clawsfour

I can't get no....

...satisfaction. Which is the half time music. And about sums it up.

Saints playing really well but still 0-0. AND THEN AT FULL-TIME 1-1.

It could easily have been 4-1 or 5-1. Sometime soon the Saints are going to batter someone, I just hope they can retain some confidence until that happens. Still at least the fans who did turn up were behind the team - no nonsense about protests against the manager or the Board.

Exciting game. Unlucky result.

Where were you on the night the music died

Well here I am at St Mary Stadium. There must be at least 5 or 6 thousand here.

Where are the other 20k so called supporters?

I've never wanted us to win so much.

Busby Babes show the way

It's only four games into the season and I'm already fed up.

Not with the team, the manager, or, heaven help me, the board. But with the fans.

In the first three games our young side played some dazzling football and were unlucky to lose two of those games. Yesterday we played less well but were unlucky to be losing at half-time and could easily have been two or three goals to the good. But this time the so-called fans started to boo the misplaced pass as early as midway through the first half.

I am heartily sick of people who want to exact their desire for revenge against the Chairman (for who knows what) against the young players in the new look Saints team.

Let me just remind these petulant boo boys (and I bet they're mostly blokes) of just one thing...

The team Matt Busby had built from the club's successful youth policy seemed destined to dominate football for many years. Such was the power of the Babes that they seemed invincible. The average age of the side which won the Championship in 1955-56 was just 22, the youngest ever to achieve such a feat. A year when they were Champions again, nothing, it seemed, would prevent the young braves of Manchester United from reigning for the next decade.

thebusbybabes.com

Whoohooo

Saints win away.

Do I care about how well they played? Who the chairman is? Who the opposition were?

None of the above. We won.

It's footie time again

Sod politics.

Saints 2 West Ham 2. Ok, it was only a pre-season friendly, but we didn't get get stuffed by a premiership team. Can't wait for the season proper.

Oh - and just in case you are thinking of voting Tory, just take a look at labour.org.uk and the minimum wage ticker.

Let me rephrase my opening two words. Sod Cameron.

Poland or Germany? Part 2.

Boo!

Poland or Germany?

Poland or Germany?

Germany or Poland?

Poland or Germany?

Two days into the European championships and it is so relaxing. None of that feeling slightly sick as the first England game comes and goes with a 0-0 draw against the bottom favourites.

No worry about who comes top of which group so that we may avoid them in the quarter-finals should we be lucky enough to win one game and not the lose the other.

So a time to watch the beautiful game without any partisanship. Just to enjoy the game as a pure neutral. To hope that sport, as well as music, has charms to soothe a savage breast (I know, I know - beast sounds better but hey, let's quote correctly for a change. And now with apologies to Congreve 1697

Football has Charms to sooth a savage Breast,
To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak.
I've read, that things inanimate have mov'd,
And, as with living Souls, have been inform'd,
By Magick Numbers and persuasive Sound.
What then am I? Am I more senseless grown
Than Trees, or Flint? O force of constant Woe!
'Tis not in Harmony to calm my Griefs.
Anselmo sleeps, and is at Peace; last Night
The silent Tomb receiv'd the good Old King;
He and his Sorrows now are safely lodg'
Within its cold, but hospitable Bosom.

Why am not I at Peace?

Because we're not playing you fool - so c'mon you Poles.

An inspired choice. Please. Please let it be so...

A brief history of the coaching career of Jan Poortvliet, Saints new manager.

1992 - Eendracht Aalst (Beglium)

Two successive play off finals with a club that went out of business in 2001 (now reinstated) and the current squad plays at the Pierre Cornelisstadion stadium in Bredestraat, Aalst in front of a maximum 7,500 fans.

1994-1998: Barabantia (Holland)

No idea, can't find any information about them at all. Apparently won fourth Division title twice in three years which sort of suggests relegation in between.

1999-2001: de Valk (Holland)

Two years here, another title - but which division this club is in, was in, where they play (what they play) who knows.

2002-2005: Telstar (Holland, not space)

Three years. One play off position. The club plays in a massive 3,200 seater stadium - but has still managed to field a good number of international players.

2005-2007: RKSV Nuenen (Holland)

Champions of some division or other (fifth, apparently, so that's a bit like the Conference League).

And finally: Helmond Sport (Holland)

No idea what they've achieved in front of their maximum capacity 4,100 crowd.

But this could go one of three ways. A complete disaster, nothing special, or an inspired choice. In those terms exactly like deciding to go and watch Saints in the first place. So I reckon that is a good omen.

C'mon you red and white stripes.

All change at the top

Not the Labour Party you dummies, but Southampton Football Club.

Just because its the cricket season doesn't mean the show can't keep running at St Mary Stadium in Southampton.

With Rupert Lowe back as Chairman it was likely that would be changes and that those changes would driven by balancing the books. Good.

The first change is the man given temporary charge to try and keep the Saints in the Championship, Nigel Pearson, has been relieved of his £1,000 a day job having done worse than George Burley in terms of points or goals per game (something that most people would have said would have been impossible). Fortunately other teams were even worse, and therefore Nigel leaves the Saints as hero for having achieved the impossible.

Which in fact is was he did - fewer points, stayed up. How about that for the impossible.

So who are the new team. Welcome virtual unknowns Jan Poortlivet Poortvliet (so well known I can't even spell his name, apparently) and Mark Wotte. OK - completely unknowns.

But I am really excited by this change. Mainly because it's a couple of months  before the first competitive match and therefore a couple of months in which we can relish the thought of the new. We can fantasise about the the opening five nil win, the exhilarating wing play, the long run to Wembley, automatic promotion. Oh I can't wait.

I must find out more about our new team. Or should I just live in hope that this time it's another Strachan appointment. By that I mean something that all the fans opposed (including me) along the lines of "what's that muppet Lowe done now?" But then turned out right. Until Strachan left to spend more time with his family. Which was also Lowe's fault.

Don't ask me to explain Saints fans. They're bonkers. Apart from me, of course.

Lowe invests - but not in Saints

I've got no idea whether this is of any significance, reported in today's Telegraph (spit).

Lord Marland, the former Conservative Party treasurer, has led a group of high-profile City investors in a deal to buy 26pc of WH Ireland and take two seats on the stockbroker-to-fund manager's board.

The consortium includes Carphone Warehouse co-founder David Ross and former LIFFE director Rupert Lowe, who will become WH Ireland's chairman, with Lord Marland as a non-executive director.

I can't imagine this is an insignificant Chairmanship for Rupert since he appears to have invested close on £600,000 in this consortium. Maybe this means he won't be quite so hands on at the Saints (if that happens) and will concentrate on the finances of the club rather than the day to day management.