leffe186

Yeah. Don't get me wrong, got no love for the Mackems.

What on earth was Richards complaining about? How was that anything other than a booking?

Best I've seen for a while. Sorry, but I confess I want City to lose more than Sunderland. Pitch looks to be cutting up - has it been raining over there? Oh, and what's with the Arsenal "gritting it out" love-in? Two away games against pretty dodgy teams who were down to 10 men relatively early sandwiching a home game against Burnley? Oh, well done.

I think he'll be off come the summer but i'd rather we kept him. Great attitude, technically very good, good passer, i want him to be a squad player next season. Thing is, he said he'll be off if he's still not getting games and i think Harry will let him go (although Harry does rate him). Think we'll sell for around 4m but my feeling is he's Fulham bound. how harry prefers jenas to ohara i don't know, if i had a choice id pick ohara He prefers Huddlestone to either. Jenas is quicker than O'Hara and more two-footed, but I'd prefer O'Hara too.

Spurs do well because of the immense ticket prices they can charge, being in London. ...but clever and commerical management too. Check out this link for a little more info - Spurs and Newcastle's "commercial" turnover was almost the same in 2003-4, the discrepancy coming in matchday (SJP being far bigger) and TV money (much better performance on the field - the season given was right at the beginning of Martin Jol's reign when we finished 14th or thereabouts). http://www.deloitte.com/assets/Dcom-UnitedKingdom/Local%20Assets/Documents/DeloitteFootballMoneyLeague2005.pdf I think it is fair to say that a fantastic position was pissed away by a combination of FFS and some of his Managers. Matchday income was always going to be massive, commerciality seemed together and a nucleus was there to keep a strong squad near the top. Vast wages and unfortunate management choices didn't help.

Quite like that actually, very old school look. The Italy strip, on the other hand, is an abomination. Only place you'll see that is in Trade (may be showing my age here).

I think the US shirt is pretty good. Isn't that similar to the kit they wore in 1950? New Zealand is mint. Pity they're going to get absolutely battered. That England strip is almost good enough to convince me to wear red.

With no Lennon, Bentley, huddlestone and Jenas right now, we're looking at Kranjcar-------Modric------Palacios----------Bale That's still f***ing mint. Kranjcar It's a nice idea, but when Palacios gets suspended there is literally nobody to make any tackles in midfield. You're looking at Kaboul or Corluka as defensive midfielders

They get excellent prices for the players they sell. Worth re-emphasising it's a revenue list. No mention of costs, as such, profits. it can't all be transfer revenue for spurs though, do they have a huge corperate section? high ticket prices compared to everyone else? secret gold stores under whl? We do have high ticket prices, though being in London helps that. We've had to swallow it for a while because we know our ground isn't big enough, plus demand is great. Supposedly our merchandising is very effective (and the last sponsorship deal was pretty damn good), though it's a hell of a testimony to Levy that we've consistently been in that list despite no Champions League and a relatively small ground.

I don't agree. The commentators got all excited about Arsenal laying down a marker, but it was against ten men and now they've lost a player who would have been useful in the run-in.

Yeah, he looked gutted. The thing is, the Martin Taylor thing was pretty straightforward, studs up and straight down onto the shin. This just looks like he tried to kick the ball, and Ramsey nipped it away, and as a result he kicked Ramsey. One foot and the instep.

I've rewound it and it actually doesn't look that bad a tackle to me at normal speed. Didn't seem to be two-footed, looked like Ramsey just got the the ball first. I'm sure it will look worse at slow-mo but it really didn't look like a horrible tackle, just a bit late and with an obvious, immediate bad injury.

Couldn't even bring myself to set the drumkit up.

I see your Eboue and raise you Gaby Agbonlahor.

Whiteside definitely. Surprised no-one's mentioned Ledley King yet. I think he would have been one of the top handful of players of his time if he'd remained injury-free.

Finally got to see the Spurs match. Bit of what Dave and Daws both said really. Ankergren (?) terrific again, Snodgrass would be fantastic if he could do anything AT ALL with his right foot, Becchio looked good and held the ball well but didn't really click with Beckford, Beckford looked good when on the ball but barely got a sniff. Bentley played well but was up against one of Leeds' truly League 1 players. Leeds would be a good Championship side on those performances, challenging for promotion, but no more than that. Reffing team was very generous to Leeds over the two games (they got away with an awful lot of late tackles) but so were the Spurs forwards. Leeds will play much better football against teams in the Championship next year. They showed it in glimpses over the two games but weren't allowed too much of the ball and got very tired last night. Spurs should have been out of sight by half time in both games.

If you look at the Deloitte Touche surveys from the Levy/Jol era onwards, Spurs have consistently had one of the lowest two or three ratios of wages to turnover in the Premiership. For example, the last full breakdown I found (2006-7) had us first on 42%, Man U on 44%, Arsenal on 50%. Other included Newcastle on 72%, Everton on 75% and Villa on 82%. Levy ballsed it up with Jol, but he's running the place well. Spurs and Newcastle have consistently generated a lot of money without qualifying for the Champions League - more than most (e.g. Everton or Villa). The problem is maintaining that while keeping wages low. We seem to have managed it so far, but I'll be impressed if Levy keeps it going.

I actually, genuinely thought they had misspelled Noble in the match reports.

So much hangs on our game with them this week. If they win that then it's looks rosy, if they lose then I can see Rafa going.

I've played some mixed footy since I've been in the US and women are far, far better than they are in the UK.

Now don't screw it up.

Come on, hehehehehe.

Reina has been excellent again, surely the best keeper in the Prem.

Come on Stoke, put one away.

Every time Stoke try something cute they fuck it up. Just lump it and run at them, you fools.