I'd say that the US (which hasn't lost to Mexico in a competitive match since 1998), Mexico, and Costa Rica could all beat Australia.

Using the DVD player example again:

I buy a DVD player from you for $100 but only pay you $80. I still owe you $20.

You want to buy back the DVD player. You offer to pay me $60 and absolve the $20 that I owe you.

Therefore, you make $20 on the deal and I lose $20.

Better would be paying $80 and absolving the $20, then both sides would be even.

It's not how much you weigh, it's how you use it.

By offering the 2.1 million owed, do you mean canceling the debt or Rangers paying it to us instead?

It seems to make the most sense for Rangers to cancel the payment and just give us 4.5 million. I think that would be acceptable. Then we'd make £100k on the transfer, not taking wages into account.

Stanford is not in the Ivy League.

The only technology that I can see that would be completely beneficial would some sort of earpiece or headset for the referees to communicate instantly.

On drop balls:

The referee can 'suggest' a course of action. If they don't follow, an unsportsmanlike conduct yellow can follow. Also, they can drop the ball when only one person is there, which usually only happens for an injury or when the ball is in the goal area and he just drops it to the keeper.

On offside:

Gally was offside. If there had been no rebound and the shot had gone in, it would have been a goal. Since he benefitted from being in the offside position, his goal was taken away. If he had been onside at the time of the original shot, then his rebound goal would have counted.

And yet, Panzerfaust records, a white power and hatred label is not being prosecuted either. It signed bands like "Jew Slaughter", whose debut album, "Alcoholocaust" is filled with much more awful things than being called devils.

Juries don't convict police officers beating a black man of police brutality until media pressure has forced many trials (see Rodney King).

These things go both ways.

Although, from watching the news here, if anyone punched a cop in the face, they'd get a jail sentence, no matter if they were white or black or asian.

I don't think that we really need a holding midfielder, per se. We have two box-to-box midfielders in Bazza and Thommo, and I think that they can do a job together. By putting people in roles we're just limiting our strength. We should let them play like they know how, and I think that both of them can provide that tackle to disrupt the opposition's midfielder, and they can both capitalize on it by passing forward and delivering the defense-splitting final pass.

One thing I thought should be mentioned: Pedophiles are not all child molesters. The only child molesters are the ones that can't control themselves.

Also, the Koran, just like the Bible, was intended to be about love and peace. The Koran, like the Bible, has been appropriated for the fundamentalist agenda by the religious right.

I don't think that you can place too much weight in the words used, like nigger, spick, kike, etc. A lot more weight should be placed on the tone of voice and context it's used in. I've called my friends "lazy mexicans" or "rich Jew" or made jokes about them having a BBC (big black c*ck). None of it's racist - it's just banter between friends. Going up to an Asian on the street and calling them "slant-eyes" would be racist, but saying "you couldn't see it because of your slanty little eyes" to one of my friends is not.

To me, using stereotypes and slurs and derogatory words in jest takes a lot of the sting away. It's instantly noticeable when someone is being serious and when someone is being facetious. I've called someone a nigga. Does that mean that I hate blacks? Absolutely not. Maybe it's just where I grew up and where I live now (by Washington DC and New York City) and the fact that the areas are so multi-cultural. Maybe things are different on the other side of the pond.

It's despicable when someone is actually being racist and spewing vitriol no matter what they say. If they use the word 'African-American' but say 'F***ing African-Americans, go back to picking cotton!' and mean it, it's even worse than just calling someone a nigger. It shouldn't be tolerated. But it shouldn't be sensationalized either.

Maybe it's because I'm American and haven't ever witnessed the racial tension that seems to exist in Blackburn and the surrounding areas, but the whole thing strikes me as both an overreaction and underreaction, depending which side of the spectrum you're on. People shouldn't dismiss a racist taunt and blame it on Yorke. What's happened has happened. But neither should people act like this is the most pressing problem in modern-day race relations either. Right now it seems like the Spanish FA have gotten off the hook a bit because of the Blackburn 'fiasco', and I know that there are other problems in Blackburn with Indians and other Asians.

And again, maybe it's just me, but what do monkey chants have to do with being black? There are monkeys in Africa? Oh, and in response to 'nigger' being from 'nigerian', it's from 'negro'.

How long has this midfield been playing together, and how many games have we lost?

About four and zero, I'd say.

Dunn's attitude to training would have gone down as badly with Hughes as it did with Souness.

For a little more than we received for Dunn we bought Barry Ferguson.

A wonderful piece of business.

Almost as good as the 2 million plus we stole Brett Emerton for.

These two along with two other Souness steals, Reid and Thompson are a top quality goal ridden midfield as good as any outside the top four and yet to reach their prime.

And all for about 10 million.

Please tell me thats a wind up Brownie.

Compare the midfield when we finished sixth to the midfield now.

Ours is much, much better now.

Emerton played better on the left against Man City too - on the right he was largely ineffective.

I think Emerton's been doing a great job on the left - I don't see the need to bring in De Pedo/MGP. Just because they're natural left-wingers doesn't mean that they'd do better than a right-footer.

I don't think there's a place in the team for Danns, but if he can show some spark in training, who knows?

Chris, what I don't understand is why you're attacking Dickov out of all of our strikers. He's by far the best one, and he was not brought in to replace Cole. Cole left for different reasons. Dickov was originally supposed to be a sub to replace Stead or Cole, but when Cole left he stepped into the starting role and has proven that he deserves it.

Chris, are you serious? Andy Cole misses more chances than all of our strikers combined!

Maybe we should focus on the fact Dickov has to play like the lone striker because his strike partners never seem to do anything.

It wasn't a challenge, though.

Diawara?

Why is Hughes not playing MGP? Because we have two better wingers keeping him out of the side. Emerton is doing extremely well on the left side, and Reid is holding his own well enough on the right. From what Hughes sees in training, he must not see enough to hand MGP a starting spot, and he certainly hasn't done anything in reserve team matches.

Dickov must also be up there in assists with Emerton - he sets up a lot of goals with his grafting too. He's the best of a poor bunch of strikers. What we need is a better partner for him, not another striker to replace him.

... or he lost his man.

Dickov is our leading goalscorer and has three times as many goals as the rest of our forwards.

All this does is show us how much Brad Friedel means to the club.

######.. Enkleman was blameless for the goals..

But Encks doesn't have the same ability to pull off the amazing save that Brad does - I never said he was at fault for the goals.

All this does is show us how much Brad Friedel means to the club.