Tamworthram

He was standing in an offside position but was not committing an offence (IMO) as he didn’t play the ball, wasn’t obstructing the keepers line of vision and wasn’t obstructing the keeper from getting to the ball. I guess it’s the last point that is marginally debatable. For all the stick Atwell is getting (rightly IMO for taking so long) doesn’t VAR protocol say that the referee makes the final decision. VAR is exactly what is says - an assistant. Or have I got that wrong? If I’m right then the fault also lies with the referee but, I can’t ever remember a referee reviewing a decision, based on VAR advice, but deciding to stick with their original call.

The opening 20 seconds of “You’re by best friend” by Queen. The saxophone intro to “careless whisper”

I'm never going to dress up as a crusader Knight, paint my face with the cross of Saint George or have a tattoo of a bulldog on my arm but I am unashamedly quite patriotic. I want every England team, regardless of gender or age group, to win every game they play whether that's in football, rugby, hockey, cricket or tiddlywinks. The thing is though that when it comes to the men's football team I've resigned myself to the fact that, generally speaking and despite all the hype, they're not very good, they're not particularly entertaining and they usually seem to lose as soon as they come against one of the "good" teams. I look forward to every tournament, more in hope than expectation, that this time it will be different even if we start badly. I'm saddened to say that, for most games (obviously it's different for the later stages of a tournament), I don't get too upset if I can't watch the game for any reason. In my younger days, I've attended a handful of England games but I doubt I ever would again. ☹️

Maybe we only offered him 2 years or didn't think he was worth the money Oxford were prepared to pay. Assuming we even made an offer🤷‍♂️ I'm not alarmed if we were simply out bid by another team. It doesn't mean we couldn't have afforded more. When you go to an auction you bid what you think the item is worth not necessarily the maximum you can afford.

Racist 😀 Marc is the Scottish Gaelic version of Mark and he is Scottish.

Distinctly second best since half time. If this continues, I see an equaliser coming with our blushes spared by the obligatory penalty from Kane.

You should know by now not to assume all comments on the forum are factually correct. Even from those “ITK”. 😀

Assuming you mean what I think you mean then yes, you do need away membership for your 15+ games to apply. Without away membership it doesn't matter how many games you went to. In order to manage to get tickets for 15 away LEAGUE games last season then surely you must have had membership last season?

Yes for me (at least Shrewsbury and Lincoln I think) but I am in the 5+ category.

It seems to have come across as a joke to everyone else. Like I say, probably best to just accept that you were the only one that missed it. It's happened to me plenty of times. Of course I felt a fool initially but I moved on. No big deal.

As did everybody bar one it seems. Sometimes it's best for folk to just accept with good grace that everyone else got the joke but it went over your head (not yours obviously). Heck, it's happened to me often enough.

Not necessarily a concern. Maybe Oxford were simply prepared to offer him higher wages than us - we all know money talks. Or, more likely IMO, they offered him a longer term than we were prepared to offer. According to the BBC, Oxford have signed him as a “long term contract”.

Except for a place in the squad and his wages that could be offered to someone else.

As you say, that could be the point. If his current salary is outside of our new salary structure and we'd offered him an extension on the same terms (just to make sure we get compensation), he might well have snapped our hands off (depending on what his actual salary was and what he agent can get for him at other clubs).

Just to counter balance the comments I’ve placed on the “things that should work but don’t thread”, I’ve recently had three appointments at Solihull and Heartlands hospital in Birmingham. In each case, I was in and out within an hour. I also had a CT scan at Solihull on a Sunday. I wasn’t even there long enough to trigger a parking fee.

I have been at the hospital for 9 hours with my daughter over the last two days (for booked appointments I might add, not A&E). On Thursday she was told she needed an injection. We could either wait “a few hours” (it was already 5pm) for the pharmacy to make it up or, they’d order it and we could come back in the morning when it would be ready and waiting. Of course we chose the latter. Needless to say, it wasn’t ready and we had to wait another 3 hours. Even when they said it was ready and they were sending a porter to collect it it still took another 40 minutes to arrive. It must be a damn long walk from the ward to the pharmacy. Regarding A&E, I know as you say lack of rooms is a problem but so is lack of staff. I was there (Sutton Coldfield, not Derby) recently with my father in law. There was one nurse having to keep an eye on three different bays at once. And yet, in the ward where my daughter was (don’t forget, booked appointments only) there were three nurses doing not much at all. On Thursday I heard one of them say to another “we don’t have any scans booked for tomorrow. What are we going to do?” I guess it’s not as simple as it sounds but you’d think the department could “lend” a nurse to A&E (and recall her if things suddenly got busy). She might not have the specialist knowledge to do a great deal in A&E but she could have helped keep an eye on patients (in my scenario) and cleaned up the vomit etc (in your example). I’m not blaming the nurses (except the one that it would seem failed to order the injection from the pharmacy).

Is buying Crypto any more secretive (from the people likely to kill you) than buying gold or silver? I don't think anyone would dispute the fact that Mexico has a very high murder rate but I'm not sure there is any correlation between that and crypto sales.

Would Bitcoin protect you from death? If so, someone is missing a massive USP.

I suspect the overwhelming majority (if not all) posters on this forum are anti war. However, to rely on reason prevailing would only be feasible if the world was entirely made up of reasonable people which, of course, it isn’t.

Off to the Dordogne on Sunday for 12 nights. I normally drive (via the Tunnel) but this year we're flying into Bergerac then heading east to Vitrac.

Isn’t that the point/problem with parachute payments? They can afford to blow that sort of money on players who collectively weren’t good enough to compete in the Premier League but might well be far too good for the Championship (depending on whether they were wise signings and who their next manager will be).

Fair enough then. We’ll call it a draw. One right and one wrong. 😀

You’re actually wrong on two accounts I believe. 1) Not all the fans were behind the advertising hoardings. 2) According to the FA rules of the game, the referee cannot reduce the minimum time added on: The fourth official indicates the minimum additional time decided by the referee at the end of the final minute of each half. The additional time may be increased by the referee but not reduced.

I think there is a precedent for “being charged” for failing to control your fans but certainly not for any points deduction (apart from the suspended deduction for Reading but that was because their pitch invasion was an orchestrated event to disrupt the game). The worst we’ll all get (which is what I said, if they’re going to charge us then they they’d probably also have to the likes of Ipswich and Wrexham) if anything, is a fine IMO. If the referee thought the game couldn’t continue because his assistants were impeded (you’d think that would have come out of his report long ago), they he could have paused the game whilst the touchlines were cleared.

The football authorities having a concern for fans travelling to away games? That'll never catch on. 😀 I do seem to recall listening to, or watching, a short programme about how the fixtures are initially generated automatically but then someone spends hours manually amending it in order to take account of major events and local rivals not playing at home at the same time.