Alex

I appreciate that but his lawyer, who is meant to be one of the top barristers in the country is probably going to be at least the equal of whoever the CPS have got prosecuting when it comes to persuading the jury.

Aye, that line stood out for me as well. Would love to see a transcript of those infamous programme notes too. Think it might've been this match: http://www.nufc.com/html/2008-09html/2008-08-23bolton-h.html

By pleading guilty he automatically gets a lesser sentence I think. Reckon he was banged to rights with the two he admitted to so he might as well have pleaded guilty to get the reduction. For the other two it would appear to be his word against hers so he could easily get off. I wouldn't know what the usual sentences are for the offences he's admitted to though. I think it's horrible what he's done and I think it's very unlikely he pursued her just for the thrill of a snog and a few texts (especially after he was googling the age of consent). Doesn't work like that though, i.e. the need for it to be proven 'beyond reasonable doubt' with it being a criminal case. Reckon there could well be a subsequent civil case too.

What about this:http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/mike-ashley-eyes-five-year-plan-1449440 as well. Like it never happened as far as most of the press is concerned.

Think it's more down to sentencing guidelines than public opinion. Presumably there's precedent for the two charges he's admitted to carrying non-custodial sentences. His shit-hot barrister will probably get him off on the other two offenses.

80% off something that looks fucking awful and was overpriced to begin with is a bargain though.

Yeah, spot on. You could also mention the promises of various things they are going to do to make things right and improve the situation which never materialise. Remember when Ashley was going to stick £15m of his own money in per season? The extra investment at the academy as well. You also have the aforementioned lack of attention to probably the two most important roles at the club, i.e. manager and chairman.

Metal-detecting is living on the edge

Aye, it's a mental story like.

Do you mean Touching the Void?

or chairman

you were when you argued £80m was fuck all.

Classy

See it's been deleted now.

Hilarious

Penny floater

Have to love the bit where they say the Beeb shouldn't link it to news about the club because they've sacked him

To be fair I largely agree with that but it's a slightly different argument to the amount not being much. I know the £80m has to be viewed in that context too. I do think the manager takes a hefty bit of responsibility for not even looking like turning things around though. You'd think a half-decent one would be able to vastly improve on Charver, even before you take the last two transfer windows into account

Had a woodwork teacher who was a bit 'touchy-feeling' with the lasses. Thought it was bad at the time but in retrospect it was fucking shocking seeing as this was middle school

That's insane

I think if you do it right, i.e. with the aim of improving the squad over the long term then it isn't a flawed policy as such. Look at Spurs for a great example of that. If you're doing it to make money / just keep the club ticking over then it's problematic. Adds to the general malaise borne out of total lack of ambition as well as being unsustainable in terms of maintain the quality of the squad. I'm under no illusions as to the core problem but it doesn't exonerate the under-performing manager

Listen to David Lightman there

It's both. You could argue we had a poor squad before those two windows but I think you could equally argue we didn't have one of the worst 3 squads in the league. Then in those two windows we've spent more than our genuine rivals but we're 3rd bottom. Some of that has to be on the manager

We spent more than the rest of the Premier League though