Barry the Badger

I'm not holding my breath for it to be finished this week to be honest. :-)

Not really the same thing is it though... I'm all for keeping up with ex Saints and what they're up to, but the point is Anders didn't even play in this match so who gives a ****? Now if I started a thread on here entitled "Zimbabwe win at cricket without Bruce", or "today I had a poo without Bruce" then you might have a point. That would be about as relevant to Saints as this thread. :-)

Ex Saints interest? The fact that one of our ex players didn't play? And this weeks tenuous link of the week award goes to....

But surely if we get in a manager who can instill that drive and concentration he could do the business. I'm not his biggest fan by a long shot but he did score some cracking goals last season so the potential is there. If a new manager can harness his potential and help him become more consistent we could have a very good player there.

With the right manager to bring the best out of him I think he could really come good. If we can afford to keep him we should.

I don't really understand how it is legal for somebody to buy a club with a massive loan, transfer the loan to the club, use the club's profits to pay off that loan, and then sell the club and walk away with hundreds of millions!!! Anybody?

I think they have bought the club without spending much, if any of their own money. If they pull it off they walk away with millions, if it goes tits up they walk away no worse off it's just the club that is ****ed.

I pretty sure Tiss trained him up.

I think the difference in levels of sensitivity lies in the fact that the British have never been enslaved and persecuted by Australians for simply being British, to the best of my knowledge. You can't roll out the old 'ginger' argument as it doesn't have the same recent history and context, which is why it is not taken in the same way.

What point? That he sometimes calls his mates little monkey? Really? In what context other than a racist one would the term "dirty monkey" be used towards a black player? Are you trying to suggest the phrase "dirty monkey" could be used in a jovial way like "cheeky monkey"? Get real. buctooim, I know it's not worth falling out over, just makes me laugh when people try to justify racism if it's "in the heat of battle" or try to pretend it could have been "taken out of context". Probably shouldn't be having this discussion on the saints board anyways.

I've always felt he looks more at home on the left and if used cleverly would be a major asset again. Maybe not your typical pacey winger but there are other ways to hurt the opposition from those areas without having to get to the byline every time, just ask Beckham.

Maybe we could enter the Vietnamese league?

Oh come on. Calling a black player a "dirty monkey" could have been taken out of context? Comedy. We don't know that he actually said it of course but you can't try to defend those words with that argument.

Out of interest, does anybody know how much Leeds (as a vaguely comparable club) have spent putting their team together? Just interested in whether they're spending or having to rely on free transfers etc...

Yes of course, you are right. Racism is fine.

Slight difference between swearing and racism mate.

If he wants to go then let him. If he's not fussed and we can afford to keep him we really should decline this.

I'm not sure his 'backer' will still be on board should pinnacle fail, after MJ has just criticised him in the paper. Not exactly proffesional.

I love that home kit, not sold on the badge though.

If there is already a good atmosphere going I would prefer for them just to turn it off.

Would prefer Southampton City Football Club

Do you think it looks good then? I'm usually in favour of change for changes sake, freshen things up etc, but it looks like somebody has snorted a load of Saints related information and then sneezed onto my screen.

Haha, fair play FF. I wish you hadn't backed down though as I've had a couple of beers and I really want to write some more about what a legend WGS is. Ah feck it I will do it anyways. We hadn't won at SMS until Strach arrived, his first game was that amazing match against Ipswich. Ok we didn't win that one but what a game. He saved us that season. We never played sexy football under him but bloody hell it was effective without being hoofball. Get it out to the wings and get it in the box! So many great away trips, West Ham sticks out for me when Beatts scored that late goal from an Ormerod cross. The last home game of that season vs Newcastle, unbelievably good match, and Paul bloody Telfer scored a 40 yard lob! Great times.

Agreed, how many of the players Strachan got to 8th in the league have gone on to greater things? Just Bridge? A lot of them were still here when we went down.

The stamp collecting was a silly analogy but I think you can at least see my point there, not everybody had the double whammy of helping the club AND wanting to see the bands, which I think was a factor. I don't think it was a bad plan as such, just that by that point I think most people had given in some way or another without any real communication from the club as to how it was actually helping. I know there was an article on the O/S after the first bucket collection which said thanks and we collected £8000... But despite so much effort that just seemed like such a tiny amount relative to what the club needed I think a lot of fans lost heart that anything we did would actually make a difference. Just to add, fair play to all those who got involved though, I'm in no way trying to knock their efforts.