Matt

Clubs always quote it seperately, though. Dekka was at pains to say how we made a small loss last year- but this was the operating loss and won't take account of the fact the club booked over £30m for a player who was probably on the books for a million tops.

Dekka put out quotes that we'd made a small operating loss of around £4m (IIRC) on the last financial year- which as you say will be blown open by player trading. I think the accounts will be delayed as late as possible in order to get the 10-year ticket renewal out of the way and probably a subsequent round of marketing to sell the remainder. I also suspect that the loan to SJHL has been reduced, which will likely generate some adverse publicity. The club will want to ensure as much cash is banked before this is confirmed in the filed accounts.

Is all of that legal? I think so, but will happily defer to the experts on here. I just don't understand how these Ticketus people have been so monumentally stupid. They should have something in place to prevent this happening, but I suspect not- this strategy reflects what he has done to companies in the past. About five years ago they changed the law so the taxman was no longer a preferred creditor- if that was still in place his plan wouldn't work.

Just watched the BBC investigation into this fella. I don't think he has the cash- he's not poor but he's certainly not got anything like the wealth he has made out. His move to put it into admin is an attempt to obtain the assets of the club and leave HMRC empty handed. That's me and you making up that tax bill, lets ot forget. The question is where has this season-ticket loan come from, who is Ticketus and why did they lend to such a dubious credit, seemingly without security? They have lent against future season ticket sales of this club, not of some newly-minted entity. If Whyte has secured £24m from them, in theory he could have paid it to himself as a special dividend, repaid whoever bridged him the £18m to buy the club's debt (plus a little for his efforts) leave the secured debt on the books, put it into admin to get his debt back, leaving all other creditors high and dry and him with a club and a few quid. All for free.

Well worth reading up on Craig Whyte's interesting track record in business: http://scotslawthoughts.wordpress.com/

But you'd need the company to be fully liquidated for that to happen surely? You can be certain HMRC won't sign any CVA.

Good to see Sting in the dugout there

Didn't Ben Arfa have a go about our style of football under Pardew? Only if you severely twist an interview he did in France.

Totally agree HTT. I cannot understand why HBA seems to be the first to get pulled up yet other players enjoy long spells in the side despite underperforming.

The lack of depth has always been contentious from day one. I don't think you'll have found anyone disagreeing with that at any point this season, just games like yesterday serve a stark reminder of what could have been if we'd have been less fortunate on the injury front this season.

We're wondering where to drink before the match as well like, haven't made our mind up yet. Our original plan was around Victoria because we work around there so we know it, and it's easy for us both to get there and then to Seven Sisters but I dunno. Not that cheap around Victoria either. I've been past on a Saturday and it fills up with Spurs lot pretty early. Nowhere will be cheaper than the Spoons, but the Magpie is reasonable for ales which are usually pretty well-kept. If you're into stuff like Peroni I'm finding most places round here are charging over £4 a pint now. For cheap drinking in the town centre, try the Cock Tavern on Great Portland Street, it's 2 minutes walk from Oxford Circus- it's a Sam Smith so you can get a pint for under £3.

It'll be rammed. Go to The Magpie on New Street or Woodin's Shades on the corner of Bishopsgate and Middlesex St. The White Hart on the corner of Bishopsgate and Liverpool Street is also decent, can't remember if it's open on Saturday. If you want to venture further east, there are a few boozers on Commercial Rd (Commercial Tavern, Golden Heart, Ten Bells) but at weekends they are the domain of skinny jeans and hipster glasses. Leffe- an impressive feat for one night out- was the bar in Chalk Farm the Hill?

Spurs will try to appoint the by-them former Real Madrid manager.

Cabaye's foul against Chelsea was nailed on.

I'd like to see them both start. They've been training together for a few weeks with the Senegal squad. Fortune favours the brave.

So because you can't stop something totally with a punishment you should just go along with it? Refs aren't as good as they could be in this country because its a thankless task for bugger all money. From the grassroots up, they are subject to all kinds of abuse and the least that the top end of the game can do is to keep players in line as best they can. Otherwise even fewer people will take up refereeing, the 'best' will be of a lower quality and we'll all be standing around wondering how refs are so bad these days. The problem is that the authorities and the officials seem to lack the will to follow and kind of campaign through and just becomes 'flavour of the season'. The idea that we should tolerate it because trying to stamp it out would create more abuse is a peverse way to tackling a problem.

If someone had made a bid for Enrique and would have matched or bettered his wages, he'd have been gone the same as anyone else.

He needs to get the ball out of his feet in less advanced positions- he has the pace the beat players with speed rather than keeping the ball close to him to pull of a jink or a turn. When he's taking the ball from the deep he keeps the ball close and its much easier for players to just poke it away from him.

Players kick out in the heat of the moment too.

I think the point is that the abuse from players would stop if some action was actually taken.

It would be wonderful if referees actually brandished cards instead of tolerated so much dissent. The more difficult it is to referee and build yourself up from a local ref to PL standard, then refereeing in general will not be as good as it could be. Everyone bitches about the quality of referees, but it's not their problem- it's ours. They are the best available for the job. Far better we pay PL referees £2m a season- crap footballers can earn that easily- so should the refs. Give people a reason to excel. £80k or whatever they get is simply not enough. And we need to get away from the idea that they all need to earn their stripes on a Sunday morning for years before being considered for the next step up.

Agree with this. I think we'll see more penalties given as well. Would be good if they could sort out handball properly though, the current rule is not really applied- very few handballs are absolutely deliberate. Many are given becuase they have broken up play or prevented a goal but were entirely unavoidable.

Indeed, would mean that he misses the whole of February which would be a real blow. We would only have the ban increased if the FA felt the appeal was frivolous.

Sounds a bit strange that. Wonder who really pulled the plug here. The club, Pardew, Best himself? Seems a strange situation... Not the club, otherwise there would have been nothing to turn down. He's got 18 months on his contract so will be on the list to move towards the exit door.

Really good centre halves know when to play and when to hoof it, and I include Colo in that.