Taylor Swift

I miss those days. But, the past is the past and we've gotta move on. I think Sam's got the ability to take us forward. All the pressure he's been under certainly isn't helping though.

we didn't expect magical results but after 19 games and 7 months you'd expect some sign of improvment,not the feeling that the performances arethe same as the last 2 mangers who at least would atempt to win away games. "not playing well at the moment"... that moment has lasted since august. we played well 1st half at bolton,then against spurs and arsenal. don't fall into the trap that we beat west ham and everton seemingly comfortably because we didn't play well and there were long spells in both games when we were under the cosh. Our last two managers did NOT attempt to win away games. Roeder took a whole season to win a couple of away games, and don't even mention Graeme fucking Souness and his ineptness.

Stick.

We have shit players. When this fact of life sinks in, everything will become a bit clearer as to why we've struggled for the past 3 years.

Think so. Commentator's saying it's an automatic three match ban.

Carvalho sent off. Dangerous tackle. Game on for Villa?

Laursen! Jesus! What a game.

Was the same score earliar this season until we Royally fucked it up in the last 10 minutes. Not gonna celebrate just yet. That ain't gonna happen. 4-1 Huddlestone.

Great play from Sheva. A fantastic turn and quick pass to Alex, which is slotted home. 3-2.

I have to say, Shevchenko's playing really well. Apart from his goals, he's dropping deep to collect the ball, getting involved in the play, has flicked the ball cleverly a few times and is making really good probing runs. What a difference a few goals and a playing in a team that doesn't have to go through Drogba and Lampard makes.

Stunning strike from Sheva. 2-2.

And the Chelsea siege begins...

I think he will become a British citizen, hence why he can play for England. I know It's not the point is it? He was born in Spain. What about the technically Canadian Owen Hargreaves? I can handle someone who's roots are based within our nation, but to have someone who was born in a neighbouring european country with absolute no link to the nation but 'qualify' through technicalities is just a little bit too much for me. Almunia=qualified englishman [Parky] But you know all of us came from Africa, right? [/Parky]

Milner's versatile is the answer to your first question. The second and third question can be answered by the fact that we're playing 3 games in 6 days. Because of how much we're playing, it's logical for BS to rotate his players around and give certain players a rest. I bet you'll see a totally different team when we play Chelsea 3 days from now because we'll have another game 3 days after that.

Don't think it was a red card meself. The ref was way too quick to even give the penalty in the first place. It just seemed like he wanted to give it because the Chelsea fans were starting to get restless.

It was a nice goal as well. The cross from Agbonlahor made the goal, a little deft left-footed cross. Headed back across goal by Carew and Maloney finishes.

If that's the team then I definitely like it. I don't think we can read too much into it though, it's most probably just players being rotated because we have such a busy schedule in the next week or so, so it's logical and practical for Sam to change players around and rest certain players.

When Thaksin does return to Thailand, the funds that he can give to Sven will increase, not decrease. Before becoming PM, iirc, he owned one of the major phone providers, a major internet service provider, a broadcasting company (similar to Sky in England). Now, if he has a chance to start running his business freely again, he'll become even richer. And of course, the people here are fanatical about Premiership football, so surely he'll be using the fact that he owns City to his advantage. He's always in the news now because of City. You can't watch a City match without hearing the Thai commentators mentioning his name at least 10 times so there's no way he'll want to give away his spot in the limelight. The Thai trio that City have signed is the first step to regaining popularity with the Thai people as well so there are quite a few extracurricular advantages of owning City for Thaksin.

You would have said the same about the SJP expansion 5 years ago And? 5 years ago no one could have predicted that we would be in the freefall that we were at the end of Fred's time. That's stunning, don't you think? 10 years ago I don't think many predicted that we'd be in financial trouble and our future would be looking seemingly bleak. That's the main thing I've been trying to say so far, though god knows I've tried my best to sound as confusing as possible.

The Emirates will pay itself off, that's why it's not a massive financial risk. The naming thing has already secured Arsenal £150m or so, so they're well on their way to securing enough money to pay for it. And the other three, even though they have debts that would be massive risks for most clubs, they've got rich owners who can deal with it.

Arsenal don't. And the other 3 can afford those risks. All their owners are rich fuckers. Who could have paid off our debt if Freddie was still here? The Halls? Fred himself?

The finances were fucked already. We made a loss of £12m in the last fiscal year, our wages took up 68% of our revenue, we have no European football this year, had little last year (at least none in the latter stages where the stadium would have been filled and tickets would have cost a bit more) and looked like we weren't going to have any next year as well. We've also lacked decent cup runs that would have generated some tv money. We were still operating like a club which had European football. Where were we going to get some money? That's the main thing. We were heading backwards as a club and we couldn't fill the stadiums except for the 'top 4' matches. My point about the Northern Rock money was that it could have been used for day-to-day expenses, paying wages etc. But it was spent in one go, and that's my main gripe. And obviously we haven't had a decent return for the cash spent as well. How were we going to pay wages? And if we couldn't spend, couldn't keep the 'top' players, how were we going to keep the stadium filled? And if we couldn't do that, where were we going to get the money to actually spend on new players? Could the club have afforded losing another £12m this year? It says a lot that we appointed Allardyce who's known for improving his team with spending little or no cash. That's a damning indictment on the financial state of the club if there ever was one.

And wasn't this debt set up nearly 10 yrs ago? So when we raised that initial debt, we were in the top 2 (!), had consistent European football, filled the stadium every week and had a really bright future. So yes, we did have a good financial model and it worked (on and off the pitch), but that was 10 or so years ago. Things are quite different now and if Fred's still here, I would think that most sensible banks would turn him away if he came calling for a couple million £s. Edit - I bet the bank we're still paying off now started sweating when the Northern Rock money was spent.

But didn't we have a ridiculously high wage-turnover ratio? Something like 60% wasn't it? This was about a year before Fred left iirc. And isn't that percentage higher than the 'safe' percentage, which is 50% iirc. Source for the 60% figure? The 50% is just a benchmark. It means nothing in reality. This isnt about wages, its about debt and capital and the servicing of debt on the basis of future income streams. None of our debt was held against predicted CL revenue streams. It therefore means it was serviced on the existing business model. The end-of-year financial figures that the club releases. According to macbeth's site, it was 58% in 2005 and rose to 68% in 2006! IIRC our debt is set against season-ticket sales, so that surely would have been affected. We definitely didn't sell all our season tickets from last year and I believe that we haven't sold out for this year as well. We haven't sold out most of our home games last season, and haven't been doing it this season. Take this and the signs of Freddie desperately trying to spend money to fill those seats and you have a disaster of Leeds-proportion waiting to happen. Honestly, we weren't heading in the right direction and the problem wasn't being tackled in the right way. The fact that we spent the Northern Rock money before we even had it shows our desperate the club was at the time. Future revenue was being spent because if it hadn't, we would have been unable to pay off the debts (not enough tickets sold). There's two problems with that. First, the fact that we were in that state reflects how badly things were going, and secondly, spending that future revenue (and not succeeding) would have meant heading further down that route and taking an even bigger risk. All the signs were pointing to a big financial trouble imo, and that would have impacted the more important side, the football one, greatly, since we would have been able to spend a sum total of fuck all in future windows.

But didn't we have a ridiculously high wage-turnover ratio? Something like 60% wasn't it? This was about a year before Fred left iirc. And isn't that percentage higher than the 'safe' percentage, which is 50% iirc. So, there was a model out there, a model that most clubs seemed to have followed and yet we were one of a select few who didn't (the other being Chelsea but they're an anomaly) follow this suggested model. Our wages were still sky-high and we did operate as a CL club, much similar to Leeds when their freefall began, but we weren't. We don't even have European football to generate the revenue that would have allowed us to spend money this year! I think Shepherd did a decent job overall, but it seems some folks are forgetting the state of the club at the very end which imo is the key phase. We'd spent the Northern Rock money before it had even arrived, our wages were at CL clubs levels and we don't have European football this year, and if Fred had stayed, European football next year would have been unlikely as well. The finances were not in the healthiest state and our spending wouldn't and hasn't been risks that we could afford to take. Spunking £16m on Owen has set us back a lot, and any money spent by BS this summer with Shepherd in charge would have been money that we didn't have and looked unlikely to have for a couple of years at least. That was the position the club was in, and all the signs were pointing at things becoming worse. That's also another key element - we were headed downhill and Shepherd looked and acted like he didn't know what to do about it (the statements before appointing Souness then Roeder shows this, and then of course the 'I'll back the manager because we've always done' speech that he gives during the middle of every transfer window).