Joensuu

Isn't there a direct relationship between the minimum price of each unit of alcohol, and the resultant levels of liver disease. Surely anyone interested in reducing NHS costs would consider setting a minimum unit price to be a good thing. However, any money raised by such an initiative should be used to help fund the NHS (or service government debt), but certainly not used to subsidise CAMRA.

Is now http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Brian+Stock+Saints+Doncaster+Rovers+Forum

Ha! Forgot all about that website...

Think you need to pay for membership first... Try googling "Doncaster Rovers forum", clicking on the second search result and looking at the recent posts to see if any of them is called anything to do with Brian Stock... then perhaps looking down towards to bottom of the thread to see if there are any links...

Guess it depends on what John Ryan is like. If he were to see that picture, it might make him want to get rid faster, but if he's bloody minded it might make him pull the plug on the transfer and stick Stock in the reserves for the rest of his contract... Unlikely, but you never know...

Well perhaps whoever posted as 'hypochondriac' on the FootyMad Doncaster Rovers forum should remove their post from there? NB, not assuming it's the same person as this thread's OP... It might be an imposter...

WTF? Been drinking?

Can they sell Boateng? Well, no, but err, maybe: http://timesonline.typepad.com/thegame/2010/01/ahead-of-thegame-boateng-still-has-transfer-value-for-portsmouth.html

A bit flippant, but heck nothing else seems to be happening today: http://www.thespoiler.co.uk/index.php/2010/01/08/hey-portsmouth-players-why-not-clean-cars-for-cash

Surely if it was successful once, it was largely down to being a small relatively anonymous club, with little national interest.... I imagine the press attention alone would make any serious money launderer to look elsewhere... say Watford?

Does make sense, but my first thought was Steve Finan... isn't he their player union rep or something?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/p/portsmouth/8446488.stm Portsmouth executive director Mark Jacob insists there will be no fire sale of players by the cash-strapped club in the January transfer window. Jacob told BBC Radio Solent: "I can assure fans that won't happen. "But, quite clearly every player has their price, and if Avram (Grant) feels there are players surplus to requirements then we will support him." Of course no asset stripper (I mean 'lawyer' working with the best interests of Pompey at heart) would ever say the squad are for sale, as it would devalue them... Interesting that Jacob is already trying to pin the blame for the forthcoming sales on Grant though... On PA now http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5hUXbWLHjBrSnkSIQWGAakLfBAEhQ

Watford want Williamson back (perhaps) http://www.watford.vitalfootball.co.uk/article.asp?a=183783 and apparently Paul Hart is after Ashdown http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11711_5840938,00.html

Summary is, three pages of the basic news articles from bbc/sky over the last month. A couple of 'they are great fans' quotes; couple of 'they used to be the only team who could rival us when we were big' quotes; some interest in the possibility of the scousers or mancs going bust. The most interesting quotes are:

Here's installement 5... http://fansonline.net/portsmouth/article.php?id=1278

Or Man City for £8m if you believe anything the simians at the Sun are paid to type...

Pompey players might be 'valued' at c. £50m, but they're only 'worth' c. £30m. http://www.emeraldinsight.com/Insight/viewContentItem.do?contentType=Article&contentId=1656139 "there are convincing arguments for the conceptualisation of the services provided by football players as accounting assets" Sounds like there are different ways of valuing players: "The historical cost model involves capitalising players acquired by the club via the transfer market on the balance sheet at their cost of registration. " i.e. the 'value' of each player is the transfer fee paid for them. Thus Utaka = £7m; Williamson = £4m! " The earnings multiplier model applies a multiplier to a player's earnings to produce a current valuation of that player." i.e. player is worth a multiple of their annual salary... if the multiple was 2x Utaka would be 'valued' at £8m; if the multiple used is 3x Utaka is 'valued' at £12m "The third model involves capitalising players at directors' valuation" Oh, that sounds sensible. So Faraj can pluck a figure out of the air, hmmm lets see, Utaka must be 'valued' at at least £15m... cough "the independent multiple player evaluation model involves obtaining valuations for players from various informed sources, knowledgeable on those particular players." A sensible method at last... I doubt this is the one Pompey have been using... it might end up producing a figure thats a bit too realistic, say £25-30m...

As far as I am aware, he can be sold to anybody, but he can only play for Pompey or Spurs this season. I'm not sure about the rules if spurs were to buy him back... but anyone else buying him would probably want to loan him back to Pompey, or else train him to make tea and slice oranges for the next six months.

Not sure. Certainly Boateng can't be sold, possibly Smith and Williamson. They can't sell their entire squad, nor do they need to. As I understand it they need to sell c. 8-10m worth of players this window to be able to stay afloat. Players such as Boateng can't be sold, but are still (intangible) assets for the company.

1 David James (G) - £500k 3 Younes Kaboul (D) - £2m They might not get it, but worth 3-4m 4 Aaron Mokoena (D) - £500k 6 Hayden Mullins (M) -£1m 7 Hermann Hreidarsson (D) - Free 8 Pape Bouba Diop (M) - £1m 11 Michael Brown (M) - £2m 14 Mike Williamson (D) -£500k Closer to 1.5m I'd have thought 16 Steve Finnan (D) -£500k 17 John Utaka (F) - Free (due to massive wages) They bought him for 7m... (doubt they could get anything like that for him), but imagine that's what his 'value' is in their accounts! 19 Danny Webber (F) -£500k 20 Tommy Smith (F) -£500k 21 Jamie Ashdown (G) -£250k 22 Richard Hughes (M) -£500k 23 Kevin Boateng (M) Can't be sold Can't be sold, but still worth c. 4m (for accounts) 26 Tal Ben-Haim (D) - £2m Bet he's valued at closer to 4m... 27 N****wo Kanu (F) - Free 29 Antti Niemi (G) - Free 31 Asmir Begovic (G) - £3m 33 Angelos Basinas (M) - Free 35 Mark Wilson (D) - £500k Experienced premier defender, closer to 1m 37 Gael Nlundulu (M) Who??? [One of their youth team Paul Hart 'promoted' to the seniors to make the squad look less depleted] 39 Nadir Belhadj (D) - £1m (Contract ends this season) Isn't he contracted until 2013? 3-4M If Utaka is down on the accountants books as worth 7 million, then my guesses would value the squad at over £32m... [NB, that's not to say that's what I think it is actually worth... just what the accountants say it's worth (so they can try to use it as security against loans)]

It might have been purchased for close to £50m, but it is far from that value now. Also, as other teams are aware of their plight, it's unlikely that any player can be sold at close to their full value. I'd estimate that the entire first team would have a value of around £35 million. I don't know how many gems they have in their reserve and youth squads, but I can't see £15m worth in there. Mind you, £50m is about the value of 2 years of Pompey's wage bill...

Looks like the Guardian has finally caught up with SWF.... http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/jan/06/portsmouth-al-faraj-fahim

http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11661_5837114,00.html Utaka wants to join Sochaux (on loan). If Pompey can't find anyone willing to pay for him this might be their best option: they get some of the wage paid (say 35%?) and Utaka gets to play some football (without sacrificing a penny of his wage).

Unfortunately not... you'd still owe Sygma Bank UK (or whoever they sell the rights to the debt to).

Plastic bags are a red herring. Yes they look unsightly, but their impact on the environment is negligible. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/11/plastic-bags-welsh-assembly