PokingFun

Does it matter so long as the deal is right for us? (and with Cortese I'm sure it will be) Surely better to have the right financial deal with a local company than be screwed down by a well known brand that may not want to offer as much? Basically, I'm sure this will have gone through a tender process and the criteria to be met has been met by these guys and not any well known brands of interest. I really don't know why you're getting your budgie smugglers in a twist!!

There is absolutely nothing that I could see in the article suggesting that is actually going to be our new shirt. It's a plain shirt for logo illustration I would imagine ;-)

Household names do not sponsor clubs in L1 or even CCC generally. They will usually look at the big boys as it matches their own size / ego / status etc. Local company seems a good fit for a club that wants to consider itself part of the local community. Another step toward Saints having a family feel to it again?

I really don't think any deal will be scuppered for a player we want or need just because of some speculation on a fans website. It will be for business reasons if it doesn't go ahead, assuming it is on the cards anyway.

To be fair to BWP, he has scored nearly 50 goals in 200 games but the ratio is better than nearly 1 in 4 as he has spent half of his 200 odd games on the bench. L1 seems to be his level to excel somewhat and would arguably still remain a useful impact sub in CCC as he is actually quite an exerienced player now at CCC / L1 level and should be coming into his prime at the age of 26. Wouldn't have been the worst signing ever.

But it will be a very good one should NA achieve it given the start he was left with by the previous management team.

You really don't have a clue at all do you? Saints are playing winning football and for the best part we do try to get it down and play but equally we can mix it up and go more direct when necessary (usually on **** pitches away from home). Its to NA's credit that he can get the team to play different styles and still win games. It keeps the opposition off balance. I don't think you will ever be pleased with performances as you really are an Adkins hater.

I like it, good spiel, you're like a slippery genius!

I'm sorry but regardless of wanting to go up this comment is ****ing wrong. You are a complete *****. Anyone that wishes ill on someone over a game of football is a complete idiot in my opinion. You fall absolutely in that category.

It was a joke, lighten up man ....

He would have no users as he would ban them as soon as they disagreed with his views lol

I would love to get back to the premiership but equally I'm enjoying my Saturdays out with the boys for a few beers and a laugh. The football is incidental to that in many respects so for me its not the be all and end all and whilst I am unhappy when we get a bad result such as Brentford at home or Notts Co at home, it doesn't tend to last long as its all about the day out.

Thanks for the summary, looks like we mixed it up a lot to try to break the deadlock but it wasn't to be last night.

I'm surprised that many are saying we played hoof ball last night when Merrington suggested we did that only when we ran out of ideas after squandering 20 odd chances. Surely you dont create 20 odd chances by simply playing hoof ball. Do people confuse hoofball (which is aimless long balls to big frontman to batter the opposition) with direct play (which in my eyes is shifting the ball quickly forward to front / wide men with support to put opponents off balance)? This is a genuine question as I don't think we play long ball tactics as our stock game but do think we use direct play at times to mix things up.

Manchester United do not lose to the likes of Wolves and Arsenal do not lose to the likes of Birmingham ..... Oh

Do you really think the team isn't trying? 11 shots on target, 9 off target, 12 corners, merrington suggesting saints dominated for large parts. Is that not trying? What is trying then? Winning 4-1 when playing badly, is that trying? Or is that just winning? I can honestly say I have not seen a lack of effort from this team in any games I have been to. I have seen the odd poor performance but never a lack of effort or a mentality that they just have to turn up to win. Your comments are bizarre.

S-Clarke, I am in complete agreement with you and I have a ST! ;-) I liked the post someone put earlier about tactics being wrong and we arent meant to hoof it (which I don't very often see us doing under NA anyway). According to Merrrington at the end of the game last night he said saints played some really good stuff for about 75 minutes and then ran out of ideas (hoofed it to forwards when 1-0 down with 15 mins left shocker). Also said their keeper had a brilliant game and that we could have been 4 up in the first half. Last time I played and managed a football team there was not much I could do if the opposition keeper had a worldy and my team / team mates could not hit the back of the net. Nothing to do with tactics, just great goalkeeping and some poor finishing. Is that down to the manager I ask the people seemingly calling for a new manager ..... So many knee jerkers and unrealistic people on this forum who base opinions on one match rather than in the round.

Out of interest, Kevin Pullein uses 32 games as the optimal period for deciding a team's form / ability over another team. 4-8 games is too short a statistical sample. I'm just pleased we are winning / drawing games even though were not hitting top form.

Last 6 games away = 12 points .... keep that up for the remainder of the season and we will be promoted!

Interesting thing was that NA was in the process of making that change when they actually scored their goal which suggests he was ahead of the game. I'd like to see Schniederlin play more often.

We hit the post twice and scored in the first half, we didnt lose control of the game for anything more than a few minutes and then wrestled it back emphatically! Every team will have a spell and they had theirs and scored but overall defensively we were sound and we are always a threat offensively. Not the best performance but we are winning while not playing brilliantly which is always a good sign.

What I am saying is there is a margin of error / misfortune at which I will think he has been unfortunate to not get us promoted after the terrible start we had, a minus ten points effective deficit. If for example NA achieved more than 2 pts per game and B'mth / Huddersfield by some miracle won 80% of their remaining games then I would feel that was exeptionally bad luck and nothing to do with our form or ability as it is out of our control. In that situation I would say he did well even though technically he failed to go up. Clearly the number of scenarios is enormous and I will base my view should he fail to get us promoted on the whole situation and not just a "well he didnt get us up so hes a failure" black and white argument. I also hope Cortese can see that he is partly responsible for our terrible start as he kept Pardew and then opted to not stick with him. That decision was nothing to do with NA and it left NA at a disadvantage and playing catch up. Fortunately, it seems that NA will catch up that deficit assuming we continue to achieve the results we have over the 24 or so games he has been in charge in our remaining fixtures. Gain the average points we have been doing in our games in hand and we will be in 2nd place. Then it all depends on who has the bottle in the last 1/3 of the season. That remains to be seen but I think we can do it. I'll stick my neck out and say that I still believe we will go up automatically. Basically, NA is on a hiding to nothing with a large number of fans. Get promoted and they will say "so he should have" without acknowledging that he has had to pick up a shattered team and rebuild confidence and winning mentality while also bridging a significant points gap after the disastrous start we had. If we don't go up no doubt the NA out drum will bang regardless of the circumstances, final positions etc. Do you acknowledge that NA has done well so far to bridge the gap left by the poor start to the season under Pardew / Wilkins? If not, then quite frankly I think you are off mark. After all, even the LMA performance ratings seem to reflect that NA is doing a good job assuming the post earlier by someone is genuine. One final thing Hypo, I still maintain that just because I don't agree with you it doesn't mean I'm nuts, mental or whatever at all. It just means I view things differently to you so please don't insult my intelligence by posting what you think of me becuase I dare to hold a different view to you. This is a football message board where opinions differ. I don't know you, you don't know me so please in future if you disagree just state so and the reasons nehind that and you will find that I am capable of intelligent debate (I would hope) but don't resort to the silly name calling, it's really not necessary and a little juvenile. The likelihood is now we will agree to disagree but I hope if we get promoted that you will come on here and give NA some praise for what he and the team will have achieved rather than shrug your shoulders and say "well, that was expected". I've been a manager of people in a big organisation for many years and can assure you that management of anything to the best effect is rarely an exact science regardless of the ability you have at your disposal. To be successful is always more difficult than not and credit should be given when people succeed. I hope you can admit your fears were wrong should NA succeed in the objective of promotion. For now I will leave the debate there and hope for a good win against Swindon on Saturday.

I can assure you that I am not deluded, mental, a nutter or anything like that at all. Just because I happen to hold a view that differs from you does not make me some kind of mentalist. As I said, I'm happy to see what the season brings, it just disappoints me that our fans seem to think we have a god given right to win every game because we have spent a few quid and cannot recognise that NA is doing a good job to date. Most fans of other teams will still see us as a good side doing well and those in and around us will believe we are a massive threat. Who is CB Fry by the way? Is he some kind of mentalist too? ;-)

Like I said, I would be disappointed but equally sensible enough to see that we would still have a good man at the helm to take us forward as I do not think our **** start should be discounted in terms the damage it has done on our season. I have no more to say on the subject and will wait and see what occurs between now and the end of the season.

I will be disappointed if we do not get promoted but if that is on the backdrop of NA getting 2 pts per game from now until the end of the season and one of our rivals can better that in the run in then i say good luck to them as they will have played exceptionally well to do that. The play-offs are a lottery anyway so I am not going to slate anyone for not winning them. The point is, we will not get anyone that could achieve more right now than NA is doing. Even the very best managers in the country would probably struggle to better NA record by more than 10% extra. I just feel our fans are unrealistic in what they consider to be a good job and feel he is being treated unfairly right now. At the end of the day we won't agree on this one and you obviously cannot see past your blinkers of promotion. On one hand you want promotion, but on the other you moan about performances even though the team is getting the points it largely needs to gain auto even while not playing as well as we all know they can at their very best. I will take the current points tally per game every time as I know it will mean promotion when the other teams have their blip. B'mth's has arguably already started with 2 draws in a row AT HOME. We have taken around 17-18 points from 9 games including SIX away. That is very good indeed!