Saint Without a Halo

"The club was named the fastest growing football brand in the world after rising in value by 89 per cent in the past year to $183bn, according to the Brand Finance Football 50" Is that really the value of the club today I know we were only worth 3m sterling when bought but surely that hasn't grown to 183 Billion dollars! that cant possibly be right and would put us amongst the top dot coms in terms of capital value if true!

That's OK as long as we don't have to play in Blue!

Thanks Alps A bit like us then in the easier Europa

Spot on he is more a Sheringham than an Owen!

Yes Chelsea were certainly 3rd if not 4th best in London in those days behind the likes of Arsenal Spurs and even possibly Westham (Moore Hurst etc.) never mind Man U Leeds Liverpool Derby Notts Forest and Everton. They are the Manchester City of London following the Ambramovitch millions invested in them. that took them from a top 12 club to the top 3 or 4. So this win is certainly the more impressive !

Not 100% sure but I think Mane has already played Champions league with Red Bull after they won the Austrian Championship in 12/13? Alps would know as our resident Austrian!

But he didn't miss his opportunity to strike he had lost control of the ball and it was going out so he decided to seek a pen as the opportunity had gone! However the laws as they stand would still give him a pen that is what is so wrong about them! In my view a Pen should only be awarded where a goal scoring opportunity is denied but hey ho FIFA are in charge of the laws so enough said! In any event if it was or wasn't a pen is not relevant, we were denied two that were more blatant and also game changing and had we been awarded them would have made the Chelsea one an irrelevance, without the need to cry about them. Teams like Saints have had decades of not being given decisions against the big boys especially away without crying about it Jose needs to stop playing the victim and sort his team of misfit superstars out whilst giving Saints credit for a great team performance that literally played his team off the park.

Totally Agree he enables us to break by holding up the ball when we are all behind it and he has the deft touches to play others in when they are pushing forward. Pelle is the ideal foil for Mane the two together can take out any premiership defence height, guile, strength and pace combined between the two of them

Gray Reid and dessaily all think we should have had 2 pens

I think he showed why he is there

Europe not proving to be good for any English team this year

So far you cannot say any of the recent defectors football careers has improved since leaving although we all know it is their improving bank balances that led to them leaving.

3 Carlisle penalty misses to scousehamptons two

Damn

Come on Carlisle

Coutinho miss

Adam what a miss!

Issued on the basis they might play better without him?

I love the look on Brenda's face 124 mins against a league 2 side and the side who have conceded more goals than all in the league 300m spent I bet he regrets those comments about the spurs spending now! Ha Ha Loveren injured too!

Well done Matt getting us a home draw!

yes won 4-0 at home lost 7-1 away and then there was the Ronnie Rosenthal spurs match

Chambers scores an own goal now! for Spuds

Sorry I should have said prefers him at right back not defender! No slight intended on Yoshi who after all is a Centre back and as you rightly point out was filling in to a role he has less experience in also if you look at the replay Fonte clearly gestures to Yoshi to play the ball back to the keeper so neither Fonte or Yoshi spotted Martial and unfortunately the ball was also under hit.

I am not saying it was the right decision I am only saying we don't know the real reasons why Koeman made it (height experience etc are all possible)and that you cannot draw the conclusion that Cedric is a crap right back because Koeman left him out for one or even a few games. I am sure we all remember Poch leaving out Clyne and preferring Chambers (subsequently a central defender) in many matches the season before last, it didn't mean Clyne was therefore a poor buy or a useless right back did it? All I am saying is you cannot speculate that Koeman thinks he is not up to it based on him being left out in a few matches! He is a young lad new to the premiere league and the UK lets cut him a bit of slack and support the boy he may yet come good.

The speculation I refer to is not around what happened but why it happened! We do not know that Koeman believes Yoshida to be a better defender than Soares on every occasion but only that he preferred him on this occasion, against this opposition, under these tactics. My point is managers can make one off decisions based on the strengths and weaknesses they perceive both in their and in the oppositions teams. We are not privy to these thoughts also we don't know what physical condition he was in last week or even how he performed last week in training. All these are possible reasons leading to a one match preference of Yoshi over Soares. You have extrapolated this one match change to mean that he is not good enough for his position in general and that Koeman will always prefer Yoshi over him. I believe it is far to early to reach this conclusion based on very little statistical back up. If Yoshi were to play instead of Soares in say 50% of all matches you may be right but you have formed a conclusion based on one matchs evidence only. That is the speculation I refer to.