stevegrant

That's true, but if the only takers are willing to take them on a loan basis, I don't see that we've got an awful lot of choice in the matter.

Rasiak signed a 4-year deal when his loan from Spurs was made permanent. Saganowski's is a 3-year deal, so I think they both expire at the same time, i.e. in 2010.

They did: http://www.saintsfc.co.uk/news/?page_id=10414 It seems as if nobody is willing to take the likes of Saganowski and Rasiak off our hands on a permanent basis right now, presumably because of their high salaries. They can probably afford to take them on loan, paying the salaries for a short period of time and with no obligation at the end of the loan period to sign them permanently. In terms of the benefit to us, it gives us a short-term cash flow relief but we also still own the registration of two players who have demonstrated an ability to score goals at this level at times in the last 2 years. If we can get ourselves back to a situation where the finances aren't so tight, perhaps we might still see the pair of them play for us again, or (again, if we get to a non-desperate financial state) sell them for more than a pittance.

Indeed. Alan Shearer, sold for £3.3m in 1992, replaced with Kerry Dixon and David Speedie for sod all Tim Flowers, sold for £2.4m in 1993, replaced with Dave Beasant for £300k Kevin Davies, sold for £7.5m in 1999, replaced with James Beattie for £1m Dean Richards, sold for £8.1m in 2001, replaced with Michael Svensson for £2m And those are just a handful off the top of my head dating back 16 years.

On paper, it's a very good side. Unfortunately, football isn't played on paper and players have to perform to their abilities on a regular basis if they are to keep their reputations intact. The vast majority of that team didn't do that last season.

Fair enough. I have a strange recollection of a news article somewhere stating that he'd been released by Reading in the summer.

Bennett was apparently released by Reading in the summer, although SoccerBase are indicating that he's still owned by them. He's currently playing for Brentford, although whether that's on loan or if he's under contract there now isn't too clear.

http://www.southamptonifc.co.uk Currently, the only player profiles are the ones from the WorldNet squad. I'll update that when I get time. The first series of league/cup fixtures are on there. We also have a friendly against FC Intier, formerly known as Old Thatched House (who will be playing in the division above us), on Sunday 31st August on the rubber-crumb surface (can't find anywhere with goals up at the moment) at Wyvern School, 11.00 kick-off.

And he's now apparently injured as well, so not much chance of him being sold right now.

No, they have a hotel.

http://www.football.virginmedia.com/page/southamptonvideo/

I'm confused myself, to be honest, so my answer would be "not entirely sure, but Hone was probably the main catalyst". According to the execs at the time, Crouch, McMenemy and Corbett voted against the idea of the fan on the board in a board meeting, which was brought to the table by Hone a month before it was scheduled, so none of those three actually had any real knowledge about it, and therefore couldn't really vote in favour of something they knew nothing about. Hone of course stated that they voted against it because they saw themselves as already fulfilling that role. Whether that's true or not, I suspect we'll never find out, and it's ultimately irrelevant as none of them are on the board anymore anyway. Hone was ****ed off that someone at the Trust (Steve Godwin, I think) had spoken to Crouch about trying to arrange a meeting with him, despite him saying something along the lines of "you'll have to ask Leon to elaborate on why he voted against it" - there was already a very distinct "them v us" situation in the boardroom at that point, hence no press statements relating to Ted Bates Statue progress being allowed through the OS because that would paint Crouch in a favourable light.

The only person I know on the Trust board who uses forums regularly is Nick, and I also know that he doesn't use this forum and never has done in any of its previous guises. Therefore, I suspect that while your questions and points may have some validity, you're probably posting them on the wrong forum if you're looking for a response from them. I do think you and others massively over-milk the whole "fan on the board" issue, by the way. It was one of many stated aims at the launch to get representation at board level (and it is an aim of every single supporters trust, as far as I'm aware), BUT it was part of a 5-year plan and an aim which was the "lowest-ranked" as far as I'm concerned of those stated on the Trust's website. Michael Wilde then accelerated it when he put it into his manifesto, although we were still working to the original plan when Andy Oldknow invited us in for discussions on the subject. He then insisted on pushing it through as quickly as possible (in hindsight, the Trust should perhaps have just backed off) hence bringing in "affiliate" members from regional supporters groups to bring it up to the 1600 member figure mentioned by Wilde, but then when the Trust had done everything to fit their requirements, Jim Hone threw a strop over the fact that somebody from the Trust had spoken to Leon Crouch and booted it all out. Personally, I wasn't too disappointed, given that it was a long-term plan and with just over 800 members at the time I didn't feel the Trust warranted it then.

Of those listed, only Gerrard has stood out in Europe. You might also remember that Gerrard didn't get a touch of the ball until the 46th minute of the game you're referring to, so I'd hardly say he outclassed them. Terry is far too slow for international football. He can get away with it in the Premier League because none of the referees spot (or they ignore) his blatant cheating and of course none of them ever spot when he decides to take a turn as goalkeeper either. "But he's so brave throwing himself in front of the ball like that". Whoopee-****ing-do. If he hadn't lost his marker two seconds beforehand, he wouldn't have to make such a last-ditch challenge in the first place... Lampard was wanted by Mourinho. Inter wouldn't have batted an eyelid at him with a different manager. Isn't it strange how every time Lampard's contract is a year from its end, he's linked with a top European club... wouldn't have anything to do with his agent trying to secure a ridiculous pay-rise for him, would it? Three years ago he was linked with Barcelona, and he then got a double-your-money pay-rise. This summer, he was linked with Inter, and he's now supposedly the highest-paid player in the Premier League. Not bad work for someone whose goals tend to come from penalties or deflections. Not a single European club has been linked with Rooney. "Typical English playmaker" springs to mind. They're all good players, don't get me wrong, but I wouldn't say ANY of them are the "world-class" players the press would have you believe.

It depends on a) the player, and b) the club they're loaning the player to. Bournemouth don't have a penny to spend (9 players on their payroll, apparently), so every loan player they get in is paid by the owner club. They tend to get the loans from clubs who can afford a few hundred pounds a week in order for their youngster to get some first-team football lower down the football pyramid. I would hazard a guess that Richard Wright, who must have been on at least £20k a week at West Ham, was at least paid in part by West Ham while he was on loan here last season. Or at least I'd bloody well hope he was, given our situation!

That is exactly why England don't win anything and won't win anything. We go into matches with an arrogant attitude that because "we're England, the country that invented football", the opposition should just lie down and let us beat them easily. The "bulldog spirit" works against a handful of nations. They are: Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland. The reason being that they have near-identical styles of play, but with vastly inferior players. A large number of nations (much more than the FIFA rankings would suggest) are technically superior to us because we have been stuck in some sort of 60s and 70s timewarp with the belief that we only have to try that bit harder than the opposition and we'll win, regardless of whether we've got any technical ability or not. It doesn't work anymore, and hasn't really worked since 1990. The vast majority of England's "top" players are so inferior technically to their European and South American counterparts, it's almost embarrassing. That's the real reason the likes of Lampard, Gerrard, Rooney, Terry, etc will probably never play in La Liga or Serie A, because they'd get found out. In my opinion, while he may have been lacking in concentration in the past and there will always be that cloud of uncertainty above him from 2004, Rio Ferdinand is the single technically world-class player England currently possesses, and the only one who would get into any top team in the world, either club team or national team.

#-o:smt014:smt046:smt080:evil::smt113:smt035:smt069 :smt102 :vom: Looks like they're working...

:-D:smt092:mrgreen:=P~:smt015:smt047:smt081:twisted::smt114:smt004

:cool: :smt005:smt037:smt0718):smt104:fball:=; :smt026 :smt059

Testing... :mad: :confused:

As has already been said, it depends on the agreement reached between the two clubs. I'm not aware of any deals where the "owner" club has actually been able to force the loaning club to play the player if he's available. That sounds like complete nonsense to me. It's entirely up to the manager if he wants to pick the player or not.

I thought OFCOM and the OFT sorted that out ages ago?

Every England manager has been the same for as long as I can remember. Before their appointment, everyone moans about the "same old faces" in the team who have failed before. Then when the new manager's appointed, he makes a vow that everyone has to fight for their place and can't rely on their reputation and then makes some bold and surprising selections, probably dropping one or two big names "to send out a strong signal". The first game ends in a comfortable victory against normally-decent opposition and all of a sudden a new era has dawn upon us. Then the friendlies are over and all of a sudden the same old faces are drafted back into the team and continue to underachieve based on their reputations and their overinflated opinions of their own abilities and everyone starts moaning again. The key difference between McClaren and Capello is that Capello clearly does have a presence about him and demands respect. McClaren was (and still is, albeit with an amusing Dutch twang) a complete waste of space who none of the players respected. Hopefully that'll be the key difference. I wouldn't get too excited about the prospect of us actually winning something though, it'll be no different to the Eriksson era. We'll qualify comfortably for every tournament and get to the quarter-finals where we'll either come up against a much better team or a team who can actually take penalties.

That would be assuming anyone else in this division would be bonkers enough to pay him £8k a week. The only teams who would be able to afford that already have much better alternatives in their squad.

After the Brazil game, it took an hour and a half just to get into Wembley Park station, let alone actually get on a tube and start moving!