oxfordshire_saint

I've spoken to Alpine and he says unless we make 20 more signings, we'll finish the season on 4 points and these will come from 0-0 draws at home to Carlisle, Exeter, Walsall and Leyton Orient. The poor results will come largely because we have no 20-goal-a-season strikers, zero creative midfielders and definitely no ball winning centre-halves.........HTH

Hopefully they'll be ok, if they can sell Dean McDonald (who I understand has been on trial with Swansea), it could give them a nice cash injection. Now they're back in the Conference South it should mean better gates too.

Tis my hometown (bar a few years spent up in Oxon), so I'll be walking over!

Indeed, I'm not doubting that you do have some quality (some of your signings like Morrison and Teale should produce the goods, alongside the decent players you already have, Grant, Potter, Tudgay etc ), but I don't think you have players who are in the same class bracket as Fonte, Lallana or Lambert. You'll definitely be our main challengers (I can only see Huddersfield making playoffs again), but I don't think we need to panic like some are suggesting on here.

To anyone who is going up on the M3, come off at junction 4a for Fleet/Farnborough rather than the main Farnborough junction, as that's where the main airshow traffic is.

Take apart our squad, player for player and tell me which team in this league has more quality than us? Yes, we're lacking depth in a couple of positions, but although we reckon Huddersfield and Sheff Weds will be strong, do they really have any depth to their squads? Yes both teams have a handful of quality players, but even without additions our squad is currently the best in League 1. This isn't complacency, I'm taking nowt for granted, we won't get promotion by just turning up to games, but I just don't understand the complete lack of confidence some people have. We all know that we've not finished in the transfer market, so sit back, relax and look forward to the season ahead. Life must be pretty depressing when your outlook is as negative as some on here.....

Europe's a good shout. You could start by going down the West coast of France (Dune du Pyla, Biarritz, etc) before going along the Pyrenees, pop down into Barcelona, then along the South coast of France, into Northern Italy (you could do Turin, Milan, Verona, Venice, try and take in Lakes Como and Garda on the way) then head up over the Brenner Pass into Austria and to Innsbruck. From there, go across to Salzburg, then up to Munich, hop over the border to Prague, then back into Germany up to Berlin. From Berlin you could get a cheap flight to Amsterdam, train from there to Brussells, then back home on the Eurostar. Perfectly do-able, you could probably even shoe-horn Switzerland into there too, which I'd recommend.

Good luck, I've done Trailwalker which is also 100k (Petersfield to Brighton) and it took me just over 24 hours, you've certainly got your work cut out to do it in under 24! All I can say is that first and foremost, make sure you've got decent footwear and socks, your feet will thank you for it! Hope it all goes well

Ah, the same old argument every pre-season! Yes, you want to win the games, any footballer worth their salt should want to win every game they play in, but the main aim of pre-season is to test the players and for the manager to learn things about his squad. Anyone whingeing about losing a couple of friendlies needs a reality check, you're the sort of people who sum up the current culture in football where managers are sacked after a handful of games. It'd have been nice to win, we didn't, but the players got some match practice and fitness. Looking forward to seeing what sort of side we put out at Farnborough.

My Dad spent a few years of his childhood in Noosa and said it's lovely there (or at least was back then!), not sure what it's like now. Also, if you want to visit somewhere a bit weird, go to Nimbin!

I think it's more to do with the pressure here, managers are so afraid to blood the youngsters. Look at Barca, Pedro and Busquets got given a chance young at the biggest club in the world, now they're World Cup winners. Same with Bayern, they only blooded Badstuber and Muller this season and then they both went to the World Cup. If the big clubs here gave people a chance, rather than buying mediocre foreign players instead, we'd see more success. There are some quality English youngsters out there, but they get shunned by the big clubs, lose confidence and then slowly filter down the leagues wasting their talent. The whole media witch-hunt about the standard of coaching and academies in this country, based on a poor World Cup, is nothing short of nonsense and a knee-jerk reaction. We produce quality players, young players with great technical ability and tactical awareness, they just need to get given a chance at the top level. People forget we got to the final of the most recent Euro U21 Final, funnily enough, Spain weren't there. The World Cup failure was a result of an outgoing generation of players being hyped up beyond all belief, poor management and even poorer tactics. It was in no way a reflection of the current youth setup in this country, how can it be?

We've probably got more foreigners than most League 1 sides!

I'm going to Belgian GP on the Saturday and Sunday, but am on the continent for the whole week prior to it, so thinking of doing the Friday on a day ticket. Foals and Blink 182 are the two I'm mainly wanting to see (due to not being able to go to Reading), but the whole Friday looks pretty solid.

Anyone ever been? Good? Bad?

Not sure about players, but when we're thrashing teams next year we can greet each pass with "Au Lait" For those that get that, I'll get my coat..............

Claus Lurpackvam?

Alpine, I've nothing against you, but you're a scaremongerer of the highest order. We'll be fine, the core of the squad is there, so I'm not too worried about "gelling". If we can go into the first game of the season having signed a central midfielder, right winger and striker (and backup keeper if Bart definitely fooks off, have seen Forecast play for the ressies and he scares the $h!te out of me), I'll be happy. Even if we only get 1 or 2 out of the 3, I still won't be too worried. Given that they know we have substantial cash, some of our target's clubs may be playing hardball, not every team have their squad finalised by mid-July FFS, tell me a club who has? At the moment I'd be more worried if I was a Liverpool or an Arsenal fan (yes, completely different level of football, but you get my point) with the amount of gaps they have to plug between now and the season openers. Cease and desist with all the scary bull$h!t, it's tedious.

I think we offered him the use of our physios and fitness facilities to help him overcome his injury, but obviously due to the severity of his injury he can't actually do any proper training, hence why no mention of him. FWIW I think he's finished. As someone above mentioned, a mediocre career as a local pundit for league teams in the South awaits..........

Wayne Thomas is training with Stoke, but only because he lives in the area and they are helping him out.

I remember watching him away at Millwall in one his few appearances last season and he was one of the best players on the pitch. Could be more than useful this season, even if we could only manage to squeeze 20 games or so out of him.

If you go into Sports Direct you'll get a pair for whatever price you need, they have everything from the expensive stuff to more budget orientated pairs. They usually have more in store than they do on t'net.

Never mind all of that, in the pic with Wotton on day 4 does Lallana not look like he's been on the roids all summer?

Also, his brother is pretty young and appears to be off to Napoli, crossed wires? http://www.goal.com/en/news/10/italy/2010/04/04/1863890/napoli-monitoring-racing-clubs-bruno-zuculini-report In summary, nobody has a clue?

I believe Franco has an Italian passport, so I presume his brother would too? The surname certainly smacks of Italian descent. EDIT - seems to be applying for one - http://www.tribalfootball.com/juventus-favourites-racing-star-zuculini-seeks-italian-passport-228165

Nope, it goes to this wonderfully named Belgian defender http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_De_Man http://www.germinalbeerschot.be/ploegvantstad/