The problem there is there are too many "plastic fans" who will just top the brand up. I've seen Old Trafford change as I grew up. My first game in the ferocity of the old Stret, through to the timid, day trip orientated match day experience. I remember the old days of concourse parties after game, now everyone is working their way out to get to Ringway.

As much as any of us who want to be able to afford to go week in week out, and support the club like back in the early 90s want to, we won't be able to, because there is that much geared towards people who just want to go to United and spend £100 in the megastore will keep doing so, just do it more regularly.

Quote ="Ski"The problem there is there are too many "plastic fans" who will just top the brand up. I've seen Old Trafford change as I grew up. My first game in the ferocity of the old Stret, through to the timid, day trip orientated match day experience. I remember the old days of concourse parties after game, now everyone is working their way out to get to Ringway. As much as any of us who want to be able to afford to go week in week out, and support the club like back in the early 90s want to, we won't be able to, because there is that much geared towards people who just want to go to United and spend £100 in the megastore will keep doing so, just do it more regularly.'" It's a lot easier to get tickets now though. You can get tickets for every game in the week leading upto the game which never used to be the case. Any sort of boycott would make an impact this time as there aren't people falling over themselves for tickets anymore. Utd steward sacked after 19 years service: www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/footba ... anner.html www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/ ... 021240.ece

Quote ="Ski"The problem there is there are too many "plastic fans" who will just top the brand up. I've seen Old Trafford change as I grew up. My first game in the ferocity of the old Stret, through to the timid, day trip orientated match day experience. I remember the old days of concourse parties after game, now everyone is working their way out to get to Ringway. As much as any of us who want to be able to afford to go week in week out, and support the club like back in the early 90s want to, we won't be able to, because there is that much geared towards people who just want to go to United and spend £100 in the megastore will keep doing so, just do it more regularly.'" It's a lot easier to get tickets now though. You can get tickets for every game in the week leading upto the game which never used to be the case. Any sort of boycott would make an impact this time as there aren't people falling over themselves for tickets anymore. Utd steward sacked after 19 years service: www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/footba ... anner.html www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/ ... 021240.ece

Just watching SSN, and Kamara said "two players had been dropped for reasons that could probably be worked out, but cannot be indulged", or something along those lines. Maybe I've missed something, WTF is he on about?

Which team?

I can't believe we didn't win that game. We absolutely dominated, even with 10 men. Rooney was fantastic again, Villa were $hite really, didn't really threaten, and I dare say, they wouldn't have scored if we'd have had Vidic or Rio playing.

It's a shame Nani will miss the next three games, including the League Cup final, because he's been on really good form lately.

Hopefully, Fergie's best signing for years, Mr Own-Goal will be fit for the title run-in, his goals will be vital.

Good to see that Saha is still a Red.

Blackburn. Chimbonda and Di Santo. I thought I mentioned it in my first post, sorry. Still, it doesn't make sense, what did they do?

Villa just didn't look interested in the second half and we just ran out of steam at the end

I think Nani will have a case to have the red card overturned as he although he did jump into the tackle he clearly won the ball with his leading foot and his other came though after he hit the ground, now compare that to the tackle on Valencia from Young towards the end when he didn't even go for the ball but took the player out and the ref gives a throw in. I saw the stats at halftime and we only comitted 6 fouls in the first half and had 1 booking and 1 red card

You've got absolutely no chance.

He dived in, both feet off the ground. How could the FA rescind that when it's precisely the challenge that they've outlawed?

Because Nani can show evidence of a challenge (probably worse as he got no where near the ball) in the same game going completely unpunished. As i said he did lunge in to the tackle but won the ball fairly

Dirty cheating Nani. He's just trying to be Ronaldo. Their United careers are identical so far. Start absolutely terribly, looking quite pants then slowly start to improve, have a controversial spell with tantrums and red cards then bang, all of a sudden the best player around.

That's just dumb. If you get a red card and the referee has made a mistake you will be successful in an appeal. It isn't a valid argument to point out a red card offence that went unpunished and ask for your red card to be similarly treated.

The Villa player might end up getting a ban as well if he got off with a red card offence, but you've got no chance of having your red card rescinded.

The Everton V Chelsea game was just brilliant. End to end stuff with Chelsea counter attacking at a frightening speed and Everton throwing everything at them to stop them. There really is no better sight in football than Leon Osman and Timmy Cahill flying round like pesky flies making expensive egotistical mercenaries flail their arms about in disgust at the referee. It was brilliant watching the reactions of players like Zhirkov and Malouda when Everton were impeding them on their off the ball runs.

What I just don't get is what Everton did today that they didn't at the weekend. Everton could have scored 5 or 6 tonight and made chances with almost every spell of possession they had. Against Liverpool they only created one chance in the whole game. Tonight there was zero fear, Cahill was playing up front for most of it and the likes of Donovan, Osman, Arteta and Baines were flooding forward.

Tonight should, if the press were watching, throw a massive question mark over the head of John Terry. He was abused by King Louis tonight, he couldn't get near him. If Saha can control and manipulate him with that much ease, what will they do to him in the world cup? What would we do if the fancy dan foreigners discovered how ineffective Terry is with dealing with long diagonal balls?

Saha had a great game. John Terry had a 'mare. Excrement happens.

Over the last three game Terry has been utterly immense. In the last few games he's been dominating opponents in the way Saha did to him tonight. It's mental to suggest that Terry can't deal with long diagonal balls when in the vast majority of occasions he deals with them as well as anyone.

Your first goal tonight was another undefendable goal IMO. Absolute perfect delivery, missing out the first defender by inches and dipping perfectly for the timed run of Saha.

Your second was a JT balls up by not heading the ball in the first place, but the control and fierce drive from Saha was again spot on.

There were a few incidents like that though where the ball was played in high and he failed to deal with Saha. There was an identical one to the goal that he didn't make the most of.

But perhaps it's just a blip as his mind could easily have already been on the plane to Dubai already.

Decent point for Utd especially with being down to 10 men and Chelsea losing. Arsenal have been let back in though and have a much easier looking run in than the other two so I still reckon it's a three way race.

Good point in the end last night taking Chelseas result into account. They seem to be struggling away from the Bridge at the moment.

For me it doesn't help when our manager says our priority is the CL. If the priority is the CL, then why bother working your off at Everton/Villa/Citeh away in the league when you have something else more important?

There were a few times last night when we farting around like Arsenal, that wound me up a lot. We got ourselves decent shooting opportunities at the edge of the box, but instead tried threading the ball through again, or even worse, playing three extra passes to shoot from a far worse position than we'd just had.

I think there are a few more twists left in the season. I think the lead could change hands a few times between now and the end.

Blatter strikes again

[url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/feb/11/john-terry-sepp-blatter-affairLinky[/url

He needs to quit as he's constantly making a fool of himself.

How do you know he's not right? I wouldn't know the cultural nuances in the latin countries.

Ashley Cole is out for 3 months and may miss the world cup!

Hard to feel sorry for someone who has Cheryl Cole to go home to every night

I wouldn't go so far as applauded, but the reaction over here (Spain) has been far from negative.

Good job Ingerland can call upon best mates Terry and Bridge to line up next to each other.





Giggs out for a month with a broken arm.

Sven has left notts county!

Ex-Lincoln City owner bought the club for a quid [size=50(and taken on the 1.5 million quid debt)[/size

With the debacle continuing at Portsmouth and that which will now occur at Notts County, it's about time they became more strict with football club ownership. I don't mean just the football authorities either, as the HMRC are the ones who stand to lose out in this situations.

I just cannot see why a person or consortium is allowed to purchase a football club that they don't have the money to purchase. The United example is the classic one, they go in and 'buy' the club by lending money, then transfer it into the club's name. IMO that should not be allowed. Football is a loss making industry on the whole, yet people with insufficient capital are allowed to buy clubs that are not profitable, or likely to be any time soon. It's laughable.

It's time they made sure the people buying clubs have a proper plan as the majority of the clubs in financial difficulty are those who were taken over by new 'mega rich' buyers. A few years back I was crying out for anyone to buy Everton, but now looking at the mess the majority of them have made financially, I'd hate to see anyone takeover the club. I'd much rather we financed ourselves by selling Rodwell to Manu, adding another £20m to their debts.

West Ham's new owners are particularly comical. They bought the club and one of their first statements is that the club is in a dire financial situation with millions owed to creditors. In the next breath they state how they are trying to sign a 34 year old has been on £100,000 per week. End of the transfer window and they throw money at three strikers, one of whom I bet they've never even seen on youtube. They have since said that relegation would be 'disastrous financially'. So near the bottom and facing a disastrous financial meltdown if relegated and they want to spend £100,000 a week on Van Nistelroy. Is that prudent financial management? Their statement this week that everyone at West Ham is overpaid also looks particularly stupid, given what Ruud would have been taking home.

The next thing that will happen is one of the BIG european clubs go bump in the night, then everyone panics and we see a situation like the banking crisis where all the clubs are reigned in and face crippling repayment demands to their panicking lenders.