St Marco

Commentator going to town on us and rightly so. Saying we are a very poor side with a very poor manager and nobody looks like they grasp the fact we are actually in a relegation battle, no fight in them.

So 3 attacking players (4 if you want to include JWP)..... This guy will never learn will he.

Pretty sure most of their first team are actually injured?

Er didn't some pitch invade and confront their players? Also last season they went ape **** too if I remember right after playing Sunderland. Think you have dreamt up this notion that they sit there happy whatever is happening.

Maybe I am being a bit thick but that doesn't make sense to me? If as you say Reed has been talking with the pros, watches training and uses that as belief he will turn it around that is not only arrogance but delusion. If what is happening on the training pitch is making its way onto the match pitch that shows the training is all wrong. On top of that if a director is keeping someone on because they are liked by the staff and are a decent person even though their personal performance is shocking then demote them to a coach. But seeing as how basically everyone has under performed this season can you honestly say he would make a good one of those? As for the nobody available thing that is a load of ****. I can't remember where I saw it but someone was talking about rather than buying Carillo put that money into offering a top manager the job. Based on performance until the end of the season. If they keep you up give them a £5m bonus. With the squad as it was many top managers would want that. A half decent manager would have kept us up comfortably if they were appointed at xmas. Although unlikely we could find ourselves back in the bottom three today. We then have two away games at Newcastle and West Ham where we have to pick up wins because after that we play Arsenal away and Chelsea at home. Lose to Newcastle and they go 4 points clear of us. Then lose to West Ham and they go 5 points clear of us. Point being no matter how good behind closed doors someone is, no matter how nice a person they are, they are being paid a lot of money to win games. He has a 17% win ratio. He isn't winning games. Which asks the OP question why is he still here? The person who has the power to sack him is ignoring the horrific results, the poor performances and the bad atmosphere at the games because MP is a decent chap and the players like him? As long as we have a decent chap who is liked it doesn't matter the results or what league we are in? That just doesn't cut it for me. As others have pointed out its most likely due to Reed not wanting to admit his mistakes. He has backed himself into a corner with his decisions and rather than hold his hands up and say hey I got it wrong, we all make mistakes etc he has decided that going the route we have is the best way. But the best way for who? The players who are under performing? The staff that MP brought in? The fans? Its the best way for himself.

Sorry but this is a load of rubbish and I mean no disrespect in saying that. This whole loan thing really drives me up the wall. It was HER business. She OWNED it. When you own something you are expected to put your own money into it. That's called investment. If she took over and didn't put a penny in we would of sunk like a stone. Which would have devalued the club meaning the prospects of selling it become less and less. These £70 million debts you talk of do not exist. They never did. Cortese asked for money to be put into the infrastructure of the club. The money went into the academy and into the training facilities. Which are now world class. Would you rather we didn't do that and have left things as they were? Because of doing that added value to the assets of the company. Then after it was all said and done she not only got every penny her family put into the club back she made a huge profit on it. I have no issue with Kat. She is a business lady from a business family surrounded by business people. Some people wish to create some kind of emotional factor with her. One that doesn't exist with other companies. The harsh reality is Kat is not stupid. She will have clever people around her advising her on the assets she inherited. They will be paid a vast sum of money to tell her when something is a good investment and when something has reached its peak value and its time to sell. That is how the business world works. Some people think she cares because she kept a stake in the club. Well if that was true why did she sell off the vast majority of it? She could have sold 51% stake for around £120m which would make her receive a huge profit. But it also means if things go wrong and we fall on tough times she only needs to buy 2% of the shares to regain control. That didn't happen and when companies do that they basically want out. She is in no position now to have any power in the club. Which brings me onto the people she sold too. What do we know about these people? We know they took out a loan to buy the club. We know that Mr Gao has been convicted on corruption and was spared if he turned witness and testified against other people. Which he did and they were then executed. We know that the PL originally had concerns about him and at 1st rejected him. Does this sound like someone who you would entrust with something you care about? I doubt it. Everything from the top to the bottom seems off and very worrying. Kat justified her selling by saying the new owners would take us to the next level. Implying they would invest and bridge the gap a little to fighting for that 6th spot. That didn't happen. The first major thing they did was sell our best player in January whilst we were in a relegation battle for a vast amount of money. And then they only invested a fraction of it back into the team. As others have eluded to the actions from the owners and board seem way too relaxed. It means they are either very dumb or simply do not care. We have heard nothing from them. We get a photo of them now and then but none of us have a clue what is going on behind closed doors. What happened to that statement/pledges we were supposedly going to get? So as I mentioned if you take away the emotional aspect of football Kat did what every business person does. Buy low, invest and raise the value, sell and make profit. In her case she made a massive profit. The future will show if who she sold us to is who she said he is with the intentions she said he had. If not then whatever you may think of her she will be just as much to blame for the clubs downward spiral as anyone else and shouldn't be immune to criticism.

Cheers when we had a lame shot on target haha

http://streamspn.info/tv/cnbc Pretty decent. In terms of football we look **** and Stoke look slightly less ****. Also Leicester losing, dropping like a stone.

Have won 1 game in over 15. Can't remember who said it but 'draws kill you eventually'.

One win in fifteen. That is 6%. How anyone can survive in a job with that level of performance is crazy.

Not one of them looks like they give a ****. JWP and Carrillo have been shocking and should have been dragged off earlier.

It's the same in the UK basically. Sky Italia and Mediaset own the current rights so you need a sub to watch them. However they recently got done for pretty much being the same company (Sky own a large stake in them) and the new tv rights will come in after this season. Which look as though its going to Mediapro. Which is actually good news because it will mean all clubs 'should' get an equal share of the money making it more competitive rather than most of it going to Juve and Inter.

I've watched Lazio a lot since I went back to Italy and in that time I think its safe to say they are a club in the same model as Saints. Get players cheap and then sell them off. Off the top of my head they sold Candreva, Keita Balde, Biglia and obviously Hoedt recently for a lot of money. They don't spend much on one player. Rarely above £10m. Last person they spent that on was Immobile who is a quality player and can see him going at the end of the season. Roma are the rich ones (American owners) who will spend a lot on players. Especially after selling Salah and Pjanic in recent seasons for a lot of money. Leandro Paredes was a 1st choice last season and they flogged him to a Russian club for a lot of money if I remember right. I can't comment on the other leagues but finance wise Italian football is in a serious need of a financial boost. One of the main issues which I don't know if people are aware of is that most of the stadiums are actually owned by the council so very little match day money actually goes to the clubs. Even then Attendances are pretty bad overall. A lot of them don't even have shirt sponsors and I don't think any have sleeve sponsors (which I hate btw). So many of the clubs were getting into financial **** even Juve who had been dominant since they came back up. I could be wrong but I think only maybe 3 or 4 Italian teams made it into the top 30-40 revenue list that came out recently. So Lazio for sure will sell anyone if they get enough money for them. Wages wise I would hazard a guess we would pay more. Teams such as Inter pay stupid fees/wages which is catching up with them now.

Way too early to judge him. Moving in the winter window is always tough as players have to hit the ground running. That said I still find it a really odd transfer. If we wanted that type of player why not hold onto Jay Rod or give Sam a chance? Who knows he may turn out to be a quality player and £20m for someone who will bang in goals in the PL will be seen as a bargain. But we really needed pace and skill in our build up play and have for a very long time now and he won't change that. You can't blame the lad for the money we spent on him as he has nothing to do with it. That boils down to whoever the person is who negotiates for players to come in.

Yep, you watch him give them a penalty for no reason at all.

First 20-25 mins I thought we were pretty decent but seem to drop back quite a bit after that. We really need to get a 2nd goal as can see them getting something from one of their long balls into the box. Especially as the ref seems to be giving free kicks for **** all.

Exactly. The only way it would actually be a break is if the PL had some rules about playing registered players in this supposed break. IE anyone registered in the squad window is not allowed to play. If they do they are docked points etc. Of course that won't happen because the PL want to encourage teams to go abroad so they get more money from foreign TV rights. Personally I think the best way to tackle this is to copy what the US have been doing. Add 1 or 2 extra fixtures to the season and have those games played abroad. They can be in January after the festive fixtures. That means 20 total PL games abroad. It means the games are actually important to those who will end up paying stupid amounts of money to watch it and for the fans at home it will mean players who are not fit will not be risked. Imagine you sign an expensive player only for some guy called Anklebreakerouchodu of Nodong United takes him out for the rest of the season.

I think overall we have been very decent and had some good chances. Maybe lucky to be ahead but Lemina has been class. And that was a good save from our keeper at the end! But please, please, please for the love of god don't go full retard and now sit back and defend as we can't defend to save our lives....

two CBs looking really **** again, could get battered here if they don't sort themselves out.

No he wasn't.... He said VVD wouldn't be leaving when both Les and Ralph said prior he wouldn't be leaving in the summer window.... You seriously take that to be ITK? I'm still waiting for this attacking midfielder who was supposed to sign last January on deadline day....

Anyone remember this one "I would have stayed at Charlton and kept them up in the Premier League. They had back to back relegations after my resignation on Christmas Eve when my position became untenable, I had never had the opportunity to sign players and took over a depleted and defeated squad. I believe if I had stayed I could have kept them up." Can't doubt his own self belief can you. Problem is it shows he will stick to his own beliefs and continue in that way no matter what is happening around him.

An hour or so left before Reed is officially in the same bracket as Lowe for me.

We look sooooo bad. Everything about the shape is all wrong. Can't get out of our half.

I think its a tough one really. Reed and co have really ****ed this club up and Kat sold us down the river so you can understand peoples anger. However the most important thing we can do is cheer the players on and try and support them. But if we go say 0-2 down pretty quickly and the players/manager continue to look as though they don't give a **** then they will deserve everything coming their way. Its easy for the staff/players to come out and say stick together etc but they themselves have to show effort/passion and give the crowd something to cheer. If they do nothing and we get smashed I can see it becoming pretty hostile which is such a shame but its a natural consequence of how everything has gone.