Rayvin

Just to add here: Carver recently canvassed tactical opinion from a group of junior schoolboys at his local golf club. “I sat with nine, 10, 11-year-old kids for 15 minutes talking about the team,” he said. “It was quite funny. I asked one kid to write his side down in formation on a piece of paper. He had two defenders in a 2-6-2. I told him we would do that against Manchester City.” Is he joking...?

Not expecting anything from this, and I think it speaks volumes that there's no thread for this even with just a couple of hours to go. We have four fit defenders, so I expect that we'll lose 2 or 3 nil, with two mid to long term defensive injuries. Carver will then opt to come out of retirement and play himself. City likely starting with Bony?

You are posting some really bizarre comments though...

I actually don't think it's possible to be more of a bellend than Sherwood, he's pretty much dictionary definition material on that front.

Could just be a gambit from his agent in contract talks with us. You'd hope we aren't stupid enough for anything else.

What did he do now?

Fucks sake...

We are gonna get caned by City...

I think so, I remember Ant's post stating as much... it was literally only for a few hours though. And he was being a total arse in that thread, if memory serves.

Does seem to have properly flounced this time. Is he still active on NO? Can't believe he took getting banned for 12 hours so personally...

Wait, there's Wilkinson as well isn't there?

As proven by the Telegraph and Oborne this week. As I said though, it is possible to develop a balanced view by reading news from conflicting sides. The issue with RT is that many of the people who read it in the West do so because they are either a) hugely deluded about it's factual accuracy or b ) consider it to be a means of 'fighting the power'/resisting propaganda in the West. I think a news source with an agenda for exposing Western political maneuverings that isn't entirely funded by an oligarchy with strong anti-West sentiments is probably a better source of information for the latter group - but reading RT is considered 'edgy', which is the only reason I can think of that people in group b continue to read it.

So that's Colo and Williamson for the foreseeable then... Collapsed lung was it?

RT - Russia Today. It's Russia's BBC/CNN equivalent. As with Chez, I've had some frustrating conversations with people over the years who felt that RT was some great bastion of factual accuracy and independent reporting. I think it's the hipster news channel to be honest. That said, they do cover stories that the Western press don't (about the West) so the argument works both ways. An awareness of a range of news sources is generally best, if time consuming...

Those are two very different kinds of war that you're talking about...although I don't actually think we'll have a seen a war like any that would come about from the West vs Russia Not sure any of us would survive it either. I think it's pretty easy to slate the American military, but they have been exceptionally clever in containment of Russia (look at where their military bases around the world are, from Osaka to Europe), and they've actually played a fucking good hand with the oil prices in the past couple of months. Yes the Afghan and Iraq wars were a shambles on the face of it, but they were never supposed to be examples of military precision - they were for political victories at home, and for the securing of oil - both of which were achieved. Putin is a hugely clever politician, but he succeeds because he does enough to make his point without doing so much that it forces Europe or the US into a position that they have to attack from. If Russia was so sure of itself in a fistfight with Europe, why hasn't it been more aggressive? It's because it's a charade. What is it about the Russian military's aging warplanes, ships, subs, and general lack of infrastructure that makes you think that they'd win a battle, head on, with the US or Europe? I don't even think Europe would need the US to become involved (although it'd get dragged in one way or another, and Russia would end up with a war on two fronts - a losing proposition from the outset). If Russia didn't have warheads, they'd have been taken out of the game years ago. Aside from all of this, Putin has much more to lose by continuing the aggression than Europe does. We've already moved/are moving to alternative fuel sources that make us less dependent on Russian oil. The Americans secured further reserves while getting 'mashed' in Afghanistan, and Russia was forced into an oil deal with the Chinese that they make a loss on for the next 15 years in an attempt to combat all of this. The Russian threat will die with Putin. It's the Chinese who will remake the world order. Using Russian resources, it would seem.

That's a really interesting article..! And has improved my opinion on Miliband considerably. I never thought I'd see the day.

I don't doubt it. I also don't think that the rest of the world would do anything (although I do think that the next thing Russia did would probably kick off an actual intervention) I would like to see an aging Russian military take on a competent modern force though. I suspect that they wouldn't be quite so bold...

Maybe we could shoot one of them down and blame the Ukrainians.

That is both inspired and unsettling.

I like Akbars but then I'm really easy to please with curry. Still consider it to be one of the best though.

Mate, it's the hope that's been killing us for years now... just let it go. Take heart in the fact that he's probably going to get you back to the CL though, unlike us with our mid-table obscurity.

Fair enough, but that might be why the club's policy is officially what it is though? Even if they can get round it, would they necessarily publicise that they're getting round it?

The gist, apparently, is that they shoved the guy off the train because he was French, not black. They then realised that, since the man was black, their actions could be construed as racist; and so 'ironically' sang about being racists as a taunt to the media, given that Chelsea have what their supporters believe to be an undeserved reputation for this. I fully agree that it's patently nonsense

Do we not need to be upgraded as a training centre before we can increase the size of our catchment area, or am I just making stuff up again...