Bananas

It's not, but it should be. If by some miracle PAO made it the CL and played say a Juve or Real, it makes no sense to play it at their current stadium. This whole sub-topic is about hypotheticals. The reality is nothing will happen.

I wouldn't say he has the upper hand. Maybe he does if the club is silly, but if the club stick to their guns and don't play him and then his NT spot becomes jeapardised, he'll move on himself. It all comes down to if Savvidis is willing to play the long game.

Great, so we'll have an unfit injury prone Vieirinha who will pile on the kilos in no time and an injury prone Kyriako. Both will want high wages too. Here's hoping it's just media fantasy stories.

Not ground sharing. But rather an "OAKA" type stadium for Thessaloniki, to be used as and if required. Each team would still have their own stadium that they would use for all their games except for the very biggest derbies or European games. The stadium would be the property of the country just like OAKA and could be used for things other than just football. Anyway, pipe dreams considering the state of the country.

Yes, I saw an article on sport24.gr a couple of hours after my post regarding his not wanting to come back to Greece (fair enough) and the interest from AC Milan.

It looks half empty most weeks as it is. Thus my apprehension. But it all comes down to projected costs vs revenues etc. and what the club expects to achieve in the future.

Stafylidis contract is due to expire in 6 months at FC Augsburg. This is one player I would love to have back at PAOK (it killed me that we had to sell him) even though it's unlikely he would want to come back to the GSL vs Bundesliga. He is the only youth player I can think of that has consistently gotten better and better each season. I'd have him over a Vieirinha who would want more money and would no doubt pile on the kilos once back in Greece in no time.

@jvc I agree. It's all just kafeneio talk but we're just passing the time. @RED SHERIFF I agree there is zero chance the state would ever build something, I was just talking about an ideal world. The last thing I want is games like in the Serie A where they play in huge stadiums but even with 15K or 20K fans the atmosphere seems lifeless. End of the day, if PAOK was to build a new stadium, 25K to 30K is the right number.

Cimirot is a starter when fit, he's not even a rotation player so he's valuable definitely. And he's only going to get better. Let whoever wants to buy him pay full price or greater.

Hopefully it means we plan to bring in a new forward during the winter transfer window. Thiam has been lackluster to say the least.

I think his neck might be bigger than my torso.

Only if Alafouzos is in charge of R&D.

Maybe. Or does the money just flow into shareholders pockets ? Like I said I haven't done the research to know if this is the case.

Επιμένουν για Πέλκα οι Γερμανοί. http://inpaok.com/332039/επιμένουν-για-πέλκα-οι-γερμανοί/ I can't see why we would want to loan Pelkas to a team that's probably going to drop from the 2nd division to the 3rd division. And I can't see why he would want to go, even if they offered to buy him out. Bizarro world.

Again a tricky area. The reasoning behind it is sound. Why should I spend million developing something that someone else can then copy immediately. If I'm not protected, I won't invest, and then everyone loses. No one benefits. But, like everything, business finds a way to bend and flex the spirit of the law. You have situations where companies were trying to patent DNA which is naturally occuring. Preposterous, and the courts ruled against it, but big business gave it a shot anyway.

Fully agree. It's why the U.S. excels in so much. But they also excel in other things that they shouldn't e.g. racism, gun violence. And regarding socialism, where do you draw the line. It's always grey. If I'm a business man and all I care about is profits, immigration is a good thing for me! Bring 'em on. Anti-immigration is actually socialist from a business point of view (the government trying to control things instead of letting them be). If you want laissez faire go all the way. I don't know the answer or what is right or best, but my gut feeling has always been that controlled, well thought out co-operation will always win out over uncontrolled capitalism (which doesn't really exist anyway).

It's a tricky question to model. You don't give decent health care to Juanito and as a result he develops a condition which means he'll never be able to earn as much as he could've if it was treated cheaply. So, instead of earning say $50,000 (and the government reaps the rewards in taxing him) he only earns $10,000 and worse, he's actually a drain because he now requires benefits. The same argument could be made for education as well. Again, difficult to model and you'll find those that do often already know the result they want (they are already biased by their politics) and "research" and "model" accordingly.

Maybe, and I say maybe because I haven't researched the area in detail. What I do know is that in Australia we have the PBS Scheme (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmaceutical_Benefits_Scheme) which is basically the government pools all the money and makes deals with big Pharma on what to buy, how many units, and what they are willing to pay. I can tell you that big Pharma hates this because they are in the unusual position of not having the upper hand in the bargaining. This was one of the first and most important issues raised in the FTA between Australia and the U.S. but no government here would ever give in on this issue. Might as well hand in their resignation that day. It's not like big Pharma aren't making profits in Australia. It's just not the profits they want. Having said that, we pay through the nose for other things.

I get what you're saying, but it made sense 5,000 years ago. As for the argument of "doing what we always have", man has also murdered, raped, plundered, maimed etc. etc. Doesn't make it cool or right. Kill something because it will keep you alive ? Cool. Kill something just coz it felt good. Not cool. P.S. Like tantra said, you are one of my favourite posters. But I can't condone this sort of thing, especially today when so many species are on the brink.

Ha ha! I didn't think of that. ;)

But the one criticising Boeing was so good!

I don't see how it doesn't make sense. PAOK's average for most games is ~10,000. But if we're playing Olympiakos or a Dortmund, we could easily get 60,000. But we'd only need such a stadium maybe half a dozen times a year. All that lost revenue now is ... lost. And instead of having to rebuild a new Toumba at 100 million (or whatever the figure is) you can build one a lot cheaper.

Regarding Trump's tough guy, not gonna take any s**t approach, I dare say as offensive and irresponsible as some may find it, with certain leaders and nations around the world, it could actually be more effective. I say could, because it hasn't really been tried before, but the softly softly approach hasn't exactly yielded stellar results either. Let the experiment begin!

I don't understand what Americans have against a medical safety net. It's known that expenditure is approximately triple in the U.S. compared to other OECD nations. Now, I'm not saying Obamacare is the right way to go (I don't really know much about it) but the gouging and rorting done by the private healthcare companies in the U.S. is almost criminal. At least, in a moral sense.

You know what would make sense ? Aris, Iraklis and PAOK having stadium that fit say, 15000 fans, and having 1 big stadium in Thessaloniki that fits say 60,000 for the big derbies and European games that is shared by all 3. But that would make sense ...