ohmelads

I'll probably get slated for this by the 'patient, sensible' crowd, but I believe we need a big signing. Not a trophy signing, but a player who we know will walk into the side and improve us, like when we signed Woodgate but preferably someone not so injury prone. Those sorts of players make a difference in tight games, whether it's a centre back who dominates a dangerous forward, a creative player pulling all the strings or a forward who takes a half-chance and wins the game. Those sorts of players can be worth quite a few points over the course of a season. For all Viduka has just had a good season, he's still lazy and injury-prone. He could go either way for us. Barton brings a lot of baggage and like Parker he might not turn out to be as good a player as we think he is. He could also go either way. Rozehnal is totally unproven and might not cut it. He could go either way. Geremi is the only one I'm very happy about, but even he hasn't had regular football for a few years. All four of our signings could be successes or they could flop, they're all cheap because there are doubts about them all. In central defence Taylor is our only player proven to cut it at this level who doesn't get injured every other week. At left back there isn't anyone, though perhaps Baba can provide cover. In my view we need two new centre backs, because I don't want Ramage anywhere near the first team. However, we could get away with signing just one centre back (Beye?) and then going for Heinze. A little ambitious perhaps, but his future at Man Utd isn't certain and the big foreign clubs seem to have turned their attention towards other targets (Barca - Abidal, Real - Chivu). Man Utd would also much prefer selling him to us than to Liverpool. Attracting the player would be difficult, but if his options in Spain run out and a place in the Man Utd team isn't guaranteed then it's not impossible. He has the sort of versatility Big Sam is looking for.

With Man Utd, Liverpool, Arsenal and Spurs all spending big to sign strikers, the path is clear to go for Gudjohnsen. If he wants to come back to England then we are looking like his best option.

If we are going for him I would hope it's as 4th choice behind Taylor, Rozehnal and another. That would leave us room to sign a top defender which I still believe we need. If Beye is coming in as well however, then he would complete the four centre backs, with Ramage, Huntington, Edgar and that lot well behind in the pecking order.

What he said.

Surely Barca aren't going to pay his massive wages during recovery only for us to snap him up on January 1st? They're not that stupid. If we do agree to sign him they'll take that into account. One of the broadsheets claimed he would cost us £3.3M. This is all conjecture but I would expect Barca to pressure us to conclude a deal now or not at all, because who knows how he will return. If he returns in great shape they won't want to give him away and if he doesn't they know we would disappear and chase someone else. They'll want assurances. I expect there'll be a lot of haggling going on if we are tying up a deal because this is not a normal transfer scenario. As for Gudjohnsen, Big Sam seems very happy with our four strikers so it begs the question where he is going to play/ Viduka wasn't bought to warm the bench and Martins and Owen wouldn't be happy with that either. The only other possibility would be that Martins, Viduka and Owen would form a front three with Gudjohnsen playing in attacking midfield where he played quite a lot for Chelsea in his last season there.

If you were to add up all the gate money we took from playing loads of games in Europe we probably made a couple of million. We played 14 games, 7 of them at home. I would perhaps agree that in hindsight, seeing as we didn't get that far this time, then the injuries and fatigue we suffered wasn't worth the money we made out of it. We certainly didn't have a squad capable of fighting on four fronts, that's for sure. It may be a blessing in disguise that Spurs, Everton and Bolton may play an extra 10 or 12 games this season while we can focus on the league.

Just another cheap dig from Martin Jol, there's a pro-Spurs agenda behind almost everything he writes. It's a shame he wasn't more like the Man City, Villa, Everton fans etc who come on here and resist the urge to have cheap digs or gloat about every good piece of news from their own clubs.

Is that actually Ronaldo on the right? If it is then well done to him and Milan have one of the best strikers of his generation.

Bitter comments from Roeder, but he's right about Allardyce trying to lower expectations before a ball has been kicked. I can't stand Roeder and think he's a very limited manager, but I think many people are forgetting that, to use an old cliche, Michael Owen is effectively like a new signing. To bring the players we have into the side, including Owen, and those that are still to come, top 6 is an extremely normal target. It does piss me off sometimes the way people try to appear sensible and patient by talking about 'top 6' as some sort of 'utopia'.

Bridge would be a massive signing for us. It speaks volumes that Chelsea fans want him in the side ahead of Cole these days. To get him here would be a real coup. I don't see Mourinho letting him go though.

I don't think we'll find out that much. He'll say Europe is the aim, everyone pulling in the same direction, ambitious people on board, exciting times, big club, wonderful fans etc. We might however find out about the stadium plans, indirectly get an idea of the budget we're working with, or about the behind the scenes staff situation.

The figure is most likely £20m plus add ons. The Liverpool fans/media will be keen to tell us it's a lot lower than that. I also think they haven't done great business losing Garcia for a few million, but maybe he wanted to go back to Spain. As for Atleti, I think they'll be a stronger team after all this.

What Liverpool are paying for is potential. He has it all, quick, good in the air, decent dribbling and trickery, pretty good finishing. His off the ball movement isn't exactly like Van Nistelrooy but it's not bad. Thing is I think he's just decent with all these attributes, he's got no outstanding qualities. A well-rounded player who needs to make the step up, you could say. And just because he's overrated it doesn't mean he's not a good player. If I were a Liverpool fan my main worry would be about how he adapts. He might be tall but he's a bit of a pansy at times and you can be sure week in week out managers will be telling their centre backs to "let him know you're about". He'll need to rely on his pace, off the ball running and trickery to counteract that, as well as his mental strength. He's been very popular with Atletico fans over the years, but then so has Raul at Real Madrid. There are many who say he has scored goals in a poor team, but just as many who say that team works hard for Torres to score the goals. For an 18 year old he was very good. 5 years later I don't think he's improved all that much. Noone can say for sure how this one'll turn out, Benitez clearly has faith in him but I'm not that convinced. I think they've landed a good player for a huge price. Defences in Spain are not that scared of Torres, ask any rival fans, and for £20-odd million that's not a great sign.

Should be interesting. I presume he'll talk about targets and how it's the start of an exciting new era etc etc. Wonder if he'll make any mention of the proposal to increase the stadium capacity to 60,000+?

You would take the news reports with a pinch of salt because it suits you to do so. You know when somebody is trying to brush something under the carpet when they start sentences such as "the world is about..." As for Shinawatra's political and economic prowess, many people say Chile wouldn't be where it is today without Pinochet. The same sort of people who talk about "what the world is about".

An excellent website that's gone drastically downhill in recent years. They clearly know a lot about football but at times they strike me as a bit too old-fashioned the way they harp on and make excuses for the likes of Parker, yet they're happy to set the lynch mob onto any underperforming foreign player. But that's their opinion and they're entitled to it, the only thing which has brought down standards is the way they've started spouting their opinions. They give off this holier than thou attitude and express their views in a very dogmatic way. I don't visit the site nearly as much as I used to but I'd be lying if I said I didn't check up to see their views on new signings and what-not. Their match reports are still very well expressed (despite their occasional pontificating) and remain the best feature of their site for me. I do respect the fact that they don't dilute their views to sit on the fence, they just express their opinions as was the case during the Allardyce appointment.

Don't see why Keane is seen as a hardman. Dirty tackler, aye, but he whinges like a girl when anyone outmuscles him. He boasts about ending a guy's career in his book, yet he can't take it when it's dished out to him by bigger players. He always had a chip on his shoulder about Shearer and Vieira because of this, they could muscle him off the ball and he could only respond with aggression. He knows it's never going to be a proper fight on the field, it's always broken up instantly. He wouldn't try and start on Shearer or Vieira in the street that's for sure. Shearer takes loads of punishment from defenders and just gets up every time and shows them he's not afraid. That attempted punch from Keane was one of the most pathetic things I've seen, it wasn't even close. Keane knew everyone was going to come in and pull him back, that's why he did it. Shearer would batter Keane in a fight, he's taller, stockier and can take a whack. I can't believe people are even suggesting otherwise to be honest. The Keane hardman thing is one of the myths of modern football built up by the southern media. He's a bitch.

We'll see won't we. Let's see which fans fill their stadium every home match of the season, regardless of results. I can tell you now who the fickle fans will be.

Embarrassing attempt to offend us to be honest, you really haven't been following Shepherd's reign at all. Freddy Shepherd is gone now, so we'll soon see who's right. The only reason you lot got Speed is because Shepherd sold him behind Bobby Robson's back, and neglected to even tell him! Roeder said he only had one full time scout at the club, and Souness said he had no knowledge of signings being made. Is it any coincidence all these managers come out afterwards and say the job was so difficult because of the chairman? The fact you can't even see that makes this debate pretty pointless.

Define 'fickle fans'? You see, some people would say fans who don't always fill their stadium are fickle... Since the Premiership began we've finished 11th twice, 13th three times and just finished 14th, yet we have the second highest attendance figures since the Premiership began. Nothing fickle about that mate.

3-5-2 is a difficult formation to pull off, espescially in England. I wouldn't want us to be Allardyce's "failed experiment". Do any of our players have experience of this formation??? I could see some teams doing their homework on us and giving us a thumping down the flanks to be honest.

Are there a load of posts I can't see or something. WHo on earth has said we've had great managers??!! Almost all Newcastle fans agree that Souness and Roeder were very poor appointments and Gullit and Dalglish were very unpopular as well. The only good manager we've had was Bobby Robson and he finished 4th, 3rd and 5th. He might not have a trophy to show for it but I would call finishing 3rd ahead of Liverpool and Chelsea a successful season for 99% of the clubs in this country.

If I knew the answer to that I'd be a very well paid man. But certainly Shepherd hasn't helped. Bobby Robson revealed in his book that Speed, his captain, was sold behind his back and he found out about it the same time as everybody else. Butt was brought in by Shepherd as his replacement and had a shocking season. He scouted Miguel before Euro 2004 and wanted him brought in as the new RB. Shepherd wanted to see him in the tournament first. Sure enough he had a blinder, kept Ferreira out the team, his price doubled and eventually Valencia came in and snapped him up. He's now one of the top right backs in Europe. It's not easy to run a club under a chairman like that. Souness recently came out and said he had very little knowledge of the transfer situation, the chairman did everything. I'm far happier about Shepherd leaving than I am about Allardyce arriving. It's not all down to the manager, but it's no coincidence that under Robson we finished 3rd and under Roeder we finished 14th. Had Robson worked under a decent chairman and come in a few years younger, who knows how far he could have taken us.

When you're talking about who has strengthened then you may as well consider Owen as a new signing for us. When you mention Bent for Spurs, you may as well compare him to Owen for us.

I think the most influential position for a world class player is central midfield or up front. The Zidanes, the Gerrard's, the Kaka's, or the Ronaldo's, the Shevchenko's and the Shearer's. Seeing as we already have an arguably world class striker in Owen, then a world class central midfielder would improve us the most.