The Kraken

There's still plenty of traditional pubs in the main areas of Southampton. Red Lion (Below Bar) Pensioners Arms (Bedford Place) The Cricketers (Bedford Place) The Grapes (Oxford Street) Gordon Arms (Portswood High Street)

I like that.

I've got mates who are Palace fans and, having gone with them up to Selhurst many, many times in the past 20 years I'd hate to see them go out of business. And to see that barrel of sh!t down the road continue to exist in their moral vacuum makes it even worse. Palace's debts must be 10% of that of Pompey. Yet they are readily admitting that everything is up for sale. Darren Ambrose, their star performer from last season, has just gone for 750K, which is massively underpriced, but they realise they have obligations so off he goes. The likes of Speroni, Cline, Danns and many others are all in line to follow in the near future, just to pay the bills. Yet the scum from down the road continue to rack up enormous bills with a ridiculous wage bill, and nothing gets done. £138M in debt at the last count, and with no revenues for the next 3 months no chance of paying HMRC for the continuing tax bill. Football makes absolutely no sense to me.

Might want to lose the "Forum" bit; Steve said it's for the whole site, not just the forum.

Many thanks. That changes matters then...

I'm a bit confused now (it's easily done). Steve, if its not too much trouble, is there any chance of mocking up the example banner you posted to show where the logo/banner might go. Apologies if it sounds a bit of retarded request, I'm just a bit unsure of what it is you're looking for, I assumed it was just a logo similar to the Saints Web main site one now.

Go on then I'll kick it off. Be kind....

Current status of vote just announced: Pat McCourt 31% Danny Rose 23% Rickie Lambert 22% Come on, Southampton's goal machine.

Gets those votes flowing; Rickie is up to 22% of the vote! Leader is on 31%. Hit those red buttons and/or get texting.

Do you accept that SISA and the Saints Trust are defunct organisations that only exist for the purposes of their spokespersons getting their name in the news? I have no problem with the likes of Illingsworth et al giving their own personal opinions, but when the Echo dress its up in headlines as "fans' chief" Perry McMillan of SISA, Saints Trust chairman etc the Echo are complicit in providing a false impression that they are speaking on behalf of a significant cross-section of fans rather than giving a personal opinion. In essence its lazy journalism, looking for a quick quote to add to an article rather than going the extra mile to actually find out what a cross-section of fans do think. There are many, many avenues you could use for providing quotes on any particular topic; this site is just one of them. Yet it is always one of O'Callaghan, McMillian, Illingsworth and now McFeat who claim to speak for all their members, yet in essence only speak for themselves. I understand why the Echo do it, as it gives credibilty to a person's view by having a (moribund) organisation associated to the name. But as these organisations are dead, closed shops, it is a duplicitious approach to take by a newspaper.

Red Alert, no worries at all. Like I said I'm really tempted to give it a go myself. I'm currently taking a career break and doing some volunteering here in Southampton but I think that once I get summer and quite a few committments out of the way I'll be giving this a go. Hearing my friends talk about what they did, and how you can provide so much help for really little outlay and relative effort, it's just a thoroughly appealing thing to do.

A couple of friends of mine have recently got back from their second stint working in Ghana; they went through Original Volunteers (http://www.originalvolunteers.co.uk). They can't speak highly enough about it, and I'm very tempted to do something similar myself. They did 3 weeks over Xmas & New Year and similar a couple of months back (though got delayed getting back with the volcanic ash thing so stayed for a couple of weeks longer than planned). Have a look through the website, they offer placements all over the world in a variety of different roles. My friends were based around a children's school and did anything from teaching to helping to build a new block of the school to managing a local football competition! The site says that the average amount of time to spend there is 3 weeks, but there's no real limit on duration of stay. Hats off if you go for it.

Who knows; perhaps the kick to the car also made a dent that had to be dealt with. Its a very high price, I'm not denying that at all. If she had to bear the brunt of the costs then I'm sure she could have got a wing mirror re-done and dents knocked out for 100 - 200 maximum. However, once you start using the main dealers and they know they have an insurance company to fall back on for payment, they go the whole hog often by replacing whole parts or body kit that are only very slightly damaged. I had a similar incident a few years back, with someone reversing into the back of my rear wheel arch. Went to go through insurance but the recommended garage they sent me to wanted £1500 to replace a whole load of the body, when there was only superficial damage to a small area. I ended up settling with guy who crashed into me so he didn't lose his no-claims and got a good body-shop I know to do the repairs for £75. Main dealership repairs are just a complete rip-off when it's an insurance-covered deal. Anyway, quite what this has to do with the OP I'm not sure!!

Actually, they really are, especially if you go through the main dealership to do it. The mirror of my old BMW got knocked off a while back; just to replace the plastic mirror cover through the dealers would have cost £130 as they were only sold in matt black and had to be sprayed to suit the colour of the car. Of course I just bought the matt black one for £25 and can of spray paint. But if the whole wing mirror gets replaced, including all the internal wiring and mechanics etc, I imagine the main dealership would charge an absolute fortune for that.

The club "made a mistake"? You pompous idiot. They took a few days to respond about a request for something free, and then responded with a kind gift? Yet according to you they made a mistake. You are an idiot. And a thread title change of "no longer disappointed with saints" shows you up again for being a fool. The club owe nothing at all, they have no obligation to fulfill any request for help from any charity, no matter how lazy and impersonal this one clearly was in its approach. Despite the negative comments on this thread about the actual charity, I'm glad it has benefitted from the club. But you seem to have taken it an an expectation, rather than a gift. Shame on you.

Being as Hooters have been running for decades in the most litigation-happy country in the world without being on the wrong end of any previous substantial lawsuits in this regard, I'd suggest they're probably quite safe.

"CUT COSTS AND WE'LL FILL ST. MARY'S SAYS FANS' CHIEF" screams the Echo headline. And who is this "Fans' chief"? Perry McMillan. Who apparently is now from the Southampton Independent Supporters Trust. I'm getting sick of these gobsh1te nobodies hiding behind a meaningless and defunct organisation just to get their pathetic regular fix of publicity. I'm sick to the back teeth of sad numpties like Illingsworth and McMillan regularly appearing in the media claiming to speak for the fans. As a fan I really don't need a complete crackpot to verbalise what I'm thinking. And our new pal Jason McFeat now seems fully intent on crashing the party of idiots, clarifying his views as those of The Saints trust. I could just about abide these morons if the views they offered were solely their own personal views, and clarified as such. But when they hide behind a false title and claim to speak for a large cross-section of the fans, there becomes a big problem. Choice quotes from today's article: Perry McMillan: "Football fans connect with the club by going to support the team. That's the connection we are looking for from the owner and chairman to make here." Jason McFeat "From a Trust point of view, we hope season tickets remain the same price. If they keep them at the same price then the fans will buy them." Now, McFeat in particular. Did he canvass the Saints Trust membership to get a common consensus on this? I very much doubt it. These people really need to find something else to do other than their sad fixation on seeing their name in print. And the Echo needs to get off their lazy arses, realise these empty shirts are a complete sham, and find a much better way of articulating the views of the fans without resorting to the lowest common denominator each time.

She looks like she's neglected to fit a saddle....

I think the season ticket prices and new kit information need to come out REALLY quick, just to give the same old faces a new topic to argue about. This one has surely run its course and seems doomed to go back and forth over and over and over again. Truly, we get it; some people would have preferred to see NC nip the press rumours in the bud and publicly deny them, which could have put the story to sleep before it got into full panic mode. Others are more than happy for NC to act in his own way, confident that he's doing the very best in the interests of the club in tandem with the manager. Subject to various other shades of gray, I'm not sure what there still is to discuss EDIT: I of course realise that by adding to this thread I am subsequently continuing the redundant discussion; therefore clearly I am the idiot. Carry on....

Indeed. Think about what your sister is doing; she's asking the club to go out of their way and donate something to her for free. Bombarding a potential dead-end with email is really not the way to do this type of thing, as its completely faceless, quite lazy and frankly a bit rude. Sometimes clubs will respond favourably to an email, others will not, and really if they do choose to not oblige in her request then they should certianly not be berated on an internet forum for that. Particularly when you don't even know if the emails are getting through. As Ohio has said, the club have helped out a huge number of charities in the past and I'm sure will continue to do so in the future. And its always best to start these things with a phone call, shows more initiative and committment.

Rather than send email after email, not receive a single response (which kind of hints that the mails are not getting through to the right person), why not actually give the club a call (or better still drop in there) and find out who the actual person to ask about this would be?

I'm as happy to laugh at Pompey as the next man, but isn't that the point of the adminisitration process? Administration is designed to rescue an insolvent company and is the one step before liquidation of the company. In Pompey's case they simply cannot continue to survive with that type of debt around their neck, therefore its only logical that the purpose of administration is to reduce the debt to a practical level, otherwise they'll simply be wound up. There are many dodgy things going on with that club, but their only realistic choice for survival is to drastically reduce the debt. I don't particularly agree with the fact that they could potentially pay back only 20% (or less) of what they owe without any real and proper penalty being imposed, but that's another argument altogether.

Being as these lot seem to be based somewhere in Asia, and I live in Highfield, then no, I don't work for them! As I recall, mine took about 7-10 days to arrive.

Despite failing to win a new contract, Simon Gillett found a cunning new way to stay at the club....

Unite members outside the court sang "we are the champions" after the verdict was announced. Says it all about how short-sighted and blinkered these idiots are.