Mick

The remark was meant to be taken literally.

I'm not a member of any Ken Bates fan club at all, the blokes an idiot. Chelsea had a ground which was terrible long before Bates arrived, you don't seem to know that so I'm just putting you right.

I'm not sure how many times you went to Chelsea but he did have a point. Most of the crowd trouble was outside of the ground, especially on the tubes but the Chelsea fans were terrible. I don't think I've ever seen as many NF mongs in any ground in my life as I've seen at Chelsea during the 80's and 90's.

I've been to Chelsea a few times before Harding arrived and it was a horrible place, both ends behind the goals were a joke, a corner of the shed looked like a scrap yard and the away end was almost as bad, I'm sure they had a corrugated metal fence between the home and away supporters the season they put 6 past us. That was long before Bates took over so it's not as if he ran the club down as they were in a terrible state before his arrival, no doubt you remember that game as it was when we really were shite.

It doesn't work like that, remember Ellis being a shite chairman yet doing better in the league than our chairman at the time?

I couldn't care less about International football, I've only ever been to one International at Wembley and it wasn't anything like going to see Newcastle. I'll watch certain teams for a while but if the football isn't worth watching I'll find something better to do. If England play good football then I'll watch them but I usually switch off after 5 minutes.

I'm not sure if they has or hasn't.

The statement I'm referring to is: "How much more money do you think the board should have gave Bobby Robson ?"

Trophy players, you'll have to define that.

The net spend for Sir Bobby was less than £6 million per year. Dalglish has a net spend of almost £16m per year, Gullit was £7.6m per year, Souness was £30.9m and Roeder was £7.64m, all figures are per year, obviously Bobby spent more than the others but he had the job longer.

What was the net spend for Sir Bobby and how did it compare to the net spend of Dalglish, Gullit, Souness, Roeder and Allardyce? Bump. I've no idea, and I'm not really bothered because they backed all of them, but I bet it was one of the highest in the country, instead of the highest sales ie as in the board who ran the club in the 1970's and 1980's that you think was "just the same" You've got no idea yet you use it. The manager that you bang on about giving us our best three finishes since the year dot was backed with the least amount of cash while I doubt anybody could argue that he must have brought more into this club than any other manager considering our league positions and record CL finish. Silly me, it wasn't Robson who was responsible for that, it was the chairman.

The club is light years better than it was in the 70's and 80's, I've never said that it wasn't. You mentioned Gazza, Beardsley and Waddle as a way of deflecting attention away from another of your stupid statements, what have they got to do with this thread? Anyway, does net spend and Sir Bobby ring any bells?

What was the net spend for Sir Bobby and how did it compare to the net spend of Dalglish, Gullit, Souness, Roeder and Allardyce? Bump.

When did we offer Robson the job when he was out of contract? Also, do I have to bump the question about Robson having spent so much or are you busy typing the answer?

Has Bobby Robson ever broke a contract? It doesn't matter when offers came, as far as I'm aware he's never left a club while under contract, at least not by choice. Is that correct or not?

He turned us down when we were 2nd in the Premiership, were we shit then?

What was the net spend for Sir Bobby and how did it compare to the net spend of Dalglish, Gullit, Souness, Roeder and Allardyce?

If you told me before then just post the link and I'll be able to read it.

Here's some facts: Before Shepherd became chairman we were 2nd in the league, when he left we had just finished 13th. Another fact is that before Shepherd became chairman the club had cash in the bank, when he left we had debt which had shot to £80 million while we borrowed £44 million for the ground extension. Freddy Shepherd said we had one of the best training facilities in Europe, Allardyce complained that it was a converted squash club. Shitty Doug Ellis finished above Shepherd more often than not while both were running the two clubs and you claim league position is the measure of success. A good chairman always backs his manager, Chris Mort has backed Allardyce more than Shepherd backed Roeder, Gullit and Sir Bobby when it comes to net spend. It is FACT that we filled 50000 stadium every week, not true, last season saw our largest attendance fall for years and this year would have been far worse if it wasn't for the changes that have taken place. Steve Bruce claims that he was offered the Newcastle job. Souness was not sacked because we lost so many games, he was sacked because three of our players collided.

If you know the reason and I don't then maybe you can put me right.

I've read some brilliant posts in here, I'm sure the content will go down well at the club, to think this sort of stuff is so easy to produce and could be so beneficial to the club and it's been wasted.

If the debt was built up to expand the stadium and training facilities, why did it almost double while our capacity was 52,000? To clarify, so you think the club shouldn't have looked at the future ? Oh dear. mackems.gif No, to clarify, you said how we aquired the £80 million debt and I explained that you were wrong.

If the amount of money spent made a club win trophies we'd have won them by now. Throwing money at the wrong manager or at the wrong time is a waste of hard earned cash, our club should know that more than any other club.

If the debt was built up to expand the stadium and training facilities, why did it almost double while our capacity was 52,000?

Could we do a bit more than clean it? It's a bit drab and would look much better if it was lit up or something, you can see the ground for miles so it should really be the focal point of the city.