diable rouge

Week 19 fixtures... Tuesday 14th January Brentford v Manchester City Chelsea v AFC Bournemouth West Ham United v Fulham Nottingham Forest v Liverpool Wednesday 15th January Everton v Aston Villa Leicester City v Crystal Palace Newcastle United v Wolverhampton Wanderers Arsenal v Tottenham Hotspur Thursday 16th January Ipswich Town v Brighton & Hove Albion Manchester United v Southampton

Week 18 points... Week 18 table... It's the FA Cup this weekend followed by mid-week PL games, so I will post the fixtures next Monday as a reminder...

Week 18 fixtures... Saturday 4th January Tottenham Hotspur v Newcastle United AFC Bournemouth v Everton Aston Villa v Leicester City Crystal Palace v Chelsea Manchester City v West Ham United Southampton v Brentford Brighton & Hove Albion v Arsenal Sunday 5th January Fulham v Ipswich Town Liverpool v Manchester United Monday 6th January Wolverhampton Wanderers v Nottingham Forest

Week 16 points... Week 17 points... Week 17 table...

Week 17 fixtures... Friday 27th December Brighton & Hove Albion v Brentford Arsenal v Ipswich Town Sunday 29th December Leicester City v Manchester City Crystal Palace v Southampton Everton v Nottingham Forest Fulham v AFC Bournemouth Tottenham Hotspur v Wolverhampton Wanderers West Ham United v Liverpool Monday 30th December Aston Villa v Brighton & Hove Albion Ipswich Town v Chelsea Manchester United v Newcastle United Wednesday 1st January Brentford v Arsenal

The Ambassador is busy smooching with the hoi polloi, so here's Frank with your Boxing Day Bonus... Week 16 fixtures... Saturday 21st December Aston Villa v Manchester City Brentford v Nottingham Forest Ipswich Town v Newcastle United West Ham United v Brighton & Hove Albion Crystal Palace v Arsenal Sunday 22nd December Everton v Chelsea Fulham v Southampton Leicester City v Wolverhampton Wanderers Manchester United v AFC Bournemouth Tottenham Hotspur v Liverpool Thursday 26th December Manchester City v Everton AFC Bournemouth v Crystal Palace Chelsea v Fulham Newcastle United v Aston Villa Nottingham Forest v Tottenham Hotspur Southampton v West Ham United Wolverhampton Wanderers v Manchester United Liverpool v Leicester City Week 17 commences on Friday 27th, so look out for those fixtures, especially if you're going away. Happy Christmas! 🎅🎄 ...

@Rockets Although it's far more nuanced than what you paint, I don't doubt that the optics aren't great. It's the classic conundrum of the economic pie not being big enough to feed everyone. For me this stems from the country as a whole and it's obsession with taxes, or rather, to pay as little tax as possible yet expect everything in return. I'm old school and just wished Labout had said they'll stick a penny or two on income tax and be done with it, that it would hopefully only be for a couple of years until we steady the ship, and stop all this slipping and sliding around. But we all know why they didn't. Ditto for Brexit. Instead of worrying about the optics Labour should've had a series of grown-up conversations about all these issues, but here we are...

Not as happy as if you worked in the private sector and had the average combined pay rise of 10.8%...

i) 5.5% pay increase for public sector, implemented by Starmers Govt 2.8% pay increase offered to public sector in addition to the 5.5% increase given July 2024 Just to clarify... The new government has accepted the pay recommendations of the independent Pay Review Bodies (PRBs), meaning that public sector employees will see their pay increase by between 4¾% and 6% in 2024–25, depending on occupation. The 2.8% rise is for the following tax year, and at the time of writing is only a recommendation by Gov depts and nothing has been implemented. Obvious question...in light of years of austerity cuts when public sector workers have received little or next to nothing in pay increases in real terms, why is giving them a pay increase a bad thing? Is it any wonder public services across the board are failing, staff morale is low, and with skilled worker shortages that lead to an ever increasing dependency on overseas workers to plug the gaps. Even with this year's rise, public sector pay rises still lag behind the private sector, latest ONS figures for Aug - Oct show that private sector pay grew at an annual pace of 5.4%, while the public sector was only 4.3%. If we're going to be a serious country again we need fully functioning public services, and that includes a workforce that is paid accordingly...

Hopefully it's aliens and they've come to abduct Jazzer, after all he already lives in a parallel universe as to why the country's in an economic mess...👽

Week 15 points... Week 15 table...

Week 15 fixtures... Saturday 14th December Arsenal v Everton Liverpool v Fulham Newcastle United v Leicester City Wolverhampton Wanderers v Ipswich Town Nottingham Forest v Aston Villa Sunday 15th December Brighton & Hove Albion v Crystal Palace Manchester City v Manchester United Chelsea v Brentford Southampton v Tottenham Hotspur Monday 16th December AFC Bournemouth v West Ham United

Did the current owner choose to do this or have they 'inherited' it? If they chose to do this then they're obviously not wedded to original period features so I'd go with an infill of matching floorboards, perhaps stain the whole lot and stagger joints so they blend in better. If they inherited this and want a period feature I'd go with decorative Victorian tiles (I don't like the sound of self-adhesive vinyl tiles). Then use it to place a floor lamp/house plants/candles etc to make it look like it was meant to be rather than a cover-up job. Both options will require some chipping away of the concrete to provide a level finish with the floorboards, but much preferable than a trip hazard step and something that looks bodged. After chipping away at the concrete I'd use a self-leveling screed to provide a flat surface to work with. Other options are a rug, piece of furniture etc and let someone else have the problem!...

''Fire breast''...do you mean the chimney breast has been removed leaving a flat wall with no side alcoves?...

Week 14 points... Week 14 table...

Week 14 fixtures... Saturday 7th December Everton v Liverpool Aston Villa v Southampton Brentford v Newcastle United Crystal Palace v Manchester City Manchester United v Nottingham Forest Sunday 8th December Fulham v Arsenal Ipswich Town v AFC Bournemouth Leicester City v Brighton & Hove Albion Tottenham Hotspur v Chelsea Monday 9th December West Ham United v Wolverhampton Wanderers

Unlucky for some...me! Week 13 points... Week 13 table... Week 14 fixtures to follow later...

Indeed Seph. This from the BBC's Economic Editor Faisal Islam for the more fiscally minded, or in layman's terms, much ado about nothing.... ''5 year gilt rate now 10 basis points below morning of Budget…. Not far off going below 4% again… important for 5 year fixed mortgages… 10 year and 2 year also 10 bps down… All back within a few bps (ie under 0.1%) of where they were on election day was some properly crazed stuff on markets just after Budget… esp on currency. Sterling now up vs euro, down 2% vs dollar. All these moves really rather normal, and as I said the day after the Budget a 15 bp rise at peak a relatively modest reaction vs significant increase in borrowing, tax & spend/ change in fiscal rules''

Just found out that unused weekly transfers can be carried forward up to a max of 5, previously it was 2, which means less pressure on the wild card...

That was certainly par for the course under the previous Gov, but Labour has a lot of very keen/ambitious MPs so I think she'll probably have to wait her turn...

I think Seph is right, the quick resignation is probably more to do with Labour wanting to quickly shut down an issue rather than allowing it to drag out over days/weeks like we had under the previous Gov...

Find myself in agreement with right-wing commentator Dan Hodges take on this... Louise Haigh's resignation sets a ridiculously low bar for cabinet service. We're now saying there can be no rehabilitation for anyone in public life who has committed the most minor of offences.

The Tory party's response to today's net migration figure of +728,000 for the year up to June (pre-election) is typical of them and their supporters attempt to gaslight in real time and airbrush out their sole accountability and responsibility, and instead attempt to blame the new Labour Gov . Quite incredible. Chris Philip - Shadow Home Secretary... "Today's figures confirm what we've been warning about: immigration remains far too high, and Labour was wrong to suspend further restrictions on family visas. "Such high numbers place mounting pressure on housing, public services, and damage social cohesion, causing a real impact felt by communities across the UK. "We need immediate action to enforce stricter controls on the border, get these numbers down, and put the needs of British workers and families front and centre."

Yep, national debt is different to deficit. National debt was £800 Billion in 2010 when the Tories first took office. Thy left office with it standing at £2.6 Trillion...

It's there not their... I'd love to know when I inferred I ''were going no longer respond to my posts, that didn't last long,''.