Addick/Canary

I, too, have days where I can't remember my own name!

Agree. It isn't easy to complete the form but once you work out how to do it, there is some satisfaction in doing so, even if you don't win the prize. I'm not giving any tips, as I want to increase my grandkids' chances. 😀😀

Not unless Lunghi has come back with a very good tan from his hols. (Am I still allowed to say that?) smacks himself on the wrist.

Hi folks. Sorry to interrupt, but I see we have signed a young player from Notts County (possibly as a LB). Now that is optimism! OK back to the politics. Over to you.

Any football news yet to lighten the mood??

Thank God it was that way round. Ed Davey's crowing is bad enough, but the thought of Nigel Farage with that many seats would be frightening. After the disaster that was Brexit, I find it hard to believe that anyone would now vote for any NF-led party (its sponsor-in-chief), other than in a tactical way. To a degree, he seems to have taken the 'disillusioned Tory vote': "I don't want to vote Conservative this time, but I could never vote Labour" etc; once the preserve of the Liberal party. Anyway, back to the football: Always optimistic before the season starts, it's just the reality that brings you back down to earth pretty quickly!

You don't understand irony, do you?

Has he actually been named as the new manager for Lens, as my Google search only confirms that he is leaving Reims? ..and that Haise is leaving Lens, to go to Nice.

Oops! Nobody else spotted it in the 5 hours since it was posted, so well done you.😀 My fault for taking Essex's OP as gospel I.e. Sunderland or Lens. Seems everybody else followed the same line, as most have been criticising North Eastern France, as an area of underwhelming interest, not that I would agree with that, personally.

There's nothing like the taste of a 'Paris Brest'.

Got one already, thanks, but isn't that IPSWICH?

There is a really nice hotel in Noeux-les-Mines, in what was the old mining area and where there is now a ski slope visible from the autoroute. A few years ago, their Maitre d' at the time was a Lens supporter, as it transpired, as he asked to change the TV channel in the lounge, where we were enjoying a postprandial digestif, to catch the end of one of their matches. After chatting for a while, he went off and returned with a second (complimentary) Remy Martin and Cointreau for my wife and I. Do love french hospitality! He will, no doubt, be pleased that Will Still will still be the Lens manager for a while.

Oh, it's another thread about them! I thought for one minute that WILL STILL had changed his name.

...long live the shirt!

18,486 minutes is only the equivalent of 205 games. He's only twenty and I suspect he is really loving it, being able to play the greatest game in the world, and being paid handsomely to do so. Wouldn't we all love to have had the opportunity to do it? Furthermore you don't get to play that many games at that level, both domestically and internationally, unless you are very good. It says more about the difference in his ability compared to Beckham and Lampard etc at that age.