Hmmmn. Interesting thread, not sure how much i agree/disagree with from a German point of view. When talking about 'reminding' Germans of Nazi atrocities you need to learn a bit more about post-war Germany and the groups that make it up. A few posters on here seem to have a good idea of WW2 related German history but not the aftermath - this is extremely dangerous imo. I don't feel comfortable talking about my family history on a football site, but like many others in wartime my family took ###### from both sides. On the subject of the England/Germany and Germany/Poland clashs, you must understand.... The English fans were drunks. The German/ Polish hooligans were just that. BFC Dynamo fans Whilst you can stop all known British troublemakers from leaving their island, you cannot stop Polish and East German thugsfrom travelling around the area. It was quite obvious to see that the German troublemakers were all big, tattoed skinheads (not normal behaviour) whilst the English loooked fresh out of Yates' Wine Bar. Of course what was going to happen, happened. But who were the worst fans in the tournament? Well, we worked on corperate, and i can tell you hands down that those guys are the biggest bunch of uninteresting pr**s you will ever encounter, and next time there are hooligans about, they should all join up and slap the prawn sandwichs brigade about.

I stopped posting on this messageboard because of some of the ridiculous views of some of the English posters when it comes to world football. I'm almost crying as i read this forum, but hey, at least now i can work out why the Sun's readership figures are so high. Rooney - Clearly a yob. Stamps on people, mouths off at referees and, to cap it all, theres that poster. Absolutely hilarious that Englands wonderkid did absolutely sweet FA all World Cup and England were saved by Owen Hargreaves. Theres more than enough evidence that hes a yob, without speaking to him. His much lauded workrate was also pitiful compared to that of Hargreaves, Terry and a good 100 other players in the tournament. Someone also suggested that he would be an ordinary member of the workforce if he did not play football, and therefore not a 'yob'. Do you have to be unemployed to be a yob? Wasn't that fat tattooed England fan from France 98 in a good job? Anyway, i'm happy with the fat chavs performance, it won me a fair few quid from English willing to bet that Rooney would score more than Poldi and Messi. As for diving, cheating etc, EVERY TEAM DOES IT. Yes certain players are worse than others, but to suggest that whole teams are a lot worse is nothing but racism. Eddie suggests the Germans were very quick to go down on the floor. Really? Ballack was going down all over the place but the rest of the team were no worse than anyone else. Having a go at Ronaldo is just the typical English blame game. At least this time the scapegoat gets paid enough to deal with it, unlike the unfortunate referee from the last time.

None of you are right with the Schweinsteiger name translation. The closest i can come up with is someone that watchs over pigs sleeping.

I dunno if there are any clubs that hold similar deals with SWI, but if we are the only one i imagine the club shop is not given any different status to other SWI's of its size. I say this as the Leeds Megastore - considerably bigger than the Ewood store -has a lot of old rovers shirts - some several seasons old - in stock at about 4 quid a pop, and has done for a while. I suspect that the smaller stores only stock 'current lines' and leftovers are moved to the megastores. For some items - if theyve got 20 pairs of blackburn Rovers mittens for example, it would probably be cheaper to bin them than follow the procedures required to sell them at Ewood - the profit on that whole lot may be 20 quid - not worth someones time adding stock to systems, adding a new pickface in a warehouse, transporting them to the store etc. They wont order in any more because its going to be an insignificant figure on the whole sales. I know sod all about blackburn town centre but i'd guess that SWI only wanted the Rovers store because its one of the few places in Blackburn people with a bit of cash in the area go expecting to open their wallets. Oh, and on the subject of the clubshop - did anyone buy one of the 'flitcroft' long sleeved t-shirts just after Shagger signed all those years ago. Blue cotton, with red collar and cuffs and flitcroft + his number (23?) on the back? Now that was proper tat. I wnder where mine is

Was sent this, may be of interest: The truth about Per Kroldrup Apparently Moyes signed Kroldrup without going to see him himself, took the advice of a european scout working for the club. A £5.1 million bid was lodged and Udinese the Italian club who Kroldrup was playing for couldn't believe their luck and immediately accepted Everton's bid. Only after the player was signed and all the neccessary paperwork had been completed, and the player himself had completed his first training session with his new team mates did Moyes begin to smell a rat. Moyes was apparently totally unimpressed with what he had seen and it was only then after he made enquiries with the scout that it dawned on him. Everton had signed the WRONG player!!! The player the scout had watched had been Kroldrup's centre-back partner! This was why the Everton bid was immediately successful and they (Udinese)were it has been reported, totally amazed with the size of the bid. So, Moyes now had a problem, he had a centre-back he knew was not good enough for the Premiership, he also needed to off-load him and get back if possible the club's £5.1 million. How was he going to do this without losing face with the Everton fans. The first thing he did was report to the press that Kroldrup was injured, he did in fact have a slight injury but not enough to keep him out for 3 months ,which is what happened. Eventually through pressure from local phone-ins, fan groups and local and national press asking questions about this £5.1 million invisible man, and also because of the club's injury list, Weir was injured etc, he eventually had to play him against Villa at Villa Park. It was there that David Moyes worst fears were realised, Kroldrup had a stinker, was out of his depth and Moyes knew it. The problem now was that other managers had now seen Kroldrup's non-performance so there was no chance of them getting back their £5.1 million- and he knew it. It has been recently reported that Florentina have put in a bid for £3.6 million, my source tells me that is in fact bull, they have offered Everton 1 million Euros- which is approximately £700,000. An agreement has been reached with Florentina to release to the media that the figure is £3.6 million, mainly, to save face at Everton Football Club. So, there you have it, mismanagement on a grand scale which goes to show how EFC went from being called the Mersey Millionaires in the sixty's to the total shambles which the club is today. Moyes apparently blames Chief Executive Wyness, he blames the european scout, others within the club blame Chairman Bill Kenwright.

I dunno, im not a Boro fan. If you want another player as comparison, Paulo Di Canio wouldn't take the same sort of stick.

This is my point - i don't think they are providing the same level of customer service as they were pre - outsource, and this is rubbing off.

Thats the bugger. Don't think i ever got very far

pretty sure there was champ manager way back then? There was sensible world of soccer out around that time as well, cant remember much about that other than the in-match screen though. There was also another game i used to play religiously on my mates Amiga, one of the first football management games. Can't remember what it was called, but you had to start as a conference club and build your way up - you even had to sell the spaces on the advertising boards round the pitch yourself!! I think theres probably several games you'll find, but you may need various emulators to play.

Hes been taking a load of crap, some of it supposedly quite threatening, from a large amount of Boro supporters who have been waiting for him after every game. Good to see he shrugs it off, couldn't see Rooney ever doing that.

Which as i see it is great from an immediate economic point of view, crap for the long term marketing. Its quite clear that the external companies brought into do these jobs (remembering selling offical merchandise and products within the ground is a monopoly) are making their profits by reducing levels of service, especially staff and product range. Fairplay to them, they are businesses looking for oppotunity and downsizing and strategic portfolio management are simple procedures for them. The question on my mind, is how does this affect Rovers core product of the football(or tickets, if you rather)? Are people going to think they may as well go to the pub anyway, as they find themselves missing large parts of the match due to being in the concourse trying to get a drink or snack? Are people finding they have less of a range of merchandise to purchase and display, therefore cementing the floating/nuetral/rival fans views that Rovers are badly supported? If attendance keeps going down, are these companies going to back out as their profits go down year on year, leaving Rovers to have to restructure again in a few years? Sorry if my questions are explained in Williams notes - ive forgotton my damn username for the official site

I think this is probably where i will end up, back in my wahlmart. I havent got a chance in hell of getting a ticket for a DE game, wouldnt mind going to a smaller game though. Fritz Walter is one of my favourite stadiums in the world as it goes, my father used to play there The fan-park looks like it will be a great place to watch the games from, well a lot safer than Leeds city centre anyway

i think there has to be a marketing department to hear

I think an official dvd with both league games would go down a treat personally.

Yes. Alkthough its less going bust, more been robbed blind by the government.