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Heres a question for you and an answer you may well dismiss as perfectly ridiculous. But which Premier League chairmen are looking at this Dortmund team, and justifiably thinking: That could be us in five years? Daniel Levy? Possibly. Nicola Cortese? Most definitely.

Of course, we know what they do have in common. This season, both had the temerity to replace a popular English manager with an aloof whizz-kid from Iberian football one who talked down to the press, and another who couldnt talk to them at all. But if very few Spurs fans would now take back Arry, and duly remember their original outrage with quiet shame, then how bewildering must it feel down at Southampton?

Both the aversion and the therapy have been far more extreme at St Marys. When Cortese replaced Nigel Adkins with Mauricio Pochettino in January, he was denounced from every rooftop. Here was the effigy for the bonfire of footballs vanities. The club simmered with mutiny. Even lifelong Saints anticipated relegation with grim relish. Fans of other clubs expressed scandalised fellowship. Just when the team had found its feet, it had been lurched into a tailspin: it was sickening, embarrassing, enough finally to extinguish the last embers of your love for the game.

Only now it turns out to have been a stroke of genius. As their team glides stylishly up the table, taking the scalps of Manchester City and Liverpool and Chelsea, Southampton fans have quickly acknowledged that they owed Cortese more respect. But for the late Markus Liebherr, who entrusted his legacy to the Italian, it seems by no means far-fetched to suggest that Southampton might have shared the doom of their neighbours at Portsmouth. Cortese has not put a foot wrong so far. If he felt that a former Scunthorpe physio might have reached his ceiling, for now, then just conceivably Pochettino had more to recommend him than most people knew. Which, after all, was not saying a great deal.

Pochettino had played for club and country under one of the prophets, Marcelo Bielsa. As manager, he had salvaged Espanyol from relegation before finishing eighth, 11th and 14th; and did all this while routinely obliged to sell his best players and blood kids. There are teams that wait for you, teams that look for you, Pep Guardiola said. Espanyol look for you. I feel very close to their style of football.

So where are you now, all who vilified Cortese? Southampton fans have taken their medicine with the sweetest elixir. But what of those who pronounced upon another foreign owner heedlessly contaminating the soul of our game? How far were you misled by your own ignorance of a broader football culture? Far enough to wonder now if Pochettino might even look at Jrgen Klopp, and decide not simply to wash his hands of unequal financial odds?

Dortmund are hardly an exact parallel in historic terms, but the present team were assembled inexpensively and owe their success primarily to dynamism and an innovative young coach. If Cortese suspected that Adkins considered survival an ample ambition, he was perfectly within his rights to hire someone who sooner aspired to being Swansea, say, if not Dortmund not yet, anyway.

Pochettino never had money at Espanyol but that will change this summer. And if theres another Michu out there, hed seem as likely as anyone to find him (remember, he came within an ace of bringing Coutinho along with him).

But it is remarkable what he has already achieved with the team as it stands, not least because their signature has become relentless pressing hardly something that can be conditioned overnight. Osvaldo, who played under him at Espanyol, says that Pochettino works you like a dog sometimes you feel like killing him. But it works.

In three full seasons there, Pochettino raised the average number of tackles and interceptions per game from 19 apiece to 23 and 28 respectively. Under Adkins, meanwhile, Cortese cannot have felt he was getting 7m worth out of Jay Rodriguez. Now the pundits are suddenly talking him up for England.

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The Last Word: Mauricio Cortese critics should admit sinning against far-sighted Southampton saviour

I have been trying to write my life story for my children and grandchildren using Microsoft Word. Unfortunately I keep losing the document whilst typing and not watching the screen. I thought it might be a problem with my Vista PC. A good friend who works with computers helped me retrieve lost documents, and lent me one of his computers, which uses Windows 7. At first it worked fine, but I recently managed to lose a document on his machine. All I am doing is typing normally, what I am doing wrong? Ken Glasby, by email

You have to be fairly determined to permanently lose a document, unless Word or the PC crashes. Even if you try to exit Word it will display a dialogue box asking you to Save your open documents, so dont ignore it. I suspect that you are either accidentally highlighting the whole document by inadvertently pressing Ctrl + A, or triple-clicking the far left side of the page, and the next key press deletes the lot. The next time your document vanishes use the undo function Ctrl + Z to reverse your last actions. As a further precaution check that the Auto Recover function (Tools > Options > Save or in Word 2007 onwards, Office Button > Word Options > Save) is enabled and set it to intervals of 5 minutes or less, and get into the habit of manually saving every few minutes or after each new paragraph, for example.

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What is causing me to lose my Microsoft Word files?

"The Word" is MLSsoccer.com's weekly long-form series. This week, Philadelphia Union beat writer Dave Zeitlin looks at rising star Amobi Okugo, who has found his footing after a position change in 2012 and become of the one of the most promising center backs in the league. Can he find his way to success with the US national team, and a shot in the 2018 World Cup?

Amobi Okugo strolls into a Philadelphia restaurant, orders a mango pomegranate lemonade and settles into a window table. The popular Philadelphia Union player is dressed casually in a black t-shirt, jeans and sneakers. A single bead of sweat, perhaps a remnant of the training session that just wrapped up, hangs precariously beneath a new faded haircut.

Outside on Chestnut Street, a group of schoolchildren holds hands and crosses the street in front of a horse-drawn carriage. These are common sights in the area of Philadelphia known as Old City. Just down the block is Independence Hall, the birthplace of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. Across the street from that is the Liberty Bell, one of Americas most iconic symbols. A few blocks away is Elfreths Alley, the countrys oldest residential street, where Okugo recently toured.

It took me a year to finally realize how historic this area is, says Okugo, whos lived in the heart of Old City since first arriving in Philadelphia a little more than three years ago.

But Okugo isnt here to talk about the past. Hes here to talk about the future. A future that looked gloomy just 10 months ago but has now never looked so bright. A future in which Okugo and the Union could return to the MLS playoffs after a disastrous 2012 campaign. A future in which Okugo might very well become the first Philadelphia player to ever earn a cap with the US senior national team while on the Union roster.

And it all started with a roll of the dice by the coach that knows him best.

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OKUGO KNOWS THE QUESTIONis coming and smiles when he hears it.

Its funny but Im used to it, he says. Im sure you guys are getting tired of asking it more than Im getting tired of answering it.

The question that reporters have been asking him for the past 10 months: Which position does he prefer between center back and defensive midfield?

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Is the Philadelphia Union's Amobi Okugo the future of the US national team defense? | The Word

In todays economy, many people are looking for a low-coast way to enjoy traveling around the country. Hostels can offer a good solution for those seeking budget travel to many of the most interesting cities in the North America. Chicago, the largest city in the Midwestern United States, is an example of some of the award-winning hostels available to budget travellers from HostelBookers.com.

The Hostel Concept

The hostel concept began in Europe when a German schoolteacher began taking his students in a coal-mining city out to the countryside on weekends. The idea quickly caught in Europe where traveling to nearby cities has always been both convenient and commonplace. Hostels were once mainly for young people who had limited funds and often imposed strict curfews and restrictions. However, in most places around the world, hostels are used by all age groups and only a few basic rules are imposed. These lodging facilities now offer the basics of shelter, a shower and reasonable security at a low price for anyone staying a short time in the location. Some hostels specialise in specific types of travellers. Staying in a hostel is different than lodging in a chain hotel. Few amenities are offered, but prices are low. You are likely to meet many fellow travellers from around the country or around the world.

Chicagos Best Hostels

Among the top hostels in the country are those in the city in Chicago. HI-Chicago on Congress Parkway is a state-of-the-art modern facility with female dorms, male dorms and private rooms with shared living quarters and bath. Bed linens and towels are provided, along with breakfast, Wi-Fi, lounge area, pool tables, hot showers, communal kitchen, laundry service, TV and game rooms. A free city tour is also included. Public transportation is nearby.

The Chicago Getaway Hostel on Arlington Place is another award-winning facility that offers travellers male dormitories, female dormitories and private rooms with either shared bathroom or private bathroom. Breakfast, linens, towels and luggage room are included in the low price. The facility also has secure lockers, Wi-Fi, communal kitchen, games room, bicycle hire, TV room and outside area.

Chicago Attractions

Chicago is a beautiful city set on shores of Lake Michigan. It has a rich architectural history that draws tourists from around the world. Chicagos museums are some of the best in the world and include the Field Museum, the Museum of Science and Industry, the Art Institute, DuSable Museum and a variety of other cultural exhibits. Chicagos Navy Pier was once a historic multi-purpose edifice that now houses shops, restaurants, boat tours and amusement rides.

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Chicago Has the Best Hostels in North America | Travel & Tea

In fact, the suave Opposition business spokesman featured in two separate internet-related tales. The more minor one concerned his entry of seven years ago on Asmallword, an enviably exclusive social networking site for the few, not the many (though it charitably sets aside an overflow section, Abigworld, for us plebs), about the horrors of the London club scene in the mid-Nineties. For asking fellow members to advise him where he might avoid the trash and C-list wannabes infesting nightclubs rendered dclass to his glacially cool self by their cheesy vibe, Mr Umunna issued a heartfelt apology. He justly pointed out that we all do silly things when young (he was 27 at the time), and that he never claimed to be a saint.

One is that he was lying, and that by underlining the clich about the cover-up doing infinitely more damage than the original offence, the president to whom he might more convincingly be likened becomes Richard M Nixon. However, noting his George Washington-esque honesty in fessing up to the trash remark, we may safely rule out this distasteful theory.

Another is that, at a precocious 34, Mr Umunna is challenging for a Guinness record as the countrys youngest victim of early-onset Alzheimers, or other memory-destroying form of dementia. Given his ability to memorise his friend Ed Milibands lines to take on the business issues of the day, this seems equally outlandish.

The third explanation is not only entirely plausible, on the other hand, but suggests a more precise comparison with an earlier Democratic president. It is my overwhelming belief that Chuka Umunna is the victim of what Hillary Clinton called a vast, Right-wing conspiracy that a cabal of unseen forces, foreseeing even before he became the MP for Streatham that he would one day rise to obliterate the Conservatives, hacked his computer to sow the seeds for the career-threatening humiliation we see in luscious bloom today.

This may sound like paranoid delusion, yet there is a strong precedent for long-term planning of the type, and one that takes us back to the current president. As Donald Trump and others of sound mind have pointed out, Barack Obama was a newborn baby in Mombasa when his parents, anticipating that 46 years later he would run for the White House, placed birth notices in Hawaiian papers. Is it one iota less credible that the enemies of Umunna set out to ruin his path to the leadership of Britain by framing him than that the infant Obamas family falsified the records to clear his path to the Oval Office? I think not.

As so often, suspicion will fall on the security services. If only Sir Helenus, who investigated Kim Philby, was still around to clear his grandsons name. In his absence, it may never be established who framed Chuka Umunna, and set him up to become the Icarus of the Labour front bench.

He has certainly flown too close to The Sun, which yesterday carried a picture of the snobby Umunnas gleaming 1 million residence on Ibiza the party island to which the Vengaboys told us, in their cheesy-vibed number one hit, they were going. Perhaps he would be wise to seek sanctuary there for a while, far from the trash, and let those melting wings cool off. The propertys name is Casa Blanca, by the way, and who would be so cruel as to inflame Chuka Umunnas hatred of a certain comparison by translating that?

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Poor Chuka Umunna is the victim of a vile stitch-up