tpbury

Bit of an arbitrary comparison as I watch Palace's Bolassie vs Man City. Both African with an orange hair thing going on. Similarly built? Both tagged with the slightly lazy 'unpredictable' tag. Bolassie's a couple of years older with more UK experience. As I watch him, I think - 'wish Mane was as good as that'. Then I realise I've ignored all the times he's tried tricks and lost the ball and generally been out of position or not put a ball in. Probably not as infuriating as Mane, but seeing as our man is a bit younger, there's potential there. And I fancy CP's attack to score more than ours over the last few weeks.

Fair play to spkyinthesky for starting the 'back in my day' business. One word - Dubbin. And some more, I was a schoolboy in the 80s but had the great fortune to play as centre back in my dad's nail the studs/metal toecaps/half way up the legs football cum rugby boots from the 50s. Centre forwards tended to stay tackled, but I had a turning circle of an oil tanker and the leap of, well, someone who was wearing frickin stupidly heavy boots. I do remember scoring a classic lob as I chipped the ball and it rolled right up the boot to my knee. Have to say, the other lads rightly took the mickey and I dreamed of having a proper pair of pumas, black of course.

Hope over expectation here, but it is true that sides with loads of replacements have pulled off surprise wins. I did think this a lot when Wotte et al were in charge, however. Anyway, onwards and upwards, come on Saints!

At least no pressure for Saturday!

I remember the barber shop quartet rendition of 'Sit on My Face and tell me that you love me'. Seems that this is destined for the audio grumble scrap heap. He is the only verse I can remember, recorded for posterity. Just like the Alexandria library Sit on my face and tell me that you love me I'll sit on your face and say I love you, too I love to hear you oralise, when I'm between your thighs You blow me away...

He's going to have to thumb it in

Think City's 3rd tier attendances were way better than ours, or anybody else's. Most Lancs/Mancs I knew were city fans, or else teams like Oldham or Bury.

I found this when I was looking up how to sew on a button. http://www.artofmanliness.com/ I think I'm going to pay someone to sew the fkkr on.

Actually, don't bother, just realised I've got a book to read and another couple on order from the library. Happy days!

I think I posted this last time we went through a rocky patch. It's as much about my own personal pain as it is about having to read the pain of others which comes out on the page as unbearable whinging and arrogant self pity. So, in the past, I've perused a number of websites, for the sake of esoteric interest (no, not porn) and different perspectives on sports, news (probably not politics) and just random stuff. Right now, all I've got is here and LadBible which is a bit crap. I think someone pointed me to TvTropes recently which I really enjoyed, but it seems quite static and it makes me yearn for similarly lively and offbeat topics found on Saintsweb. Except when it's full of suicidal dictaphones. So, hit me with links that you lookup regularly. Not porn, I want to engage for more than 85 seconds. Thanks, TP

They show quite a lot of Netball in Oz, coz those chicks are quite good at it. Goes back to that good old Field of Dreams argument (erect it and they will come, or some such). Anyway, it is very competitive and having zero exposure to the game before, it is as captivating as Basketball. Which you can make what you will of. Think there's some hot girls play, but they are very tall and, well, athletic which is not my cup of tea - too intimidating. Anyway, girls, eh? Sports, eh? Girls sports - know what I mean? Nudge, nudge, wink, wink. Know what I mean? Eh? Girls playing sports eh? Know what I mean? Eh?

Frustrating tonight and the last couple of games. But so has the whole team been - intricate passing moves which end up with no end product and giving the ball away. Put one decent cross in and should concentrate on dong that. Fact is, he has played better, so he can play better again. Pelle was crap, Pardew was crap, West Ham were crap, now they're good. Is it possible to live outside the moment now it's after the game?

He had quite a few - 'tidy'. Think there was one time he had a chance to shoot, but fell into the 'pass it through them' mentality (which often led to handing the ball over). Having said that, it might have been Davis.

Carroll equalised - amazingly from a quick, well placed cross. Note to Koeman

Blimey, I never knew CoxLou was a woman. Despite this handicap, she often posts sense!

Good anticipation from Forster also - play up Fraser, play up and play the game!! Ra, ra, ra!

I agree about the confidence bit - he seems a bit shy, but so did many others. We could speculate about what it's like growing up being super tall... However, need to remember his kicking is way better than Boruc's, and with the amount of times we gave the ball away in midfield, it would have been excruciating to have conceded possession every third kick!

I saw the Israeli umpire article as well (cricket in Israel is new to me). It's entirely possible that many more people have been killed playing cricket in obscure games around the world. In all honesty, is there any chance the Israeli umpire would have made even the slightest blip on the radar if he had been hit the week before Hughes? Also, I haven't picked up on any knee jerk safety debate over here or in the UK media I follow, not that I have been seeking it out. There is a real feeling of sadness of course, but I don't get a sense there is a mood for change. Having said that, there's possibly room for more padding in the helmet in the area where Hughes was struck, though it might make it difficult to hear run calls.

I bothered to find the previous thread about this: http://www.saintsweb.co.uk/showthread.php?52053-Why-no-Saints-women-team&highlight=womens#.VHu9BDGUcTp To be honest, I thought it was the same people churning out the same turgid crap about women's football on this thread. But it's not - a completely different set of people churning out the same turgid crap! I suppose the weight of opinion must make it true that promoting and supporting women at the highest level of the sport is a waste of time, as they couldn't beat the Dog and Duck. It's a bit depressing that those who denigrate the quality of football they see should also seek to quash any aspirations the participants may have to raise the level. I think of women's cycling, and indeed indoor cycling in general, could also chuck various forms of rowing in. This sport, as far as I remember, had zero profile and very limited public interest until targeted gazillions were thrown at it (including paying elite athletes from other sports to switch) - primarily for the Olympics. Right now, these are big ticket medal shots for GB Team, though I wonder whether there is a great deal of grass roots interest in them. With will, the same kind of transformation could be applied to Women's Football, or indeed archery. Quick squiz at Wiki shows a 53K at Goodison in 1920 - the year before the FA pulled the plug on women's football, as it 'damaged their bodies': http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_football_in_England The subsequent 70 years or so seem to have reinforced the view that women are crap at it and shouldn't play. This is evidenced by the retrogressive and blinkered views of what appears to be the majority of male opinion here. Sadly, the ABC over here is cutting its support of the W-league after budget cuts, but I have been very happy to watch my daughter (CB) out-muscle male centre forwards in the u15 league. The women's top level team she is trialling for has many skillful, quick thinking players and is miles better than 5 years ago - who knows what the standard will be in 10 or 20 years. Why kill it off now?

We had a couple of free kicks from just wide of the box which weren't too bad, but I've come to expect nothing from corners - unless they're short. Reminds me of a training session with my lad's team where we did 60 corners with no direct attempt at goal!

Getting a bit of a probe

ta, geez

Thanks goat - what is this XBMC add on you speak of? I am in the process of subverting my son's mother (it's on at 11:30pm here) by trying to let him stream on his ipad mini (is it called a mini? Can this stream also?) What should be more important for a 13 year old - watching Saints or going to pesky school?

Hi - what is the exact sportsnation website? I ask as I trail through this thread, hoping for a quick response! Also, do you think performance will be degraded as it's the only game on and a top 4 clash?

has not scored for a while and the team has been a bit ropey. Need to fix both tomorrow and I hope we don't suffer from 'commentator's curse'