Joensuu

Aye, Google Translate suggests that the Indonesian phrase 'terakhir saya' could mean 'last', 'latest' or 'recent'. I'd suggest few professional footballers would burn bridges so openly, and that 'Southampton are my latest option' is a more reasonably translation.

I'm not sure I get what's so wrong about what he does. Why should society penalise him?

RIP Iain.

Pap, hate to say it, but your posts on this and the marathon just don't add up. Its right to be cynical and question what you are told, but cynicism needs to have some grounding in reality. The first thing to look for is a clear motive. There's a half motive for Boston (but only if the US really wanted Russia to ease off over Syria, which hasn't happened. There is no logical benefit of staging last weeks attack for our government. In fact it's caused them no end of problem. Buildings 'collapsing in a unusual way', or 'murderers without enough blood' are incidental, they certainly don't indicate a conspiracy. In recent yours the only conspiracy I'll even half consider is the last plane at 9/11. Government had clear motive to stop it; had jets in area; had clear reason not to want to let the public know; and had few witnesses. Even so, I'd argue that there isn't enough evidence to argue against the official line. And doing so would naturally offend the families of the victims. I guess I'm saying, you're a good poster, but banging this drum relentlessly is making you look rather silly.

Belief in the existence of anything that isn't evinced in the slightest, positions 'god' firmly in the same category as UFO's, ghosts and Nessie. Just one shred of evidence is all I need to convert me. Until then agnostic, de facto atheist is pretty much the only rational position. Thinking about it, I'm not sure I needed 'pretty much' in that last sentence.

Agreed on all counts.

I feel that the main difference between the teams is the 7 less goals they conceded. We are better going forwards, but not significantly so. Our tactics make for far more interesting viewing. Big Sam's experience counts for little IMO, I think it more likely that Big Sam is actually holding them back. Tenth only seems flattering until you look a the points - 46 is good, but in most seasons wouldn't get you 10th place. This year teams like Spurs have performed better than you'd usually expect the 5th best team to do; while pretty much the entire bottom half of the table is very close (except the bottom two). So, overall, add a top quality central defender, and don't lose any of our better players, and we would be better than the current West Ham squad. Add another player who knows where the net is (midfield or up front) on top of the centre back, and suddenly we will be pushing for 8th and up. 'Bigger' is subjective, but by almost any rational way to define 'bigger', West Ham are a far bigger club IMO.

Opinion peices sometimes include facts, normally selective facts chosen by the.author to support their opinion. Just because they contain some truth, does not indicate that an opinion piece is actually 'true'. As such what we have is the authors interpretation of the evidence, which happens to emphasise the negative interpretation, while deliberately overlooking the alternatives. Of course, the forum WUM's won't hear anything said to criticise this opinion piece, as it happens to side with their anti-saints agenda. A swift banning of WUM's please mods (only the blatant ones like Turkish, Hypo, Miltonroader etc.). Let people with opinions rather than agendas be heard for once.

Finger in air: £37m total spend with c. £20m received (Mostly from selling Lallana to fill a Bale-shaped hole in north London).

I disagree with the OP. Yes, early signings are good, but the right signing is better. Getting both is a very rare scenario. You see, any player who is good enough to be the 'right' player, is likely to be good enough to receive a number of offers, as such they are likely to delay their decision while they weigh up their options. To get the 'right' player in early, you either need to have better scouts than your opposition, or make far more attractive (aka expensive) offers.

For the first time ever, I hope one of your predictions actually comes true.

I hope this isn't true. Cortese is the single most important person at the club. He has got all the big decisions right, and hasn't really got much wrong at all. I personally think we should make our views about Cortese clear at the Stoke game. If we lose him, I'll fear for our future. Perhaps he has finally had enough of the petty anti-Cortese sniping that a tiny (but often load and boorish) minority of the fan-base seem to relish.

1 quality CB and keeping the key players. That'll keep me happy. If we have anything left in the kitty, a Rickie understudy would be superb; but I think I'd rather we got a decent older left back whose happy rotating with Shaw. Doubt it would happen, but Bridge would be perfect in this role, and playing for us again might give him another new lease of career.

If anyone does find a way to contact the owners, I'd be up for sending them a big thank you message from the majority of saints fans. It would, of course, also thank Cortese.

Forgive me if I'm wrong, but we don't appear to have settled out of court in the case you've linked to.

Sport Turks, I'm not sure I'm getting why settling out of court at the last minute is a bad thing? Surely, avoiding an expensive court case can only be commended. Doing so at the last minute is fairly standard practice (a bit like the way the transfer window works). Also, don't get your 'open minded' argument. It's you who seems to be failing to stay open minded about the situation.

Still banging the same drum eh Turks? If the agreed settlement is acceptable to both parties why would we need to throw extra cash at the situation to fight a moral battle which would cost the club more that it would save? Also, court cases are magnets for journalists who want material for their cheap stories. A court case would see both parties throwing mud at each other to see what they could get to stick - perfect material for the red tops and local rags. Face it, if an acceptable agreement can be made out of court, is almost always a better strategy, and cheaper, for everyone involved, than to allow a case to actually enter the court room. In fact, I would argue, that the most successful way of defending yourself, is to do so outside of court, if that is at all possible. Why are you always so anti anything and everything Cortese?

Good decision Wes, too much time wasted on this thread, but an interesting chat nontheless. For example, I've learnt that: 1) cutting taxes for the richest few is fair. 2) cutting taxes for everyone, will lead to increased overall tax revenue. 3) you love referendum, but not on issues you think the public might vote against you like 'how much should we tax the rich?'. 4) you feel Germany will be happy for us to stop paying our EU membership fees, but let us keep all of the benefits (incidentally, does the same thing work in LA Fitness?) Cheers guys, good enlightening debate.

This thread has convinced me that Cortese must be evil, and I whenever there is an absense of facts I must learn that the club are always in the wrong. Next step, I need to learn how to troll like the pros on here. I take it that the best technique is to always try to find the most negative interpretation and post like its definitely the only possibility. Is that how you pros do it?

Ay, the EEC became the EC, then just over three years ago the EC became rebranded as a 'pillar' of the EU (have to admit, the EU does an awful job of self-promotion, someone somewhere got paid to dream up those 'pillars'). I was trying to point out that the VAT agreement was made back in the 70's and done to try and establish commonality across taxation. As I said before, it's not the fairest of taxes, but not work losing our EU membership over.

For the purposes of this debate, it is not important to establish where the optimal tax rate lies, only to get you to admit that reducing taxes does not always increase revenue. Can you admit that once you reduce taxes too far the revenues will actually start to fall? Yes, I agree that there is, and each person will have a different view on what they feel is fair. I'm sure some feel 40% is fair; while others would find 10% an unwelcome levy from the state. Doesn't really effect my point though does it? Reducing the tax rate will only result in an increase in revenue when the tax rate was already very high; I see no reason to think that reducing a 40% tax rate would result in anything other than reduced revenues. Can you prove otherwise? I don't see how that is relevant to my point; and I can see how you might feel it's unfair on a personal level; I can't see how it's unfair on a private level. Surely those wealthy enough to have more to spare are happy to support those who need their help? Or would they rather the gap grew? Of course revenue from top rate payers increased under Thatcher - she reduced it from 83% which I think we agree, is far too high. Of course, what you've not said here is when those increased revenues were made - most of the increased revenues were made when the top rate was reduced from 83% to 60%; there wasn't such a dramatic effect when it was dropped from 60% to 40% was there? I can promise you, dropping the top rate further would not result in increased revenues. I'm aware that there are plenty of countries with lower taxes. Very few provide anything like the services we do. Very few fund massive military forces; and free health care. You could argue that we could do without some of the perks if you wish to? UKIP of course seem to want to increase military spending! As a liberal, I'm all for free choice. Lower taxation, is definitely beneficial. Two caveats, firstly, society should support people who need their assistance. Secondly, government should ensure that the gap between rich and poor doesn't grow too wide. NB, liberals are as far removed from the 'Nanny' state as you can get. So you DO agree that there is a point beyond which reducing taxes will reduce revenue? Blimey, this feels like a breakthrough. No contempt for differing opinions; more than happy listening (and learning) from well thought through opinions. I'm just conscious that sensible decisions can't be made by people who are only half aware of the facts, and that this is compounded by mis-information in the press. Do you honestly think referenda are the most appropriate method of making decisions? If so, should all decisions be made this way? Or just some of them? Would you honestly still be pressing for a referendum if you knew you'd lose it? For example, would you trust the public to vote on tax rates for the richest?

No Lord D, I wasn't aware that the EU force us to keep VAT (I was however aware that the EEC do). Let's weigh it up, VAT is a regressive tax, that takes a larger percentage out of your wage the poorer you get. Should it be scrapped in favour of a boost to Income tax, yes, in an ideal world. Do we live in that world, no. Certain VAT vs EU membership is a no-brainer - EU membership trumps us scrapping VAT every day.

Correct answer. [i'm sure Turkish loves Cortese really; it's just his internet 'persona' spinning out of conTrol]

Can bears sue for racial discrimination? I've been trying, but it's not easy to get sacked.

Nope, but then the former employee accepted their first out of court settlement offer. Turkish, you know the point I'm getting at; we don't know what has happened here. I'm not blaming Frannie or the club. I just don't get why some people always jump on the club whenever they can, for literally any reason (and rarely with anything more than hearsay to back them up). All we know here is that club and ex-player had a dispute. Ex-player decided that the (latest?) settlement he was offered was less risky, or more money, than he could have hoped to have received by going to court. The club might well have just saved themselves a large legal bill. Why assume the worst?