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Good job there's no evidence of him being in the UK in the last 14days...

Several have another game tues/wed. Also Krul didn't score either.

🥳 Yay! Not the most relaxing Saturday evening! Thanks for all your picks, PUPs! This is for all those annoying 5/6s!

Including Buendia 😂

I like the one where the two couples are discussing alarm systems (Verisure) whilst having a meal. One of the women says how reassuring it is to have an alarm and the other one tells her partner that they should get one. Throughout the advert the men respectfully do not interrupt their partners and agree (by nodding) with the conclusion that getting an alarm is a good idea. At no stage do the men attempt to mansplain about how alarms work and neither of them attempt to make it their idea that they should get an alarm. Good work by the good people at Verisure.

They should just follow us on here VW I think. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58452953

Kenny was the U21 coach for a couple of years and the idea was he would implement a new play style and see it through from youth to first team. I believe when he was announced as U21 coach, it was also announced that he'd take over the senior team in 2020. This is why the ROI team is a bit of a 'work in progress', they are trying to focus on younger players and develop a whole philosophy - I guess similar to what England did with the 'England DNA' plan. Unfortunately for Ireland it doesn't seem to be working as quickly as they hoped. The focus on youth is probably why players like Idah and Omobamidele get call ups - I don't think they would have done normally due to lack of game time. I'm not sure Northern Irish Neil Lennon would be a popular choice for the Ireland National Team (also the fact he is a fairly awful manager as well).

Much more important is that no one gets injured, and all return safely back ready for the Prem games ahead.

I reckon Arrdee and Lapps have gone for a beer 🍻

Lots of division on here but here’s maybe something we can unite on. Hatred of adverts. Lets relax and share our most annoying current adverts. Internet, TV whatever. personal worst one at the moment, the climate change pledge ads with the self important kids in it. When that Australian kid says “do more sustainable farming, it’s a thing now” it makes me want to get in my car and just start revving it. It’s makes me want to disturb a family of endangered water voles. What moron thought that this could encourage people to want to do more to act on climate change? proof, if any more was needed, the climate issue will be solved by clever scientists and engineers. Not spineless politicians or hippies covered in red paint who have never worked a day in their lives.

Some do, and some don’t I guess, Greavsy - just as is the same as us mere mortals! Don’t blame Emi etc for wanting to play for their country, but agreed, there are clear laws in place and they have flouted them, they knew this, end of. I’m just pleased we’re not having to deal with all of this - let’s say we didn’t sign Tzolis etc, and we were facing Buendia doing several months jail time once the transfer window had shut - we’d be royally screwed this season. Dean Smith must be tearing his hair out wondering how to handle this one - Emi’s only been there 5 minutes and already it looks like he’ll miss a significant amount of games for them this season as long as he continues to get called up and there are 14 day quarantine restrictions and red tape in place.

Hahaha ok that's fantastic

If the rumours are to be bealived only reason Emi joined Vila is that Martinez convinced him too

Watched this from the get go - some episodes are comedy genius with touches of wonderful sentiment, but others fall short- it's generally worth a watch though! #believe #footballislife

I think Emi will say to the authorities that as Cambridge didnt start a thread about it - it didnt happen. So nothing to see here!

Apparently the Brazilian Health officials got stuck in traffic and hence why this all happened after the game kicked off. As Messi has just said though "We've been here for 3 days, why did this not happen before?"

Mortimer and Whitehouse Gone Fishing. On BBC2 now 👍

He's got what he cares about though. Money and his fashion line/social media celebrity.

Sorry all, Vera will be on instead 👍

Thanks, First Wazzock. (I was allowed one reaction and no more! 😆)

Handing out caps older players that are no way near first team level and no way when he could be blooding youngsters. I guess we can leave that for the summers right Gareth. Also why not have Saka take pens like this that are a little bit less important before giving him the biggest in his countries history?

Adverts for products that start with “vagi” where are all the special soaps and lotions that start with “n o b “ ?

https://public.flourish.studio/visualisation/4045161/ https://public.flourish.studio/visualisation/4044787/

There are lots of things we can do about this Brexit, but all start with a new non-Tory government. Freedom of Movement Customs Union Single Market Common Currency European Army Reciprocal education Portable pensions Irish re-unification All independent ideas that could be debated on their merits and we could choose to adopt any one or all of them.

To be fair to the Boomers they just demonstrate understandable self interest. The real issue is when this is translated into a belief they got what they have entirely through their own endeavours as opposed to the luck they had being born in a particular epoch. The answer is simple if you can look passed that. A National Care Service funded by higher capital gains and inheritance taxes combined with the merger of NI into Income Tax.

Because domestic seasons are being disrupted at inconvenient times so England can play Andorra and other similar type fixtures, 156th ranked in the world. There should be world cup qualifiers for anyone over 128 before they join the top ranked countries in the main qualifiers. I would probably go further and make it the top 64 and everyone else has to pre-qualify. No, because that was going to be a closed shop. I'm not suggesting that, just that smaller very low ranked countries should have a pre-qualifying tournament between themselves before joining the rest in the main qualifiers. It happens in all sorts of sports. It's a huge issue imo - or at least it ought to be. The Premier League is already a farce of a league imo, but it is further spoiled by transfer windows and international breaks. People will say, "it is what it is and we have to deal with it" but that doesn't make it right.

To add to what Bethnalo posted, I'll add that the FAI are totally fooked for Cash , mainly due to years of spending without restraint. Google ex FAI boss Jon Delaney if you have time.....an interesting, if not glorious story. Which, added to the ONeil /Keane era, left the FAI little choice but go down the cheaper ' promote from within ' route.

Just another example of why the present international set up is so daft.

Rock and a hard place. He's a good player but he's shifted to 3rd choice with us and while his national team have trusted him enough to throw him in the spotlight at first choice.. His national team is awful

They are woeful that’s true, NI and Scotland are far superior at the moment. Maybe I’m being harsh but I thought Idah would have kicked on a little more over the last few seasons.

In his defence look at the creativity the Irish don't have. Poor idah seems to get a ball down the channels and he's running them on his own majority of the time. They seem to smash it down the line for him to chase or punt it in the box and he's outnumbered.

Bravo Cosmic 👏

It was not a good Scotland performance.

Nice one cosmic…….💛💚

Excellent work.

Getting a goal is not the be all and end all. You can play well and not score, you do know that right?

It was Moldova and they scraped a 1-0, nothing at all to shout about

Normann won 2-0 played well and got taken off with the game done for a rest. Pukki also won and had a couple of decent chances. Idah effectively got the assist for Ireland. Gilmour and Sargent both praised by their managers for their performances. It's not all bad

Problem with this axe grinding is it is not a fact. As any venture capitalist will tell you you have only made money when you realise your assets. Furthermore, it should be considered that S&J own little more than half of NCFC. That is without taking into account that if S&J had invested in other assets rather than a football club they would have received greater returns on that investment due to compound interest.

Fair point Parma but I don't think we can know any of that. The asset is testament to the job they have done as custodians. But trying to second guess what D&M will do in the future through the eyes of how and what other clubs have done probably won't be prophetic. What ever happens will fit in to their unique world view. Or pretty much unique in football. I wouldn't mind betting theyd like to involve another "husband and wife team" at the club. But they certainly wouldn't be after their money.

Delia lost money by investing in the club, because her loans were interest-free. So inflation in the period between the loans being made and then repaid means she is less well off. And if instead of lending the money to NCFC she had put it into a normal investment fund then at the worst she would have kept pace with inflation and probably bettered it. The shares she bought could very well be worth more than she paid for them, but that is at the moment only a theoretical gain since to turn it into reality she would have to sell them to a would-be buyer, and I keep hearing from posters that as a matter of absolute and proven fact that is the one thing she will never do. Certainly if the Nephew Plan happens and the shares are gifted to Tom then she will end up overall in the red. Buying the club will have cost her money.

Thanks Parma. Why Ipswich? Let me answer a different question that was posed here recently, why Crystal Palace? They recently had another(!) investor buy into the club - how do they keep getting so lucky? Well Palace are owned by pretty astute businessmen. They used their contact book to get in Blitzer and Harris to invest in the club several years ago. The latest investor, Textor was looking to invest in a club, the Palace investors looking to sell and the people running Palace are good businessmen. A case of the right man at the right time. Ipswich Town is similar. Marcus Evans was publicly looking to sell. In fact, pretty desperately. He has run out of patience and was no longer going to put serious money in. Regardless of how things have turned out at Ipswich, he's a good businessman. You don't create just a profitable corporation like his through sheer luck. So he's going to be reasonable to deal with, professional. And ORG are looking for someone to buy. For better or worse, they've met some guys who they trust to run football clubs. They've already tried their hand in the US with Phoenix Rising (it seems to be working out). The next logical step is England - like you say it's the current zietgeist. On the face of it though - it doesn't make much sense. Wearing my financial adviser hat - it seems like a very risky punt for a lot of the reasons you (and others) mention. However, there are some reasons why Ipswich. First, as mentioned above, Ipswich were available. Sometimes that is the most important reason. Money burns a hole in a pocket. Another example (that has gone all awry) is Sheffield United - McCabe wanted to sell, a Saudi Prince was looking to buy... Second, as much as it pains me to say, Ipswich aren't where they belong. It's pretty reasonable to say that they are punching well below their weight in League One. A little investment and they should easily be back in the Championship. An easy opportunity for a return. Third, is cashflow. As touched on by another poster, OGR didn't actually need to front much cash to takeover the club. The majority of the deal 'value' was in Marcus Evans writing off debt - he even kept a stake in Ipswich, reducing the initial outlay. Very little cash needed to change hands. Compare to, say, Norwich, you are needing to spend a lot of cash to buy out Delia and the other shareholders before even thinking of investing in the club. In addition, as opposed to a Championship club, you can overhaul the playing squad cheaply and with most of the cost backloaded (see the ton of free transfers). Overall, the less cash you need to put in upfront, the easier to generate a higher rate of return. Finally, my gut feel is the property is a key part. It's in effect an option. If things go well, Ipswich get promoted, then they can re-buy the property. If things don't go well, they haven't had to pay upfront for the expensive land in the initial deal. The other aspect is the owners of the Portman Road land (the Council) and Playford Road (Marcus Evans) are going to pretty professional to deal with (compare to, say, what happened with Wimbledon). All that said - I still don't think this is a good deal - but I've seen worse. Would a UK pension scheme even consider something like this - no chance! Thinking of one of the pension schemes I work with, it's contoversial enough that they are investing even a tiny bit into private infrastructure. This would blow their mind. My prediction is that the yanks and Ipswich Town fans are going to end up disappointed.

Can you read Hungarian? We all knew the reception they would get if they scored let alone run toward them brandishing a slogan. Sterling and the FA must be dumb. You yourself have used the word spastic which could be construed as out of order. I am fed up with us telling other nations how to behave when we haven't sorted out our problems.

It's best to lay out the structure of the investment first. Ipswich Town are now 87.5% owned by Gamechanger 20 Ltd (the remaining 12.5% owned by the legacy Ipswich Town Plc which is principally owned by Marcus Evans). Gamechanger is owned by the Org Az Secondary Opportunity Fund. This is an investment fund managed by investment adviser called ORG. The fund appears to be set up by ORG to invest assets on behalf of Arizona pension funds. There isn't much information on ORG, but they appear to be predominately focused on real estate investment (which makes the investment in Ipswich Town seem a little strange). ORG are listed as a consultant to the Arizona Public Safety Personnel Retirement System pension scheme (PSPRS) , again as a real estate adviser. The fund is listed as a real estate fund. In that sense, the ultimate owner of Ipswich is now the pension scheme. But legally, and more accurately, it is the ORG fund that is the 'ultimate beneficial owner'. ORG will be looking to maximise the return on investment which will in turn be passed on to the pension scheme. According to some quick searches the pension scheme has assets under management (AUM) of $13bn (relatively medium in size in pension scheme terms). The ORG fund has AUM of c.$200-300m. In that sense, the investment in Ipswich Town is puny for the pension scheme, although relatively significant for the specific ORG fund (ORG has several other investment funds). So how can a pension scheme invest in a football club? First, PSPRS is a 'defined benefit' scheme (DB). In short, it means that individuals get a set pension on retirement based on a formula - a defined benefit. These are often referred to as 'final salary' schemes (though few schemes are based on final salaries anymore). These schemes are now rare in the UK (the public sector is one of the few remaining defined benefit pension offerers). This is in contrast to 'defined contribution' schemes (DC) in which the employee gets as a pension what they've put in plus investment return (or loss!) These are the predominant schemes in the UK. The rules on what you can invest in as a DC scheme are much stricter than for DB schemes. This is because, if investments plummet the inidivudal loses out in a DC scheme. Pension schemes must invest in the interest of the pension scheme members. Therefore a DC scheme is much less able to invest in private equity (if at all). Even for DB schemes, UK regulations are now much stricter - certainly more so than the US. PSPRS as a US DB scheme can more easily invest in private equity. In fact it does so. According to its website, 24% of its AUM is invested in private equity (i.e. investments into things like Ipswich Town). This is because it can have a long 'time horizon' to get a return on its investment (i.e. how long it can wait to make money) and private equity investments are riskier and therefore on balance are more likely to provide a higher return. Moving on to management. Pension schemes are hands-off the management of the companies in their investment portfolio. As such they will have no involvement in the running of Ipswich Town. Investment funds (like ORG) also typically do not get involved in the operations of the companies they invest in. They are in the business of identifying investment opportunities - not running companies. It may be the case they are a more 'hands-on' manager, but that appears unlikely. It seems that Brett Johnson, Michael O'Leary and Mark Ashton will running things. ORG instead will be monitoring their investment and checking it is on track. Moving to the investment / finance side, ORG can get a return through two ways: dividends/distributions; and sale (exit) of the investment. The first way can be through dividends or interest on loans. For Ipswich, the dividend route is unlikely - the club doesn't turn a profit so won't be able to pay dividends. Instead, the money would have to come from interest on loans. That interest would have to be paid out of operating income - i.e. money that would otherwise have gone on buying players, paying wages or investing in the ground. The second way is via an exit - that is selling the club for more money than you bought it for. Private equity investors will typically buy in at a 'multiple' (of revenue, or profits or assets), they then seek to increase revenue/profits/assets and exit at the same (or possibly higher multiple). That doesn't quite work for football clubs as the pricing of clubs doesn't tend to marry well to financial metrics. In short, for ORG to get a successful exit they will want to increase revenue (principally via promotion, increased commercial income - see Ed Sheeran); reduce costs (staff redundancies, 'trim the fat'); and improve the assets of the club (here Ipswich Town is light on assets, they don't own the Portman Road land for example). The economics for turning a profit on football clubs is generally awful. I saw Brentford mentioned above as an ideal investment outcome. For perspective, Brentford have racked up the best part of £100m in losses over the past decade. They made losses in each of those years (bar one where they sold the Griffin Park land and made a huge profit on player sales). As a reminder, the ORG investment fund has total assets of c.$200-300m - an investment of even half of Brentford's is not realistic unless PSPRS decides to give more money to ORG (again unlikely as the hundreds/thousands of investments PSPRS has compete against each other at any one time). Even Norwich, which balances the books generally makes losses in the Championship (albeit we usually have larger promotion bonuses). So what do I think the plan is? Immediate promotion this year is the short-term goal. Long-term, I imagine ORG were interested in getting back the Portman Road land and the other real estate assets (ORG is a real estate investment adviser after all) - ideally at a cheap price. I also imagine the goal isn't promotion to the premier league (although that'd be great if it happened, it takes a huge investment). Instead, I'd imagine something more along the lines of Mick McCarthy's reign - get in cheap players, flog players at the peak of their market value and run the club on a purse string. This would hopefully keep Ipswich in the Championship and generate enough income to get those interest payments. With the club owning the real estate again and established in the Championship, they can then work on finding an exit. A final word on Mark Ashton (as I think its important). My experience (when things go wrong) tells me to be vary wary of guys like him. I often refer to these (somewhat unprofessionally) as 'Todler CEOs'. That is they like shiny things, make reckless decisions and then get bored. They like doing M&A (or buying players, see how many players Ashton signed at Ipswich and at Bristol). They like their ego stroked (Ashton at Watford to disastrous effect, see the social media crap coming out at Ipswich). If I was a Town fan I'd be concerned with him at the helm. Apologies for the very long post.

So you're telling me Ipswichs current model won't last and they are gonna end up in the national leauge and then wound up?

Nizet has gone, and Dennis is out on loan to Southend. GOALKEEPERS (8, 1 on loan) HF 1 Tim Krul (born 3.4.88, age 33): signed until 2024 (contract signed in December 2020) F 33 Michael McGovern (born 12.7.84, age 36): signed until 2023 (contract signed in April 2021) H 38 Aston Oxborough (born 9.5.98, age 23): signed until 2022 with club option to 2023 (contract signed in March 2020) Y Archie Mair (born 10.2.01, age 20): signed until 2024 (contract signed in March 2021) H Daniel Barden (born 2.1.01, age 20): signed until 2024 with club option to 2025 and on loan to Livingston for 2021-22 season (contract signed in March 2021) H Joe Rose (born 5.11.01, age 19): signed until 2023 with club option to 2024 (contract signed in November 2020) H Jon McCracken (born 24.5.00, age 21): signed until 2022 (contract signed in December 2020) H 28 Angus Gunn (born 22.1.96, age 25): signed until 2025 (contract signed in June 2021) DEFENDERS (13, 2 on loan) H Sam McCallum (born 2.9.00, age 20): signed until 2024 and on loan with Queens Park Rangers for 2021-22 season (contract signed in January 2020) HY 2 Max Aarons (born 4.1.00, age 21): signed until 2024 (contract signed in July 2019) H 3 inj Sam Byram (born 16.9.93, age 27): signed until 2023 (contract signed in July 2019) 6 Christoph Zimmermann (born 12.1.93, age 28): signed until 2023 with club option to 2024 (contract signed in July 2019) unavailable Timm Klose (born 9.5.88, age 33): signed until 2022 (contract signed in May 2019) HF 5 Grant Hanley (born 20.11.91, age 29): signed until 2025 (contract signed in July 2021) H Akin Famewo (born 9.11.98, age 22): signed until 2023 and on loan with Charlton Athletic for 2021-22 season with option to buy (contract signed in November 2019) Y Rocky Bushiri (born 30.11.99, age 21): signed until 2023 (contract signed in July 2019) H 26 Bali Mumba (born 8.10.01, age 19) signed until 2025 with club option to 2026 (contract signed in July 2021) H 4 Ben Gibson (born 15.1.93, age 28): signed until 2024 (contract signed in July 2021) H Jaden Warner (born 28.10.02, age 18): signed until 2024 with club option to 2025 (contract signed in November 2020) Y 44 Andrew Omobamidele (born 23.6.02, age 19): signed until 2024 (contract signed in December 2020) F 30 Dimitris Giannoulis (born 17.10.95, age 25): signed until 2024 (contract signed in July 2021) MIDFIELDERS (18, 3 on loan) 7 Lukas Rupp (born 8.1.91, age 30) signed until 2022 (contract signed in January 2020) unavailable Tom Trybull (born 9.3.93, age 28): signed until 2022 with club option to 2023 (contract signed in July 2019) HY 14 Todd Cantwell (born 27.2.98, age 23): signed until 2022 with club option to 2023 (contract signed in July 2019) F 23 inj Kenny McLean (born 8.1.92, age 29): signed until 2023 (contract signed in September 2020) 25 Onel Hernandez (born 1.2.93, age 28): signed until 2023 (contract signed in June 2019) unavailable Melvin Sitti (born 14.2.00, age 21): signed until 2024 (contract signed in January 2020) F 8 Billy Gilmour (born 11.6.01, age 20): signed on loan until 2022 (contract signed in July 2021) F Danel Sinani (born 5.4.97, age 24): signed until 2023 and on loan with Huddersfield town for 2021-2022 season with option to buy (contract signed in July 2020) 19 Jacob Lungi Sørensen (born 3.3.98, age 23): signed until 2024 with club option to 2025 (contract signed in July 2021) F 11 Przemysław Płacheta (born 23.3.98, age 23): signed until 2024 (contract signed in July 2020) H Josh Martin (born 9.9.01, age 19): signed until 2023 and on loan with Milton Keynes Dons for 2021-22 season (contract signed in May 2020) H Daniel Adshead (born 2.9.01, age 19): signed until ???? (contract signed in June 2019) H 10 Kieran Dowell (born 10.10.97, age 23): signed until 2023 (contract signed in July 2020) H Matthew Dennis (born 15.4.02, age 19): signed until 2022 and on loan with Southend United for 2021-22 season (contract signed in July 2020) Reece McAlear (born 12.2.02, age 19): signed until 2022 and on loan with Inverness Caledonian Thistle for 2021-2022 season (contract signed in July 2019) Aidan Fitzpatrick (born 20.3.01, age 20): signed until ???? (contract signed in July 2019) F 17 Milot Rashica (born 28.6.96, age 25): signed until 2025 (contract signed in June 2021) 20 Pierre Lees-Melou (born 25.5.93, age 28): signed until 2024 (contract signed in July 2021) FORWARDS (10, 3 on loan) HF 35 Adam Idah (born 11.2.01, age 20): signed until 2024 (contract signed in December 2020) F 22 Teemu Pukki (born 29.3.90, age 31): signed until 2022 with club option to 2023 (contract signed in July 2019) F Josip Drmic (born 8.8.92, age 28): signed until 2022 and on loan with HNK Rijeka for 2021-22 season (contract signed in June 2019) F Sebastian Soto (born 28.7.00, age 21): signed until 2023 and on loan with FC Porto for 2021-2022 season with option to buy (contract signed in July 2020) H 9 Jordan Hugill (born 4.6.92, age 29): signed until 2023 (contract signed in August 2020) Tyrese Omotoye (born 23.9.02, age 18): signed until 2024 (contract signed in December 2020) Tom Dickson-Peters (born 16.9.02, age 18): signed until 2023 (contract signed in September 2020) F 24 Josh Sargent (born 20.2.00, age 21): signed until 2025 (contract signed in August 2021) Gassan Ahadme (born 17.11.00, age 20): signed until ???? and on loan with Portsmouth for the 2021-22 season (contract signed in January 2019) F 18 Christos Tzolis (born 30.1.02, age 19): signed until 2026 (contract signed in August 2021) Finally, here are all the squad members listed by year of contract expiry, with (+1) indicating we have the option of an extra year: 2022 Klose, Trybull (+1), Cantwell (+1), Pukki (+1), Drmic, Rupp, Oxborough (+1), Dennis, McCracken, McAlear, Gilmour (loan) (11 players, 3 with an extra year) 2023 Byram, Zimmermann (+1), Hernandez, Sinani, Famewo, Martin, Bushiri, Soto, Dowell, Hugill, McLean, Rose (+1), Dickson-Peters, McGovern (14 players, 2 with an extra year) 2024 Aarons, McCallum, Sitti, Płacheta, Omotoye, Warner (+1), Omobamidele, Krul, Mair, Barden (+1), Gibson, Giannoulis, Lees-Melou, Sørensen (+1), Idah (15 players, 3 with an extra year) 2025 Rashica, Gunn, Mumba (+1), Hanley, Sargent (5 players, 1 with an extra year) 2026 Tzolis (1 player) ???? Adshead, Fitzpatrick, Ahadme (3 players)