Latics and England

I have to admit that I am really confused by their boycott. I understand they want Oyston out and can see why they boycott home games but I see no benefit in boycotting away games. It would surely send a bigger message to have Bloomfield Rd empty every home game and a full away end each time they travel. It strikes me that they have 'just stopped going. Oyston's attitude is disgraceful but they are probably back at their natural level now. They are a similar sized club to us in my opinion. I know they have a more illustrious history but I don't see them having that much more potential than us, other than having better facilities (thanks to the Oystons). It is also worth saying that had they actually been going to matches this season and supporting the team, they would have had a season to remember like we haven't had in twenty odd years.

It is far from irrational. It is purely contextualising what has happened. Rightly or wrongly, these things have much more impact when people can relate to them. I wasn't at the Arena on Monday night but I have been there on a large number of occasions and have often walked through the foyer where the bomb went off. That makes it much easier to picture what happened, know the kind of people who would be affected and, yes, to think "that could have been me or one of my family".

Clearly we don't know any of the details here but we are the ones who chose to bring it into the public domain. It seems pretty certain that the amount Bolton will owe us will outweigh what we owe them. I think the £86k suggested by Harry is too high as it ignores the fact that a fair number of the tickets sold would have been concessions. It is probably more in the range of £70k. We had Taylor for under 4 months so assuming we paid £2k a week (pure speculation without any basis) we might owe them around the £30k mark. Whilst I accept that this should result in a simple payment from them for the difference, I can understand why they might be holding it back. If someone owed me some cash for months and I said nothing but then they started slagging me off as soon as I owed them something for a few weeks I would probably be a bit miffed.

Andy Cole when we played Newcastle. Think it was live on Sky and he scored a hat-trick. We just couldn't handle him. Although it was Bower Fold rather than BP, I would have to give a special mention to a very young Michael Owen against our reserves. Showed nothing in his general play to suggest he'd go on to be owt special. Only remember him touching the ball 3 times, another hat-trick. Matt Le Tis on the last day of the season in 93. The result and jubilation overshadowed how good he was.

Tommy Lee Particularly in the JPT Northern final, but generally for a good 5 years

Didn't they state a few weeks ago, when people were making accusations, that the season ticket deal hadn't been brought forward to cover losses? If so, the money must still be there to use over the summer. I am happy to be corrected if that was a comment I dreamed up. I don't think consistency of messaging is our forte.

Instead they now sack their manager for failing to take them up and we have weeks of speculation ;-)

I think this is a bit harsh. They have been in the Conference constantly since '98 (they were only one behind us on the 'nothing happens' scale until they went up) and Vince didn't take over until 2010. I think their fans deserve a bit of success, even if there aren't that many of them. They aren't a Fleetwood or similar getting season after season of promotions after someone ploughs a load of money in.

My biggest concerns about the Labour manifesto issued yesterday would be: this has been billed by the party as the 'most costed manifesto ever' and yet has a massive black hole over the largest costs. To simply add a section at the end of the costings stating that there is an expected quarter of a trillion additional spend on nationalisation and infrastructure which will take advantage of 'near record low interest rates'... I'm sorry, but that is not fully costed. I understand the argument that the actual costs of nationalisation cannot be known as the drivers are outside the Government's control but these costs will be significant and can't be ignored. To suggest as JC did in his interview with the BBC, that most of these will be cost neutral seems far fetched to me. The material increase in Corporation tax rates from 19% to 26% at the same time as we go through Brexit feels like a recipe for disaster. Whilst I do not anticipate a max migration of companies out of the UK following Brexit, combining more difficult EU trading relations with a hike in tax will undoubtably lead to some outflows. I am not in favour of offering favourable rates to big companies to stay but I don't think we should be offering them dis-incentives at a difficult time.

"You'll never get past M'Voto. He's magic, you know". We thought he was great. Shows how good our centre halves were last season.

Insurance is absolutely corporate gambling hence why a club would not, surely, be allowed to take out insurance against results. FA rules are extremely tight on any form of gambling so I would be amazed if they allow this loophole. Even if it was allowed, the premiums on this would be huge. The likelihood of us winning 3 or 4 of those games was not too long. Any insurer would have only offered similar 'odds' to a bookie.

From that video I would 100% sign him up as quickly as possible. From watching him all season I wouldn't even consider it. Time again again he looked disinterested but you cannot argue with those goals which were very well taken. I am sure you could make a video showing all his misses that would look somewhat different. Ultimately I guess it depends whether Shez has seen something in him that suggests he can score more consistently next season (and whether Leeds want him to come back, and whether there is anyone better out there)

If you ever think of changing the name of OWTB, I think Prozac has just come up with the perfect alternative.

An insurance policy against us winning those games would effectively be the club betting on the results. I would be amazed if that was allowed. Why don't we just take out an insurance policy against being relegated?

Not a million miles from the truth although I think you might be largely referring to Simon Blitz rather than Simon Corney

If it was really simplistic, in that: Ten teams as selected by the Premier League (both Manchester clubs, both Merseyside clubs, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham, Newcastle, West Ham & Southampton) are invited to enter a new League 3 along with the top 14 from the Conference League 3 is simply added to the pyramid between Lge 2 and the Conference Relegation and promotion is unchanged except that the B Teams cannot be relegated from Lge 3 or promoted from Lge 1 Lge 1 solidarity payments to each club increase by £1m per year Lge 2 solidarity payments to each club increase by £0.75m per year Lge 3 clubs get solidarity payments of £0.5m per year How do you think that Simon Corney would vote (taking him as a fairly standard owner at our level)? Although simplistic, this seems a realistic offer to me. It would only cost the Premier League £54m per year or alternatively £5.4m per club if paid for by the 10 invited clubs. This is an absolute drop in the ocean for them but would be enough to turn the heads of enough clubs to make it viable. You could double it if you wanted, still nothing significant for the Premier League but way too much for most lower league chairmen to turn down. Even if a club like us realised that this could very quickly lead to relegation if the B Teams were competitive, we would simply see that we would still be £750k better off than by not taking the deal.

In principle I agree but the issue is much bigger than this. You are absolutely right that a reduction in income across the division should simply result in an equivalent reduction in expenditure and therefore should have no impact. This assumes a perfect market, though, and ignores the number of clubs being bankrolled. Plenty of owners would simply increase their personal investment and create further inequality. This is where the argument differs from additional money (eg. increased prize money from the Checkatrade). If you were to increase revenues, that would be likely to lead to increased budgets across the board as the wealthy owners would not cut their investment in line with the extra inflows. The biggest issue caused by the swathes of cash splashing around the Premier League is that it has led to an increased number of owners (not just foreign owners but I accept they probably make up the majority) who are ploughing funds into lower league clubs in an attempt to enter the 'land of plenty'. This has a two-fold effect of creating huge inequality in the lower leagues and leaving these' fortunate' clubs open to financial disaster if and when the owner gives up on their dream. Whilst there has always been such equality it is on a completely different scale now. Prior to the top flight having such wealth, you would get your Dave Whelans and Jack Walkers who would put in relative fortunes but they were doing so because they wanted success for the club that they supported, not because they saw it as a long term investment scheme. This restricted both the level of that investment and the number of people prepared to do it. Today, putting tens of millions in to a club you have no affinity to makes sense to may with the potential returns in the hundreds of millions. This is what I see as the genuine 'trickle down effect' and I don't know how it can be addressed whilst there are multi billion pound TV contracts being handed out like confetti. Whether this is what the chairman of Accrington was trying to convey or whether he was simply moaning that he doesn't get given more of the money I really don't know.

If the EFL (still hate that branding) are prepared to allow the Premier League U23s into their cup because the club's will vote for it with the chance to win up to a couple of hundred extra grand, how does it not follow that B teams will ultimately be invited into the league? If the Premier League offered all Lge 1 & 2 clubs say £1m a year to allow B teams in, they will get in. The club's are showing now that heritage has a price.

We were always going to vote for it to remain in its current format, as will most other clubs. It is an additional income stream and that is all that most chairmen will see. I don't really understand why we went through the charade of asking for fans' feedback though. I would be surprised if many people actually fed back that they loved watching games in empty stadiums or were comfortable with having to make a decision between standing up for something they believed in and supporting their club. My view is that if this is embraced it will lead to the reopening of debates on introducing 'B' teams into the lower leagues which will ultimately seriously damage the integrity of football at our level.

It's six weeks late, but here is the Ernieflag report from the trip to Dortmund in March. Sorry, holidays and work got in the way. One Saturday without football was clearly what it needed to get it finished. http://www.ernieflag.co.uk/site/index.php/the-tour/5-on-the-road/196-season-9-germany Remember to look after yourselves this summer guys. Sun cream is your friend!!!

I would have thought Holloway was potentially the highest. He got a huge offer last summer to go to Fleetwood. We will have had to pretty much cover those wages when we signed him.

I am surprised that people are so confident about these guys all signing. It all depends what they are offered elsewhere. I can certainly see Wilson having other offers and quite possibly Green too. Wilson is in a particularly good position having had a decent season and knowing that we will be quite desperate for him to re-sign. If he gets a sniff that someone else is thinking of offering him a better deal I can't see him worrying too much about a deadline. If it doesn't happen for him and he comes back a week or two after any deadline, do we really think Shez/Corney will have withdrawn the offer?

Motherwell & Hyde?

We are 4 days into the Summer now so it seems like aboit time to start looking towards the return of football. Would be nice to get a fee new grounds to visit come July. I would imagine there is a decent chance of a return to Fylde and their new stadium. Neil Joy's position there must make it quite an easy game to arrange and now they are in the Conference (National League or whatever it will be called next season) it wouldbe a good test for us. Any other thoughts?

Big year for George next season for me. Last summer we were talking about him as the next big thing but he failed to break into the first 11 in 2016/17. He will be 20 in August so he is no longer a young kid. Pleased to see that we have given him a contract but he has a big task on to force his way ahead of Clarke and Gerrard. I think this just shows how difficult it is to blood youngsters when you are constantly in a relegation battle.