Meenzer

Two own goals and a fluked cross, mind.

Casting the line into deeper waters? Keep at it, you'll get a catch soon enough. deadly serious, tbh About as realistic as you getting your end away with Elisha Cuthbert, tbh

Makes sense. I presume Gary Speed fulfilled that kind of role for Allardyce at Bolton.

All that and turning into a nation of gay Lithuanian street-sweepers (plus omnipresent chav underclass). It's going to be a tough century.

Bring on the first £500,000 studio apartment in this scabby South London street. With the dollar being so weak, I'd seriously consider moving to the States if it wasn't for, well, having to live in the States...

The Loud Family - Plants And Birds And Rocks And Things

Dub War - Gorrit Rah!

He's a fine figure of a short baldie with dubious fashion sense.

Dexy's Midnight Runners - Don't Stand Me Down

You seem to be terribly paranoid. Hate bandwagon? I've been ripping you over your posting style for aeons man. Aye, it's still funny what it engenders though. It makes me happy and lets you slip out of character into occasional public displays of gross paranoia. How can it be wrong?

You seem to be terribly paranoid. Hate bandwagon? I've been ripping you over your posting style for aeons man.

I would extend it to include don't post patronising smilies. Hypocrisy; nature or nurture: Discuss. No idea, but I bet your parents italicised and underlined you all the time as a bairn.

Depends how many JD and Cokes you've got inside you, I imagine.

Could shag two teenagers in that time though. Apparently.

I was just thinking the same thing--this can't really be a discussion on a message board can it? We're civil and finding common ground! Then again the discussions I've had with you have historically been civil and worthwhile Homo. Enabler! Or something.

Fair enough, aye (I now expect this thread to be deleted on account of us not being anywhere near abusive enough. )

Funniest thing you've said on here yet.

I don't really get it, but then I don't really tend to get anything like it. Doubt I'm exactly its target audience though.

About as close as I can get to guessing what my darling mother might like as a Christmas pressie (other than that cat's arse pencil sharpener, obviously )

Natalie Gauci - Umberella.

My only counter-argument (though I think it's a strong one) is that, in smaller countries in particular, you need to dangle the carrot of "you might get to play against England or France or Italy" in order to make people leave their crops/cows/lucrative banking jobs and agree to kick a football around the pitch a bit in the first place when failure is almost guaranteed. In other words, there has to be a reason to aspire or you'll never get any kind of aspiration. OK, a Liechtenstein is never going to be a world power on the footballing stage, but there's always an element of slippage in this game (viz. the previously decent Estonians now being ranked in the bottom pool), and even making it into the second-last group of countries is seen as something of a badge of honour for the smaller nations in Europe. Maybe it's a fundamental difference between the European (or even British) and American mindsets, but the latter seems to have a lot less time for the romance of the potential giant-killer. EDIT: And, addressing your initial points, a lot of the 'smaller' countries are pretty rich anyway. The last thing a tax haven like Andorra or Liechtenstein has to worry about is a few quid spent on flights and accommodation.

Fop do you just make this up as you go along? It is pointless discussing anything with you, whether tongue in cheek or genuine debate, because you're expert on everything. Am I wrong? In your judgement of the tone of Sammy's original post? Completely and utterly.

Aye, I realise Montenegro had to be seeded in the bottom pot due to their lack of a competitive record, but they did beat Hungary in a friendly so they might be a bit tricky. Still, cheap beer, friendly locals and a spectacular coastline will make it a better away day than England's trips to Belarus and Kazakhstan.

Aye, that and the Fergie track. Like I say, not having a go, it's just so hard to pin these things down in the Internet era. I got into an argument about the release date of "You're Beautiful" once (believe it or not - pub quiz geekery will do this to a man ) - turns out the album was released in late 2004 even though the song itself wasn't a hit until mid-2005.

Kind of... there are 9 groups, so 8 of the 9 second-placed teams go into the play-offs, while the worst is immediately eliminated. Typical FIFA - never a simple solution when you can have a complicated one. You want complicated, you should look at the CONCACAF system. That said, I think it would benefit Europe to adopt portions of that system. I dunno, I know you've got the "get rid of the dross" aspect there, but the European system is precisely what the European countries have grown up being used to. What other benefits do you see in what CONCACAF have to deal with?