a sincere belief that the Qu'ran is the word-for-word account of the will of the creator of the universe. Because ISIS and those of their ideology view them as apostates who have left the faith - i.e. - no longer Muslims Perfect example, he was an Ahmadi - which is viewed as an apostate sect of non-Muslims by the mainstream Sunni majority. As targets, they deserve but don't get our support. Consequently, Sufism, a remarkably peaceful (and soft-drug-friendly, hence Kabul was the terminus of the hippy trail) variant of Islam that was dominate in Afghanistan until the 1970s, has been wiped out by Saudi-financed and 'educated' hordes of crazed Islamists. The same thing is currently happening in Pakistan, where Sufi shrines - great pieces of architecture in themselves - are being destroyed and their worshippers murdered and forced out by sheer terror. What actually should happen - even in our own interests in the West - is that the diversity and richness of Islam should be protected from these lunatics. If we did that, when the Saudis run out of oil, their pernicious, violent, cretinous form of the religion would (I hope to heaven) fade away. Diversity and richness? Seriously? What do we in the West have to learn from Islam? What recent contributions has the Islamic world made in the fields of science, technology, philosophy, the rights of minorities, women and homosexuals? democracy? What aspect of our society would be better if it were more Islamic? Happily enough this never happens. Although I'm sure that someone throwing some pork scratchings into the local mosque will be leaped upon by the Guardian as some kind of mass-racist backlash Cobblers. Look up the mainstream views of mainstream Muslims across the world in Pew polls. Huge majorities are opposed to equal rights for women, *most* believe that homosexuality should be a crime and again, most believe that blasphemy laws should be reintroduced. Your average Muslim worldwide makes Marine Le Pen look like Jeremy Corbyn. Oh, and btw - you used the words "diverse/diversity" four times in your post

See its interesting. Even four or five years ago people were still peddling the 'No true Muslims' meme. But now, with the reality having truly obliterated that line of defence, its now changed into 'got any solutions?' (The implication being that there are none, and therefore by extension that we shouldn't do anything & should simply learn to cope). If its a choice between Donald Trump/Marine Le Pen and literally doing nothing, the world could be in for a shock.

in what was effectively 5 matches of football when you add in the 3 extra times they played!

Poor form if this doesn't happen. Fonte exemplifies and represents an 'era' perfectly; us consolidating our status a solid Premier League team that competes in Europe and whose players win major international tournaments, whilst nevertheless maintaining the identity of the club that won us two successive promotions. Fonte is a club legend without doubt.

Lets not go too far left on the scale of: *talentless-try-hard-clogger-who-gave-his-all-but-had-no-talent* -------------->--------------->--------------->--------------- *immensely-talented-player-who-didn't-give-a-*****

Had a couple of reasonable seasons. Didn't pull up any trees but 11 or 12 goals all from open play isn't a bad return for a £9Mn striker. He'll need replacing though. I'm not keen at all on this idea of relying on sicknote Austin & Rodriguez. Could we perhaps gazump Palace for Benteke?

I work near Trafalgar Sq. and a few weeks ago Galloway was driving round it on top of a great big open-top bus he bought for his mayoral campaign - pontificating with a microphone stood on the top deck.

That mong co-commentator whinging about how Portugal haven't done anything to deserve being 2-0 up can pipe down. - Particularly given the way Jose and Cedric have both been outstanding in keeping what looks like it'll be a clean sheet.

The man is an utter superstar regardless of whether people like him or not.

It would have been cheaper for the US to simply buy the oil if that's what it was all about. The US was a cost overall.

Poor lad. Clearly absolutely bricking it and just obviously trying to convince himself as much as anyone that he's not nervous. He's had a fantactic tournament.

So otherwise perfectly sane, rational and compassionate people suddenly transformed into a bunch of racist scum****s purely on account of the referendum result did they? I mean, what's even being argued here? That we have to submit our own democracy to the control of a federal European superstate in order to somehow subdue the odd racist twerp from doing something racist and twerpy? Or that staying in the EU would have prevented this sort of stuff from happening? Load of old tosh.

This is quite something. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36637037 Boris Johnson says the UK will continue to "intensify" cooperation with the EU following its vote to leave the EU. The leading pro-Leave campaigner said exit supporters must accept the 52-48 result was "not entirely overwhelming". I voted Brexit but make no mistake, this isn't over. I reckon there's still a good 25% chance we'll end up staying.

Massively. Its absolutely ridiculous and embarrassing. The tournament format has been a complete and utter balls up. If a nation manages to cause an upset and qualify for a 16-team tournament only to find themselves way out of their depth and get comprehensively dicked by anyone half-decent then at least let them exit the tournament gracefully along with the rest of the 50% of the teams that enter the tourney and don't manage to make it out of the group stage. Don't pat them on the head as adorable little triers.

If we really do leave i'll give you my address and fellate you