andoru

Forgive me. I didn't check the forum rules first on whether it was permissible to post on thing you "give two *****s" about. As for the Defector's Thread, I forgot it was there. This could possibly be collapsed into it, although it's as much about Skrtel as Lovren.

An issue I see with that is it effectively means only the rich clubs will be able to buy non-EU players. Clubs like Saints, with smaller transfer budgets and thus cheaper targets, will find it more difficult. We'll never be in for the likes of Falcao, Sanchez, Messi, etc who would qualify as "high quality ones". The kind of players that teams like Saints go after – e.g. Mane and Wanyama – are more likely to be labeled "low quality". This also introduces a knock-on affect, in that smaller clubs lose a potential revenue stream as it will be harder to buy cheaper foreign talent, develop them, and then sell them on, as Swansea did with Bony.

Looks like Skrtel is facing a three-match ban, which could see our favourite Croatian back in the Liverpool defence at a crucial time in the season.

I realise that Ronaldo and Pelle are EU citizens by the way. Was just making a point about quality. We'll never be in for the kind of players for which the league might be willing to bend the rules (it would be great for the brand to get Messi playing in England, but nobody had heard of Mane until we signed him.)

Doesn't sound that good to me. We're shopping in minor European leagues a lot more these days, and we have fewer homegrown players now Lallana, Shaw and Chambers have moved on. Clyne and Morgan will likely be off soon as well. It's just the academy graduates left, most of whom aren't yet Premier League quality. I also wonder about exceptions. Would the Premier League deny Messi or Ronaldo the chance to come here? I doubt it. Lesser known players though, the likes of whom we would be in for, would have less chance. They'd argue that we should be able to find a British equivalent of Mane or Pelle.

Between Gazzaniga and Davis, it's Kelvin all the way for me. At least he can stop a shot. Paulo looks like me in goal, jumping out the way of anything that's hit too hard. The defence aren't confident with him behind them. Also, Davis did well for us at Championship level. Our fixture list only really throws up two real quality teams in Spurs and Man City. Hull, Leicester and Sunderland are basically Championship teams. Aston Villa can't score. Everton aren't much better. I'm not as worried as I would be if this had happened 8 games into the season.

Get in. Not pretty, but I'll take any goal in open play.

And our worst fear for the season looks about to come true. The one position we truly have no back up for.

I don't support the decision to give Qatar the World Cup in the first place, but now it's done now and it's not going to change no matter how much people moan, so FIFA needs to do what it can. Frankly, the health of players, officials and spectators trumps any inconvenience to the European leagues. It's not as if this decision has come from nowhere. They've been warned for months this kind of thing could happen, and they still have years to plan around it. They'll figure it out. Anyone still annoyed with the decision needs to get past it, and realise that protecting people is more important than a bit of scheduling hassle because, not to sound melodramatic here, but we're talking about human lives being at risk if the tournament is played in summer. I don't want anyone dropping dead from heatstroke.

Maybe it can be like the appeal system used in tennis and American football. Every manager gets 15 penalties to use every season and gets to decide when they take them. 1-0 down to Man Utd at Old Trafford with a minute to go? We'll take a penalty ref. Need to swing your goal difference to make the CL spots? We'll take five. Some teams might use all 15 in one match. I think I'll write to the FA ...

Pen. But who takes it?

Think you'll find my comment made no mention of Forster and instead blamed the five men around Costa doing nothing.

Very weak goal that. At least five men in the box around Costa and he had a free header.

My cable provider has added a run through of all the goals scored by every club this season. I just watched all of ours (it's great - no goals against, so it's like we've never conceded!) and was struck by the brilliance of several assists. Which gets your vote for the best of the season so far? I think I give my vote to Steven Davis' assist for the second goal against Arsenal. He took the ball down over his shoulder, controlled it brilliantly on the volley and then crossed it from a tight angle. Okay, a bit of luck was needed to convert it into a goal (it was the one where the Arsenal keeper screwed up and then had a drink), but that takes nothing away from Davis' bit of skill.

Surely you can add Luke Shaw to that? As much as Man Utd have slipped in the past two seasons, they are still one of the biggest clubs in Europe. Arsenal aren't exactly minnows either.

I wonder, do we make the most per player, as an average? £90m for, say, ten players is not as good a ROI as £60m for five players. Anyway, I'd still rather get more service from our best players than have them itching to leave the first chance they get. It's good that the club has a decent source of revenue, but as a fan I'm more interested in what happens on the pitch.

Oh how I would love them to get shafted by their best players. "I don't feel any sympathy for Liverpool. We all thought they were aiming for league titles, but it looks like their ambitions have changed. They didn't have to sell."

Wanyama. He's been immense in his primary role of breaking up attacks and breaking attackers, and has added goals to his game as well. He won us six points with winning goals against Swansea and Hull (and what a cheeky goal that was!). His passing has also been a massive improvement on last year, when he could barely play the ball six yards.

Completely forgot that Bertrand had signed for us permanently and so can play. Hopefully he'll be well up for showing Chelsea what they lost by not giving him his chance.

There's a big difference between having a wealthy owner and being a wealthy club. Her money is not Saints money. We wouldn't be where we are without the Liebherrs, but from now we're basically on our own. Katerina is essentially Saints' richest supporter. As far as can be told, she wants the club to fund itself, meaning that we'll always have to sell to earn, and invest in cheaper, younger players to develop, just as we've have always done. We'll trade and survive on the reputation of our youth academy, ability to revive stalling careers, and willingness to take a chance on players from weaker leagues who want a chance at playing in the Premier League. Dare I say it, but now we're really just an upmarket version of Newcastle.

Didn't see the game because of the time difference (hate these mid-week fixtures) but was incredibly relieved to see the score on the BBC website this morning. Liverpool and Spurs still have games in hand on us though, so I expect us to be back in 7th before too long. Still, good to stem the tide.

Let's just hope it doesn't involve any skiing. Don't want half the squad ending up in hospital. They can make snowmen instead.

I've revised my hopes for the season to simply bettering our best points total (56). It's a bit of a come down from the high of aiming for CL, but that's unrealistic now (although I know it's not impossible). Even Europa might be a stretch for us, the way the other clubs are playing. I think we are going to end up 7th. I think/hope we'll stay close in terms of points and not get cut completely adrift, but nobody remembers that, only where you finish. If we end up 7th, people will choose to remember how we choked and fell out of the top four after so long. That's going to be annoying to deal with.

Sh!t weekend of results for us, but at least Chelsea have eased some of my pain today. Can't wait for my Spurs-supporting coworker to turn up.

Never really understood why people don't like Rasiak. His goal scoring record for us wasn't that bad: 65 games, 24 goals. He was our top scorer in 2006/07. I also met him in Toys R Us that Christmas, and he seemed like a nice enough bloke. Took a few minutes out of his shopping to talk about prospects for the season. At that time he'd already scored about 15 goals or something.