peterms

So front page articles need to be factual? Hmmm, rather cuts down the scope, don't you think? I think it was posted front page because it was cogent, tackled some current ssues of concern, and wasn't a slagging. Just my opinion. It's good to hear the clear backing of MON. That won't end the concerns, though my view is the concerns are overstated.

Now you mention it, I have some vague memory of MON's comments. Don't know what it meant or what happened, though. On the point about who qualifies for bonuses, I take your comment as tongue in cheek, but I very much hope it's not just one or two players. Performance pay is fraught with dangers. One danger is rewarding people unequally when the outcome has depended on all of them. The theory is that team efforts should attract team bonuses. If people feel that their efforts have led to someone else getting a bonus while they have been overlooked, then that has the potential to be massivly demotivating for them, while not being especially motivating for the people who get the money. Result - less effort next time, discontent, and no particular thanks or ectra effort from the people who get the handouts. PRP is a murky subject, and one where the actual outcomes often run counter to people's gut feelings. These schemes more often demoralise than motivate. I imagine the effect is even more marked in football, because I think the influx of crazy money, agents, and the abandonment of wage structures, have all combined to create a madhouse where no-one is thinking further than next week. Arsenal tried to think long term, but couldn't hold the line. Credit to them for trying. But we are now in an untenable situation where something has to give.

The issue about other players' reactions is an important one. I think there is scope for causing a lot of discontent and undermining team spirit if differentials become too great, or if someone has a "top dog" clause. I think we all recognise it's not about the money per se (how many people can truthfully say there is something they plan to do and value doing that they can do on £55k a week but not on £45k?), it's about perceived status. And when pay is used as the measure of appreciation and status, keeping a collective team sprit becomes that bit harder. I imagine most players won't begrudge someone more money if they are really delivering, but to see someone get more money even when they are playing poorly, just because someone new has negotiated a higher rate, must be pretty divisive. The other point I think hasn't really come out in this thread, though I think it's been recognised before, is the problem of trying to move on players who are past their best and who are on wages that no-one else will match. If the wage structure promotes high wages, triggered increases, and has no provision for redcutions based on appearances, that spells trouble in my eyes.

Yes. In fact, my proposal for a law, should I ever get to pass one, is that caravans should be allowed on the road only between the hours of 3am and 4am. And camper vans only between 4 and 5am. That'd sort the ****. Let them spend their lives waiting, like we do whenever they're on the road. Ever seen a caravan pull in to let people pass? About one in 40 do. All the rest are selfish clearings in the woods.

I'm relaxed, calm and confident that we have the right leadership in place to build a successful club. I don't believe we will have signed fifteen world class players by Thursday. And I don't believe that the expectations of some people on this site are reasonable or realistic. We are making susatined progress and building for the long term. Immediate and total success would be nice, but then so would immortality and superpowers. But if I don't get them, I'm not going to cry myself to sleep.

Optimist/pessimist are fairly objective descriptions. Whinger and moaner are not. If you read a challenge to pessimism as an attempt to enforce one view, then you read far too much into it. There are many different views. "Two camps" doesn't really describe the variety of views that I see on here. At the same time, if you want to broadly categorise things by saying that some people appear fairly optimistic, others pessimistic, then most people would know what you're saying. But moving from this, to asserting that stating an opinion and challenging others is an attempt to dictate a line and say that no-one may disagree with it, it really a massive leap which in my view is just wrong.

Some people's views are more optimistic, others are more pessimistic. Fact. What's the problem in recognising that? And if someone airs a view which others think is too pessimistic (as many have done), they have the right to disagree. Why interpret it as an attempt to impose one view at the expense of any other?

Good article. Nice to see a bit of perspective on things.

Great article. I agree it's useful to try and see it from the other point of view. On another thread (his only contribution to any thread other than his own, and significant for that reason) Krulak wrote If he sees the Harewood signing as the cause of the scepticism, I think he's wrong. It was what set off the widespread expression of frustration, but that was there already. I think the cause is the perceived gap between stated ambition and action (ie statements about ambition, but signings both fewer and lower profile than fans took this to mean), coupled with a memory of Ellis' deception. The scepticism is both unfair and out of proportion. It seems to me that what Fitzerald said was essentially no different from what Krulak had said earlier, ie that the ambition was to compete at the highest level and the funds would be made available to do that. Many people translated that into immediate signings of world class players. Which is, yes, where MON comes in. Blandy mentions him wanting players with a point to prove, and this is exactly what he said when he started at Celtic, I understand. He's also careful with other people's money. And starting from where we are, it would require quite a leap of faith for a world-class player to sign up straight away. So he's working towards making tangible improvements in the squad at whatever pace seems possible, but we're unhappy that he hasn't already gabbed Sneijder and Huntelaar and others. I don't believe there is any significant difference between MON, Fitzgerald and Krulak about where they want the club to be, and I think that ambition also fits what we want. But I do think there is a gap between what MON sees as a realistic and achievable way of getting there, and the vaulting ambition of many fans, who want it all now. Is there something that MON could say which wouldn't give away detail that would be unhelpful in future dealings, which would reassure people, which wouldn't make false promises or raise expectations or else depress people? Probably not, actually. There's a pent-up sense of frustration that has built up over many years, and people are looking to the new board to relieve that immediately. It's unrealistic, and maybe the lesson for the board is to expect some of this, try to counter it where they can, not to be upset by it, and trust that in the end people will judge on track record, which so far has been good. Either that, or sign Sneijder and Huntelaar damn quick.

Wrong thread, mate. There's a raging, ranting thread elsewhere. This one's a little more reflective. You might enjoy yourself more in that one.

Agree with this. I've helped organise street demonstrations and collections for the miners, and also crossed a picket line organised by SWP for their own internal and recruitment purposes, little to do with any genuine dispute. It has to do with the circumstances, and any answer that it must always be either right or wrong to cross a picket line makes no sense to me.

I mean things like "holding the country to ransom", a cliche for the last 30 years which purports to be an analysis of what is happening, but in the end is just a grunt of disapproval. A more interesting question would be "in what circumstances is striking wrong?". If your position is that it is always and everywhere wrong, regardless of circumstances, I would suggest that you're operating more on an emotional than a rational level on this.

Your emotions about it are clear. I think people are asking about a reasoned argument in support of your emotional position, though.

On the "sell to buy" point - in previous years this would have worried me, because it would have meant transfers were heavily dependent on the scrapings from the barrel. With the current departures, I mostly see no problem. I don't think they would have played a part this season, and losing them just underlines the commitment to replacing with better. The one exception for me is Davis. As some people have said, he's not an outstanding player. He's a pretty good one though, and I suppose I would like to be sure we will replace him with better before losing him. Since so much depends on the market, I would have found it more comforting to see the replacement first. Still, in the end the manager, CE and owner have to back their judgement. I'm impatient for news, but I'm confident they will do a good job, based on track record to date.

Yes, I agree there's no objectively correct value, it's a case of what someone will pay. I just mean that most commentators speak of him as being in the £6-8m bracket, and would think of £12m as too high, with reference to what other players go for. Sticking out for what you think is his potential market value is one tactic, I suppose. But in a situation where potential buyers will also be looking elsewhere, the selling club has to be careful not to drive away several potential purchasers and be left in a buyer's market. O'Neill has made it clear that he won't pay silly money for anyone, there's not reported to be a queue of suitors, the player clearly wants away and the club wants rid of him; these things all suggest that sticking out for a very high price is a tactic which is more likely to backfire than succeed. I take the point made elsewhere that the valuation may just be another lazy journo making things up, but I think that caveat applies to anthing at the moment.

I don't think people are bitter, more like incredulous. He wants out, you want him out, the generally accepted valuation is around £6-8m, and the club are asking what most people see as a ridiculous figure. It's not how you do business. But if Wham won't shift from that valuation, that's their right. I think that most Villa fans regard it as a joke, though. Especially if you're left with an unsold player hanging around, making waves, getting wages, and preventing a transfer fee coming in which could be used elsewhere. It seems both daft, and self-defeating.

Dont hear of ye olde chavs though.... Well it depends what you read. Their exploits, such as they were, certainly don't survive though several centuries. But if you seek it out, descriptions from those times and others suggest we've always had a chav problem. If only it was as simple as being harder on the little shits, we'd have stamped it out millenia ago.

I think we have come to a time in this country that we do need something to guide the masses, but religion isnt it - society needs a more realistic alternative that will encompass the masses. Either that, or just make punishments more severe - I mean ASBOs are a **** joke and petty crimes these days usually go without punishment due to the huge amount of time, money and effort it takes to get somebody charged. Well, we tried that in the Dark/Middle Ages. I'm not aware that it was enormously effective.

But maybe the masses still need controlling? After all, in this country, as people are becoming less religious, are we seeing an increase in stealing, cheating, violence, etc. Some people don't have the brains/willpower to self-impose a moral code, and so need a guiding force like religion to control their wild impulses. by the way, i'm an Atheist (who was brought up as a Hindu). Mmm. But those who practice most antisocial behaviour are pretty unlikely to subject themselves to the social control of religion. So, in a society where religion has lost its ability to control behaviour - (and by the way, this ability came from social disapproval in a context where most people listened to the church, not from something innate in individual belief in some spooky ethereal being) what role does religion have in keeping the streets more pleasant to walk in? Not much, I'd say. It's down to us to sort it out. God's resting, or otherwise engaged.

So you dropped a button in the plate and spewed up in the church

Agree. But in cases where the business is struggling to the extent that a downturn in trade (not profit) of 2.8% is enough for the business to go under, and where they have the option of selling the premises, selling the licence (see above), and making a bigger return more quickly, don't you think they will already have been actively considering this option? It's simply not the case that everyone was existing in a happy, steady-state until the smoking ban came and ruined eveything. If you want an analogy, look at owners of private care homes who are selling up and cashing in. They will give as their reason the increase in regulation, the trimming of placement rates and so on. Truth is, it's not any one factor - it's a complex set of circumstances which taken in the round means that another option begins to look more attractive. Many of these would have sold up anyway, because it makes financial sense. Just because they say that one factor did it, doesn't mean it's so.

I think the point remains, though, that most of the comments in what you've linked point to the drink driving crackdown as being far more significant than the smoking ban. And I'm sure you don't expect us to take the smokers' lobby group as a source of objective information. It is true that there has been a rapid acceleration in the number of rural Irish pubs closing. Before leaping so quickly to conclude that this is because of the smoking ban, despite the comments of friends, family, publicans and assorted worthies, consider the logic of the situation. Pubs have closed in some areas, and opened in others. But the smoking ban applies equally in both. Are rural smokers so much more resitant than townies to popping outside for a fag? Unlikely, I'd have thought. The drink-driving crackdown, though, is a far more important disincentive to pub-going in rural areas where there is little or no public transport. As some of the comments you've quoted show, that is seen as a big problem for rural pubs. Also, to create a new drinks licence you have to extinguish an existing one. So some pubs are being bought by people who want the licence for a more profitable use, but not the pub. Saying that the smoking ban came in, pubs are closing, therefore the closures are because of the ban, without taking into account all these other things, is really a very weak and misleading argument. The Irish Times covered these arguments a few months ago - I'm not sure this link will work for many of you, it's a subscription service, so I've quoted it below and bolded a couple of key points.

Well, I'm just going down the shop for a pint of milk. There'd better be some quality signings by the time I get back, or there'll be trouble.

Last one I seem to remember was Hassan Kachloul - stole him at the eleventh hour before he signed for Ipswich(?) - and look how well that turned out! I believe when we signed Michael Boulding from Grimsby, we beat both Exeter City and Cannock Town to his signature.

Nothing wrong with taking the piss. My point was simply that your comparison was neither a good analogy, nor something which took the piss out of the opposing argument. I'm sure there's a convincing point struggling to come out there, but I just don't see it yet. Maybe I'm missing something.