ant

What a few minutes. 😅 Bloody good to nick the 3 points - and no bad thing to do so whilst off the boil - but ample reminders throughout of the need for recruitment. Fair play to Tonda on the implementation and timing of the subs. Made decent use of what's currently available to him.

I get where you're coming from, but we'd do very well to not lose. Last season's 10 losses would be a fair aim, given the -4. Burning 2 of those straight away would raise legitimate concerns about the season's direction.

Have felt like this for much of the summer, but kept quiet as the prevailing opinion was so opposed. I appreciate a lot of our quality was signed late in the window last year, but I have fears about expecting Spors to keep pulling rabbits from hats. And frankly I'm not sure we can afford a slow start. I don't believe the second half of this season will go the same way as 25-26 did.

Shouldn't overlook that the bench is especially lacking for supposed automatic promotion contenders. Huge pressure in the coming week to shift some deadwood and to reinforce.

Bingo. There was marked surprise at just how well the appeasement went.

Oh, they got this all wrong. "I promise you that we'll bring to you at the end of the summer the team that will take you out of your seats [in protest] and excitement will run high at St Mary's [as you attempt to guess which jobbing manager will replace Tonda each week - like Have I Got News For You, post-Deayton]."

By my understanding the project's very much driven by Dragan. The club's spent an awful lot of money developing plans - way more detailed & specific than anything shown to date - for land it doesn't own yet. Unfortunately the relevant landowner(s) know the future value, so are asking silly money. I don't know whether the club will just cough up or if there's an ace up the sleeve. Whatever happens, full council & transport provider buy-in feels critical. Beyond a couple of buses (passing near but not through), St Mary's has scant links - and the surrounding roads are frequently heaving as it is. Pie in the sky perhaps, but I hope there's an exploration into dusting off the old service rail line and popping a platform by the stadium.

Tonda is talented if flawed. Spors has the provenance and has earned some goodwill. What is Parsons? I don't expect to see a CEO getting his hands dirty, but equally see very little evidence in his ability to get the best out of (or inspire) others.

Parsons leaning on his (almost certainly invited) ex-Saints mates in his closing speech was fucking cringe. And sadly sums the man up.

Whoever just asked that question to Parsons: I want to buy you a pint. 😆

Throwing our weight behind Tonda was a strong message, but there was an inherent risk to putting it all on red. There's been an arrogance from day dot that we'd escape with a slap on the wrist. I've seen little to no evidence our leadership has learned from it. Did they expect the FA investigation to pass without incident? Or was their master plan really to hope the ball wouldn't land on black?

The black box no longer exists.

Aha, I knew you must have links in the office. I'm no longer there, but over the past few months noticed a few ITK snippets cropping up on here as they were breaking internally.

Boro now so focused on litigation that they didn't feel the need to bother with, say, a shot on target to win the match. ⚖️

Eurgh. Supposed to be at Beer Merchants now, sipping ill-advised pre-match imperial stouts at their Omnipollo takeover. Thankfully managed to get a few online, so today's not entirely fueled by FOMO. Enjoy the sunshine and don't get sucked into doom scrolling, folks. ✌️