stevegrant

The game's next week.

Not especially. A win would guarantee progress, but we've got another game to come yet, and we could conceivably lose both and still qualify.

The scheduling is ridiculous, and the ECB never even come close to getting it right. I'd go along with your idea of three divisions for the County Championship with two-up, two-down through the three divisions, but I'd go one step further and make them 5-day games of 90 overs per day, replicating Test match conditions. That would mean a possible 450 overs in a game compared to 384, which would obviously give greater opportunity for positive results in games affected by bad weather. Bring the T20 competition back to a 6-week block in the middle of June and July - this will ensure the players aren't chopping and changing playing formats every few days, we've had situations this year where teams have actually played all three formats in the space of a week, FFS Having the T20 group stage in a block also ensures that any overseas players recruited are generally available for the whole competition, rather than popping in for 3 or 4 games then buggering off, forcing the county to sign another player for the rest of the competition. The 50-over competition is probably fine in terms of the format, but perhaps have half of the group stage before the T20 kicks off, with the rest afterwards, so there's only one limited-overs format in play at any one time.

Worked so well against this lot last time Think we've got full-backs, just need another centre-back.

Venue confirmed as Parmiters School. Could do with at least one more defender if anyone fancies a game...

Impossible to think we could travel up on the Friday, obviously... Basically, they've decided that because Warwickshire (not going to call them Birmingham, **** off franchising) are in one of the semi-finals, they'll try to string it out as long as possible for the local interest, to keep anyone who's local in the ground from start to finish. They'll be ****ed if Warwickshire get smashed in the semi-final, though.

I've been very impressed with Sportsmania so far - the communal dish at home is playing up a bit so a few of my Sky Sports HD channels aren't available through the dish, so having that as a backup solution is ideal. Worth bearing in mind, though, that you probably won't be streaming Sky Sports in full 1080p because I'm pretty sure they don't actually broadcast at that frame rate - it's 1080i (still!).

Reserve day tomorrow (2:30 start) if required.

I didn't watch the new Channel 5 highlights show at the weekend, but apparently on that the highlights were filmed from the main gantry. Health and safety, my arse.

I don't think their prices change, the price is the price, but if you want a seat rather than standing for 3 hours, you might want to book it early...

I literally watch no Scottish football at all these days, it just doesn't interest me, but the results from the club's recruitment over recent years has earned my trust that they can spot a player, even if he's playing in a league that's apparently barely fit for purpose. We've done pretty well out of the players we've signed from north of the border, which considering the apparent lack of talent there, seems pretty impressive. If they think VVD is the real deal, fine by me

Liar

A build-from-scratch stand offers them the opportunity to build the back of the stand over the top of the alleyway behind, so I don't see that being a particular problem - the existing stand is basically the old terrace with seats bolted on, so it's much shallower.

As far as I can tell, the Milton rebuild isn't adding any seats, just a rebuild to add a proper covered concourse underneath the stand.

Yes. My interpretation of events is that Celtic gave us permission to do whatever we need to do, i.e. discuss personal terms and conduct a medical, subject to agreeing terms between the clubs. He'll remain available for selection for them until it's all tied up, though, and as I said, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see them stall it until after the playoff round.

Yeah, it's a bit weird how it's all changed, but I guess it makes more sense doing it this way. There's no point putting in the effort to negotiate with a club if the player's got no interest in signing for you, after all.

Malmo are no mugs, they've knocked Salzburg out of the Champions League in both of the last two seasons. I wouldn't be entirely surprised to see Celtic try to stall the deal until the end of the month, but the Forster deal was done a year ago after the third qualifying round and they still got through, so there's a precedent there.

I'm led to believe this deal is now at an advanced stage, just need to iron out the finer points of the deal with Celtic

In reality, they perhaps should have done something for the Vitesse game as well, but with a bigger allocation it becomes such a massive operation. I've had to suffer "100% collection" scenarios with England away games for years, it's a massive pain in the arse for the fans and it's probably a massive pain in the arse for the people who actually run the whole thing, but it does ensure that the tickets go to those who are entitled to them - the only way to sell the ticket on would be to collect it in person and then sell it, but that leaves a pretty small window, and you'd have still had to have made the effort to travel in the first place...

You'll probably find it cheaper to buy from their equivalent of an off-licence - while it's horrendously expensive to drink in bars and restaurants, carry-out booze is much more reasonably priced.

That wasn't the question I was answering or the point I was making. He asked whether home attendance would be used for future European priority or not.

Would assume that it's only away attendance at Vitesse and Midtjylland that will get you priority for future European aways.

Main difference being that that was at a big ground where the home team wasn't ever likely to sell out.

No, they've got a big fence around the away end.

100% collection for a Saints away game - we're officially big time Interesting to note that it shows how many tickets get creamed off the allocation for player and staff comps - Midtjylland explicitly stated on their website that we've got 600 tickets, so that's nearly 10% of our allocation gone to others.