Arq

I'm fired up for this as well. I know it's early, but win or lose I'm really hoping for a good show by the lads. Come on you Blues!

A bit? Sorry, had to go there...

I would have gladly, for half of that amount, kicked him in the gut and thrown verbal insults at him for 4 hours. THAT would have been better than what he did... We hope.

Terry imho. Teams love to boo him every time he touches the ball so why not wear the kit of the man everyone else "loves" so much. Add to the fact that he's one of our legends, and I think it's a formula for success. Drogba is a good second.

Wearing one of our kits of course.

I just watched this again and had to give this thread the bump. I know it's preseason, and I know it's a new season. I know that everyone is going to be gunning for us. I know that our Drogs is no longer here. I know that there are some that are already concerned about our preseason results. Me? I'm not worried. Not when I see something like this. We were in nothing short of serious turmoil and we pulled through. Whether or not it's repeatable is one thing but we did it. We will be fine. I know we will. I'm not forgetting this. Not ever. This was magical and truly well deserved. The lads came through, RDM came through, and our fans pulled through. We have some of the best fans on the planet, there's no doubt in my mind. This video, and this forum, proves it. Thanks to the OP for an outstanding 20 min video. Truly f**king amazing. KTBFFH! On to 2012/2013 and hopefully another magical season!

I'd throw the Spuds in that want category especially with loudmouth at the helm... Anyway, my guess at the three that are going down are: QPR, Wigan, Swansea

It's definitely going to be an exciting season Sals. It's hard to gauge expectations for this season because of what we were able to accomplish in the second half of last season. Still, our lineup is looking a lot different and our average age has decreased. I believe we've positioned ourselves well for the future we just need a few more pieces to finish it off. I, for one, cannot wait to get it started!

Either that or we SERIOUSLY need the season to start.

I know I'm probably in the minority but I thought Japan's inquiry was not only smart but correct. They showed the replay a few times and while it was ugly, I thought it was a dismount and he did land on his feet. It really was more like a dismount combined with a fall. What saved the Japanese is that he landed on his feet. He was correctly penalised but I thought a score of 13 and change was too harsh just because of that. If the judges gave that much of a difference then even they admitted that their initial scoring was incorrect. I know for GB that getting the bronze felt like a disappointment but they did one hell of a job. The gap between Japan, GB, and Ukraine was so close what I was hoping for initially after the inquiry was put in that they would award Japan with just enough of of a change to have them tie with the Ukraine and both get bronze metals (with GB keeping the silver). I'm not upset ultimately at the decision but I can see why the GB/Ukraine gymnasts and fans are. It's still something to be extremely proud of. Unfortunately for the Ukraine, that doesn't get them much. And no, I'm not talking about the US gymnast debacle. What a shame for them but they have no one to blame but themselves.

You and I think way too much alike (football wise at least). Must have been some mind-meld over the Euros. If the choices were not limited to strikers, one of the tops on my list is Schweinsteiger. I think he's one of the best midfield players in the world, as well as one of the most versatile, and would be perfect to help drive our attack. I'd also definitely swap Torres for Messi. We would find a way to fit Messi in and he's the type of player you change your formation for. He's that special. Ronaldo I'd also do a swap for even though he has that stigma that he disappears during the big matches. Ronaldo has so much talent that he can change a match in an instant. Agüero I'd possibly do a swap for. And for the record, I hope Torres flourishes and shows us the form that we saw before his injury and his transfer. If he can be that lethal striker he used to be it's just going to help us move forward. He's on his way, he just needs to get there.

This kid is going to be quality for us. I'm excited that he's here.

Cave Johnson is my hero.

Welcome, where in the USA are you located? There's a few of us Americans on this forum.

I think Piazon is going to be a very good, if not a special, player. He's got lots of potential and I believe we're going to see that flourish here. We know what Hazard brings to the table and so far he's shown us exactly what we want to see. Marin is the interesting signing so far. A lot of his highlights are from the season before last because he was injured last season. He's got a very good work ethic and can play a nice through ball. I don't think he's going to feature as a starter, yet. He very well could depending on what RDM wants to do with our lineup and how he develops. What we've seen is two signings of players that know how to play the through ball to our striker up front. They also know how to score themselves. This makes for a very dynamic and fluid three behind the striker. Watching Özil at RM, you'll notice he drifts from his 10 role out wide quite a bit. I believe you're going to see that with us as well, and I find that to be exciting. If we can get our RW sorted, we'll be in fantastic shape. It's going to be a very interesting season indeed.

Welcome to the twitter realm, Ash!

Have to second this. Podolski is usually one of our staples when it comes to International play and he was just anonymous. I expect better of him in the future... Internationally speaking of course.

A man's got to have his toys too!

The beauty of the nettop is that we have a camera hooked up to the TV and we just Skype, etc. right from that instead of fiddling around in the office trying to huddle everyone around my gaming rig. Plus streaming is just win on that thing. Really happy with it. Did you get it working then?

I've never tried it directly because something needs to process the movie format. I'm not sure how good/bad those new Smart TVs are at processing different movie formats. I have a nettop sitting next to my TV and I use XBMC to do the processing of the movie. Since XBMC processes, I just stream the raw data from my home server to my nettop (or directly from any movie/show stored on the nettop). The output is via HDMI to the TV. This can be done with any laptop that has an HDMI out put as well. Not sure what you have available at your disposal, if anything. Speed wise though you should be fine. Your external HD is most like USB 2.0 so the read/write speeds should be good enough but it's still also a slight possibility of an issue since the maximum and actuals are way different.

Final Fantasy Diablo (yes, even 3) Starcraft Phantasy Star (oh how I long for the old Sega consoles at times) Elder Scrolls FIFA Madden Those are probably the best series of games I've played with obviously some in the series better than others.

Stats are stats and while they are good for something, they certainly aren't the end all be all on determining how much a player is contributing. As stated earlier in this thread. Look at Gerrard for instance. Yes his stats numbers in certain categories are higher but look at his minutes played, it's much lower than Lamps, roughly half. That says two things imho. One, it tells me he was either out of favour or injured and we know that he's not out of favour so he was injured. Two, it confirms that the presented stats are skewed because it just taking into account those numbers. The only real way to compare Lamps versus Gerrard, or anyone else, is to have the same amount of minutes played with all of the same factors (team surrounding said player, opposition, etc.) in place. That's an impossibility. Take a basketball analogy for a minute. If I hit two free throws out of two, that's 100%. So based upon stats you can confirm that I'm always going to be a perfect free throw shooter, right? Wrong. The numbers have a lot greater chance to show more accuracy if I shoot one hundred free throws. The stats are one thing but they don't tell the full story. As also stated earlier, I don't think anyone is arguing that we could use a little bit more upgrades to our midfield especially with Lamps getting up there in age but to say he's worse than Gerrard, Scholes, etc. based upon stats is just being naive. There are too many factors to take into consideration versus just stats. It's a good starting basis, but it's not the only thing that should be considered.

How dare you talk sense good sir.

My favourite moment en route to the final is Rambo's goal. As stated before, 2-0 down and not a sniff of goal. Lamps threads an excellent through ball that Ramires chips sublimely over Valdes into the back of the net. If there was no hope at 2-0 down and down to 10-men, that goal instantly gave us hope. Torres' goal was the one that put the realisation in my head that we're going to the final. Until that point, my fingernails were taking a serious beating.

Brings a smile to my face that I cannot remove and goosebumps to my body. Unbelievable night! With Drogs being a main piece of the puzzle that put us over the top!