Taylor Swift

That's dumb. People were only complaining because the thread was closed IMMEDIATELY after the match finished. Just give it 5 or so minutes, alert people, open up a new thread and then close this thread. Now we'll have mega-threads, with the beginning 5 or so pages filled with predictions, expected formation etc. etc. It'll be annoying for anyone who hasn't posted in the thread before to find out when it actually becomes the 'match' thread, and then of course having to search through and find out when the 'post-match' part of the thread actually starts. The forum as it is now is already starting to be clustered with uberthreads which go on for 10+ pages. It's a real deterrent for anyone who hasn't posted in that particular thread to see that there's been that much discussion going on already. I thought this forum (and the mods) were against uberthreads of that kind? Edit - Better yet, you don't even have to lock threads, just leave them open but post a link to a 'match thread' or 'post match thread' in the pre-match thread and direct people there.

[FM] Barzagli's a bit slow, not sure he'd cope with the speed of the Premiership. [/FM]

Was Riise not bankrupt a few months back?

Jesus man is your spelling bad or what

I'm with Vic here. It does not make a fucking difference that the company is now de-listed when Ashley already knew that it was going to happen. If he was going to spend any money in the past couple of weeks, he would have. He wasn't waiting for the de-listing to commence any 'spending spree', which if it did occur right now, would be a mere coincidence or actually related to the completion of the internal review, rather than related to the de-listing.

I know this is all subjective but IMO he has Berbatov just about right, he can bump and bang with all the big defenders and doesn't complain too much, and has real silky skills he is a real pleasure to watch. As for Ronaldinho well he goes awal far too often in games to be rated the best or in this case the second best in the world, again IMO the best footballers are the ones that give you effort even when they are not playing well, their touch might be a little off in a game but hey still graft for the team and Ronaldinho is not one of them. I agree Berbatov's rank is okay (well, justifiable) but he does not have a body like a bruiser, which was something that actually made me laugh out loud.

The Owen pic has me really excited for the new season. Don't think I've been this excited since we randomly came 4th under SBR. Howay the lads!

Thought it was a decent list tbh. Some of the stuff written (like the Berbatov thing ) was utter shit but at least he's tried to justify most of his choices and well, for the most part, I can see where he's coming from.

Post-match drinking session I agree, we've really developed and honestly the passing play at times was fun to watch, almost Arsenal-esque like I mentioned before. Cheers for the luck, good luck for Bahrain as well, but it seems your passage is quite secure - surely Korea will beat Indonesia and thus leaving you with needing only one point from the game against the Saudis.

Just got back home from the match. Fucking great performance from us. Battered them for a sustained period of about half an hour but just couldn't fucking score. We seem to be trying to play the Arsenal style of football and took like 4 or 5 shots throughout the whole game. Really entertaining stuff though. The home fans were brilliant and surprisingly there was quite a big Aussie section as well, was really cool to see. Viduka didn't really perform well on the whole. For the first 60 minutes or so he lost the ball on numerous occasions, was too slow or non-reactive to the general attacking play of the Aussies and just seemed really unfit, then boom pops up with a clever hold-up play which leads to his first goal. His second goal was a really nice header as well. Can't really make a full judgment of him yet. When he did put the effort in, he was really good but the first 60 minutes still bothers me a lot. It seems this has been the case in all three group games as well, so hopefully he'll sort out this stuff soon enough. Saddened that we lost when we really honestly dominated play and was by far the more entertaining and enterprising team. Best of luck to the Aussies though, they showed their quality in the end with all the counter-attacking play.

Bahrain man!! Haha, fucking hell, Korea might be out.

No doubt now that Morty-boy is checking the forum.

Ronaldinho was poor last season? Yea, 21 league goals is poor.

Monday 7.45pm Bangkok time (12.45pm GMT). I will report back on Viduka (if he plays) though I'm obviously hoping we batter the Aussies.

Korea my bad.

Exciting game. I feel sad for Indonesia, they played really well. Now if Japan beats Bahrain then don't Indonesia have to beat Japan in the last game?

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=445494&cc=4716 Straight out of Roeder's book

Parky man, £25-30m net?? Surely on the wind-up. I'd say about £15m if we don't sell Martins.

Are some fans really that fickle? Jesus man, there's some knee-jerk reactions on the board to every single piece of news atm. Just calm the fuck down. We're a month away from the beginning of the season, a full fucking month man! We're over a month and a half away from the close of the transfer window, so ffs, relax. We have good players at the club, and most of them are now in training and getting better preparation than they've had in the past couple of years. We've signed 4 players in about two weeks, and we need to sign about 4 or 5 more in the next 6 weeks, which honestly will happen. Allardyce isn't Roeder. He has shown he doesn't take long to wrap up signings (Geremi being a prime example). So please, relax and be excited for the new season. It's gonna be a good one.

But probably not play the same amount of games, Jon. I see him getting about 10-15 goals, but I see Owen and Martins getting more than him so I'm not worried.

just like that eh? have you ever heard of published accounts? mind you, probably in the same fantasy fucking land as Fat Fred is not the Chairaman Yes because the football world is so clean, nice and pure that something like this is just really impossible.

Yes they want to see the money going to West Ham but obviously Kia will feel this is unjust (and rightly so), which is why the most probable case is some sort of 'backdoor' payment that West Ham will make to Kia. Essentially the money that Manyoo pay West Ham will end up with Kia and thus, all parties will be happy and satisfied. West Ham survive the saga and can move on, Manyoo get Tevez and Kia gets his money.

West Ham will 'buy' Tevez from MSI then 'sell' him to Manyoo. This would mean any money Manyoo paying would actually be going to West Ham and thus satisfy the PL. And of course Kia will be happy cos he's gonna be a rich fucker.

Should be an even better game then. I'm scared shitless now

The Aussies will need to beat us by 2 goals to go through. A 1-0 defeat for us would mean we go through (iirc). Should be a great game on Sunday. Hopefully we'll freaking start Leesaw from the beginning because his pace will be needed. Kiatisuk can sit this game out, we need to have an effective counter-attack to capitalize on any mistakes the Aussies make. Should be a great game!