Congratulations to Bristol City on reaching the Play off final. I was convinced that with Palace being the form team that they would go through. Brilliant to see someone a little different make it though. Ben Watson's penalty miss seems to have been the turning point.
Tonight sees the 2nd play off semi 2nd leg in the Championship. Hull ought to be able to see Watford off, but if the Horns get the first goal then things will probably get a bit edgy. John Eustace is available after his red card was rescinded.
Also tonight sees the UEFA Cup Final and Walter Smith's disciplined Rangers side come up against former Gers boss Dick Advocaat and his technically superb Zenit St Petersburg. It's likely to be a clash of styles and I think Zenit are probably favourites, but Rangers have achieved against the odds on numerous times in Europe this season, I'm not going to bet against them.
Henrik Larsson has made an unexpected return to international football after being called up to the Sweden squad for EURO2008.
Dean Kiely has also made a return to the interntaional fold for the Republic of Ireland.
Chelsea look set to beat Man City to the signing of Giovanni dos Santos.
Newcastle have opened contract talks with Michael Owen which rather closes the door on a move to Japan...!!!
Spurs want to sign Joe Hart with Paul Robinson as well as Eto'o, Bentley and Anelka.
West Ham are hopeful of signing Richard Dunne.
Middlesbrough will pay £6million for Alan Smith.
Didier Drogba has done his bit for Chelsea's team spirit before the Champions League final by branding his team mates 'complacent' and 'careless'.
LOL at spurs and also
COME ON YOU 'ULLLLLL!!!!!
Richard Dunne?
Thought West Ham were skint?
They're not skint
but apprently don't really want to spend any money so I doubt this happens
exactly the same as Villa
loads of money, but never spend any of it
I thought the Icelandic banks...
were up the spout or something at the moment. I doubt we'll spend, unless we sell Ashton, Anton and get rid of Freddie Ljundberg.
To be honest, with players back fit, it'll be like having new signings.
you sound like Curbs
with that last line!
There's no guarantee that the injured players will be fit for the beginning of the season which is a worry.
The banks are suffering because of the credit crunch but the chairman and his son aren't short of a few bob either way
I thought Freddie
had been released already?
not yet
i hope he doesn't...
i think he'll be good next year
Really?
"Henrik Larsson has made an unexpected return to international football after being called up to the Sweden squad for EURO2008."
Excllent? Sweden for the cup!
oh god i hope robert pires gets called up :D
And Bergkamp
^THISX100000000000
And Hagi
I think I'm gonna follow them
<3 Larsson
<3 Mellberg
<3 vikings
<3 bright yellow kit
I will follow Sweden after Netherlands
Since my gf is Swedish and is going to make me watch them anyway.
I bet he isn't in the final squad
unless Sweden have some real injury problems
£6 million for Alan Smith?
I know being a Chelsea fan I'm not supposed to mock people being ripped off, but that's a shocking signing.
that's GOT to be bollocks
if judas hasn't lost value since he went to the barcodes then i'd imagine Shevchenko is still worth 30mil.
Play Off Semi
last night was pretty ace, moments of lower Premier League / Football League KEEP THE BALL OFF THE GROUND AT ALL COSTS football, but largely a performance by both teams that suggested that West Brom had't got the monopoly on being half decent with the ball in the Championship.
Patronising? Sorry. My point was both teams looked worthy Premier Leaguers. I just wanted Palace to win :(
I think they'll really benefit from a season in the championship
to have a good go at it when they come up next year. Warnock's a good manager, i think he's said they'd be OK with not going up this time around.
Having said that, when bruce did a similar thing with Birmingham (second half of season charge and up through play offs) they did well in the premiership for 2.5 years, and should never have got themselves relegated.
£6M for Smith?
fucking hell.
Can't see any truth in the Dunne story, unless of course we are selling Anton. Still, we'll have Gabbidon, Collins, Tomkins & Upson to play centreback. Not forgetting Spector & Neil, who can also do a job there.
Drogba, biggest idiot in football? Can't wait for that tosser to leave the Premier League.
Larrson, quality. Is Freddie Ljunberg in the squad?
Gabbidon will leave I reckon
Two awesome goals last night
from Lee Trundle and Michael McIndoe. If they do go up Brizzle will need serious investment but Gary Johnson is one of the best managers in the game and their team is full of honest pros rather than overrated "superstars" so yep, good on em.
It's really annoying that Kettering
were managed by Johnson and sacked him, since then he's done pretty incredibly at every club he's been at. I'm not sure what we did wrong. What do you reckon about signing Earnshaw?
I think Earnshaw would be a good
signing for us. Granted, he did nothing for the Sheep last season but then who did? His goalscoring record at Championship level is second to none, and if we are going to spend £2.5 million on a striker then he'd be one of the top 3 candidates on my list.
he's blatantly gonna get a hat-trick
against us.
i mean, if we had to sell him, why oh why is it to your lot...
we've clinched the signing of Paul Connolly from Plymouth apparently. not familiar with him at all.
Has fat boy Commons
signed for you yet? You're welcome to him, honestly. Good player on his day but wildly inconsistent and injury prone.
To be honest, I'm surprised at you getting shot of Earnshaw as I would have thought him and Kenny Miller would be ideal players to form a partnership and score goals at that level.
Let's hope your loss becomes our gain...
who would he go to?
I'm not sure
I thought he was injured wasn't he?
Yeah,
bust rib. But he could be fit for the Euros.
Drogba should stop complaining about his team mates..
..and concentrate on his own performances which this season have been inconsistent.
If he leaves we should sign Berbatov and play Anelka further forward, whatever happens I'm hoping we don't sign Villa, which would probably end up being a waste of time.
Where did you here about the Dos Santos story ht27? I only frequent Sky Sports and Football 365.
Zenit will probably win tonight and part of me wants them to for entertainment reasons, although I wouldn't begrudge Rangers who've been excellent throughout the tournament.
Also lol at Middlesborough, what are they thinking?
That would be one mardy
forward line
I know but potentially great, on the pitch.
Berbatov over Villa?
Berbatov is perhaps the only player in the Premiership who can match Drogba in a battle of who can whinge and blow hot and cold the most
He complains but so what?
Drogba as you've said is a whinger but he's been excellent for us, more inconsistent this season but he still makes a huge difference when he plays.
Villa isn't anything special, I wouldn't be surprised if he got a few goals here and there but it would be a backward step if ever I saw one.
Replacing an inconsistent, whingey striker
with another inconsistent, whingey striker. The sort of lateral move I can fully see Chelsea making.
And why the Villa hate? He has been outstanding in a mediocre team this past season.
Villa in a good side
would rip up defences. He's had to feed on scraps at Valencia this season yet still works his tits off. He'd be a class signing.
Exactly this
He is the only player we've been linked with I'd like to see at the club
But we've been linked with everybody.
Kaka, Messi.
Do you mean the only realistic player we've been linked with?
Partly yes
although I wouldn't want Kaka
I worry about your sanity sometimes.
Are you trying to be controvertial?
Nope
He is a great player, I just don't see that we need him.
He's dead
I just saw it on the news
:(
For God's sake
don't tell PocketMouse.
I think I would rival PocketMouse for Kaka's fan of the year.
We've already had a petty little squabble about it. :)
A lateral move in this situation would be the right one.
I don't see a way of making a forward move to be honest. Some of the greatest players whinge, sometimes it's worth signing them anyway.
I don't hate Villa, I'm just not convinced by him. The premiership might be too physical for him and he's one of those players who'll probabaly never be quite world-class. He's definitely a very capable footballer but I wouldn't sign him for a club like Chelsea.
sounds a bit like Torres
and he's done alright
Absolutely nothing like Torres.
See my post below.
A lateral move when you aim to win the league
and have just finished 2nd is never the right one.
There isn't a forward option as far as I'm concerned.
Drogba is irreplaceable, in hindsight anyone would be a backward step let alone a sideways one.
We wern't exactly far off winning the league and new signings aren't always the answer anyway.
No-one is irreplaceable
least of all Drogba.
^this completely
theres always someone better and younger these days
Excuse me?
excuse you?
Hello you
I owe you a punch in the face
I never said anything about the face
That was all klaire.
Oh the internet
sorry i havent read the thread but are we talking about david villa?
if so hes a brilliant striker.perhaps not torres standard but brilliant none the less
Last summer I was telling everyone I knew..
..that Chlesea should sign Torres to play up front with Drogba, I think I was right.
Yes, David Villa. Arsenal can have him if you want.
i hope wenger does buy him hes ace
Both
shrugging shoulders prats that play for teams I despice. Can't wait for them both to leave.
Any Rangers fans on here? Will Daily get a game tonight? Altogether... "Oh, Christian Daily, you are the love of my life.."
It was on the BBC gossip column
I think it's appeared in todays Sun. Read into that what you will.
Probably not going to happen then.
I love Drogs and will be sad to see him go.
And Chelsea HAVE been careless and complacent over the past month or so, as the results against Spurs, Bolton and Wigan testify.
However, I believe that Drogba's knee injury may never fully clear up, so it might be a good time to dump him on someone else.
The story about Lewes seems pretty incredible
After gaining promotion to the BSP they are releasing all of their playing staff and signing local sussex league players so they can invest money in their ground. They also replaced their manager with a local business man with no experience in the game. And in some capacity Gareth Barry is going to be involved in it all. I fear that they could have a very long season ahead of them.
It makes you wonder
what the point in investing so heavily in the squad to reach the Conference in the first place was only to pull the rug from under the manager and players. rspce who posts on here is a Lewes fan...
Must be hard times for them
If they don't get any investment at some point then there's a very good chance that they will end up having a considerably worse season that Derby did this season.
Absolutely...
Certainly signing players from Horsham and Horsham YMCA isn't the way to attempt to stay up.
On the plus side
the money's been pulled before it's too late - they're now unlikely to do a Telford/Hornchurch/Halifax/... and go bust.
Have Halifax definitely been relegatd to Unibond yet?
Or is there still a chance they won't go into administration?
The company had a last minute
short term reprieve yesterday - still talks over it being bought and debts repaied by new owners - but the important bit is that they've missed the Conference deadline for next season's membership.
I'd be surprised if it's anything but Unibond Div One or county league football (if more deadlines are missed) next season for them :(
re:Henrik Larsson
he's in good form this season - second highest scorer in the Allsvenskan
11 starts, 6 goals (all from open play) and 3 assists
joint top in points on the fantasy statistics
and most pundits are saying he should be in the starting 11 up front with Elmander with Zlatan coming of the bench as the impact sub
off*
Welcome back!!! :D
I'd love to see Henrik at the Euros, he's easily in my top 10 favourite players ever.
I'm not back for good
but I just couldn't resist posting on the subject of Larsson/Sweden/Euro 2008
the thing is this - because of the hellish winter up here in Swedeland the Swedish football season runs from March to October (with a midsummer break)
this means that someone like Larsson (and the other 6 members of the squad who ply their trade domestically) have a great fitness advantage of having played around 14, 15, or 16 competitive matches before the tournament starts.
Compare this to those who've been playing in England, France and Italy who've had upwards of 40-50 competitive games (except for Ljungberg) and despite his age Larsson looks a good shout
my swedish flatmates
are pretty pissed off about the larsson affair. is this not the third time he's essentially retired for qualifying and then announced he'll play in the tournament proper? anywhoo they reckon he's not needed in a squad with ellmander, ibrahimovic, rosenberg and...er...allback.
then again, they all fellate allback and reckon he's better than zlatan...
apologies for woefully inaccurate spelling.
Will Ljungberg
be in the squad? Will he get a game?
Excellent news for City.
It's quite surreal how close we are to being a top-flight team. It seems only yesterday we were fighting relegation from League One and bemoaning how much of a disaster zone the West Country is for football.
It must be amazing for Bristol City fans at the minute
If they do get promoted and have a disatrous season next year would there be any dange of Johnson getting sacked? I really hope not, and he must be in contention for bigger jobs at some point as he's never really been linked even though he's had continued success.
I can't imagine it happening.
It's a completely different situation to, say, Billy Davies. Johnson's been here for the best part of three years, is massively liked by the fans and I just can't see the supporters turning against him. City's board tend to be relatively sensible (the only charge I've ever heard levied against the chairman is that he's a bit over-cautious spending-wise but in my view that's a good thing as City went through a phase in the late 90s where they over-spent and paid the price a little).
So I can't see the board acting rashly, and can't see the fans turning against him so I'd be amazed if he was sacked.
I kind of hope
Watford mount an unlikely comeback to