Thetownend.com

Ha Ha in yer face you jock bastard!! :clap:

Thought this was good too:

"It is a unique experience to go to Stamford Bridge having the world of football watching - we have got nothing to lose"

Wigan manager Roberto Martinez

Obviously forgot pride!! :D

Premier League is becomming a bit of a joke in terms of the gap in standards.

What would it take before they moved to act? A 10-0 scoreline, 15 nil? 20 nil?

I can see double figures on a few occasions next season.

Couldn't give a fuck about Chelsea or Man U. A northern bunch of cunts wins the title or a Southern bunch of cunts - what a choice.

I look forward to listening to the weekly village idiot fan calling 606 boasting about Chelsea's phenomenal season... The same chap who called two weeks ago calling for the sacking of their manager.

Pre-Season could be interesting for fans of the "bigger" Premier League teams as many of them need to spend if they want to compete in Europe.

ditto Leeds fans on 606 yesterday-wankers

yeah-biggest meh of all time.Premier league is a fucking joke!

Could not agree more. Crap League

There's plenty of good things about the Premier League but I must admit that I found this campaign quite uninteresting.

Agree with you rich.

The Premier League is just a load of over-hyped, hideously over-priced, over-rated, boring shit. I've not watched a full 90 minute game for probably four years now.

One of the reasons I love the NFL is that one of its main aims is to achieve 'parity' i.e. a level playing field. They do this, primarlily, in two ways:

1) A salary cap - does what it says on the tin. Each team can only spend a certain amount on players' salaries each year. This means that a top team may have several of its best players out of contract in one season but they cannot pay them all the amount of money those players command because of the salary cap and those players become free agents and are free too sign for any team they like (providing that team is able to pay those players what they are asking for whilst staying within its salary cap)

2) The draft - the worst team from the previous season gets the first pick of all the top College players in that year's draft (and the second worst gets the second pick and so on) The College game is pretty much the only source of new talent for the NFL teams so this is a pretty big deal.

Obviously the second point cannot be applied to (our) football as it's not set up in that way but you could certainly have a salary cap. I know it won't happen because there are way too many self-interested greedy bastards for it to ever happen.  What it means in the NFL though, is that you get a far more open and interesting competition.  The Cincinnati Bengals for example, only won four games in the '08 season but won their division and got to the play offs in '09. The New Orleans Saints were bottom of their division in '05 but won the Super Bowl this year. Similarly, teams who are in the play offs one season may finish bottom of their division the next season.

This is not to say the whole thing is a totally random 'crap shoot'..you still tend to have certain teams who are among the top teams every year (Baltimore, New England). Similarly, you have other teams who are scrapping around at the bottom such as Detroit and Oakland (although even Oakland were in the Super Bowl in 2003) The point is that where teams finish has more to do with good coaching and good management rather than who has the biggest wallet.

The game is much, much better for it. 
The Premier League is just a load of over-hyped, hideously over-priced, over-rated, boring shit. I've not watched a full 90 minute game for probably four years now.

One of the reasons I love the NFL is that one of its main aims is to achieve 'parity' i.e. a level playing field. They do this, primarlily, in two ways:

1) A salary cap - does what it says on the tin. Each team can only spend a certain amount on players' salaries each year. This means that a top team may have several of its best players out of contract in one season but they cannot pay them all the amount of money those players command because of the salary cap and those players become free agents and are free too sign for any team they like (providing that team is able to pay those players what they are asking for whilst staying within its salary cap)

2) The draft - the worst team from the previous season gets the first pick of all the top College players in that year's draft (and the second worst gets the second pick and so on) The College game is pretty much the only source of new talent for the NFL teams so this is a pretty big deal.

Obviously the second point cannot be applied to (our) football as it's not set up in that way but you could certainly have a salary cap. I know it won't happen because there are way too many self-interested greedy bastards for it to ever happen.  What it means in the NFL though, is that you get a far more open and interesting competition.  The Cincinnati Bengals for example, only won four games in the '08 season but won their division and got to the play offs in '09. The New Orleans Saints were bottom of their division in '05 but won the Super Bowl this year. Similarly, teams who are in the play offs one season may finish bottom of their division the next season.

This is not to say the whole thing is a totally random 'crap shoot'..you still tend to have certain teams who are among the top teams every year (Baltimore, New England). Similarly, you have other teams who are scrapping around at the bottom such as Detroit and Oakland (although even Oakland were in the Super Bowl in 2003) The point is that where teams finish has more to do with good coaching and good management rather than who has the biggest wallet.

The game is much, much better for it. 

De ja vu?

we should forfeight our play off place and never try to get into the premiershit.it's rubbish!

We'd make it better!

Any Town fan who says they wouldn't want Town "do a Wigan" and settle in the top flight then I'd then I'd think they were crazy.

Sure, it's hype but it's also the pinnacle of English football.

Imposing a salary cap would make English teams significantly less competitive in Europe, and would thus make the Premier League significantly poorer, meaning none of the best players would come here any more.

For the sake of parity, perhaps it could be argued that's a good thing, but in terms of the quality of football it certainly wouldn't. Unfortunately I don't have a much better way of bringing about better competition within the Premier League itself. Yet.

It was better when we didnt have all the best players.

We are spoilt.

What I mean is that a salary cap should apply accross the board, in all countries. I know there's no chance of it happening but that's the only way of ever having genuine competition. I don't see the point in any league where certain teams are so much better than everyone else (i.e Chelsea and Man U over here or Real Madrid and Barca in Spain) What is the point?? It's just boring!!

Football's just gone totally fucking nuts in the last 10/15 years or so. I saw the other day that Jimmy Bullard is on 45k a week..I mean FFS, Jimmy Bullard! He's a reasonable player but that is insane. To me, only the absolute top, top players should be on that amount. Again, I'm talking about all of Europe not just England. Salary levels are obscene and unsustainable and I don't see how anyone can possibly argue with that. Oh yes, going back to Jimmy Bullard, there's no provision in his contract for his salary to come down in the event of Hull getting relegated!

So how do I feel about the possibility of STFC one day getting back to the Premier League? That has to be the aim of Fitton & Co, even thought they've never once mentioned it, it has to be on their agenda. I think we could do it as well. Wigan, Burnley, Reading have done it, why not us? It would certainly be exciting to get promoted to the Prem but would I pay £40/£50/£60 to get into games? No fucking chance. I might go to one or two games a season as a 'special day out' and I would just watch the rest on TV. If we never got back into the Premier League in my life time I really wouldn't be bothered.

Not seeing a downside to any of that: just negatives for the money men and the armchairs, and positives for English football and proper fans

yaknow was talking about this yesterday and saying pretty much the same thing.   I hate the fact that all these prem clubs with plastic followers are playing on a massive pile of debt with players who are paid so much they don't care if they are sat on the bench earning it.    It doesn't mean much any more, it's just a bunch of over-paid knobs posturing and moaning about something or other.

I like our football and the teams we play cos it's real football and we have real fans.  How would I feel if we got into the Premiershit again?  I'd probably still go, but would want it all on our terms even if it meant a season in and then out again.  
might even consider going to watch a good non-league side if things got really crap and we ended up with Xeng Ding Xiu and Fango playing for us

It's a shame for some fans though. I go to games up here and there are so many fans who are far from "plastic" but their crime is supporting their local club.

"Plastics" are leaches.