ohmelads

I won't bother making any predictions but the UEFA Cup still represents our best hope. To win the Carling Cup we will almost certainly have to beat two top class teams of proven Champions League standard, starting tonight. We are one of the most experienced teams in Europe left in the UEFA Cup and I still see that as our best hope.

It's more likely he'd put Huntington at LB with Taylor and Ramage in the centre. The official site are still reporting about Duff's fitness test. Who knows, maybe he'll make the bench. If needs must how about Emre at left back? I'd say he could do a job there, remember when Flamini had to fill in for Arsenal at left back.

No fog at all in Jarra.

He's an andaluz gypsy, it's not surprising he never settled here. My gooner mates are glad to see the back of him and hope the transfer becomes permanent, when he was in London he was always whinging about going back to his pueblito. I expect he'll spend the rest of his career in Spain as he wouldn't hack it anywhere else.

Reyes is a gypsy.

Tbh it wouldn't surprise me if we splash our moneyt on a winger and a goalkeeper.

Is Newcastle the sort of club that can afford to spend £5m on a striker to "have around" when we have such pressing urgencies in defence. With Owen returning possibly late in the season we have to consider that whoever comes in is likely to be rotated next season and I'd agree that we need someone with presence up front. But the problem with Crouch is he encourages a long ball game, we've seen that with Liverpool and England. I honestly think that Crouch would cost nearer £10m than £5m given that Liverpool paid £7m for him and his stock as an England player has risen since then. At that price we should stay well away.

Interesting debate this, I'm sure Parker's return will give Roeder a little bit of a headache. I'm a firm believer of playing players in form. But let's not forget that our recent upturn in fortunes has coincided with an easier run of games. Portsmouth, Reading, Watford, all at home. That's where our points have been coming from and we made very hard work of them with two very late winners in our last two home games. These next couple of weeks will provide a much bigger test and I must admit that I feel safer with the big guns on against the big teams, regardless of form.

Martins over time will show himself to be the better all round player. Johnson is a canny forward but a bit overrated, probably because he's English.

If we're going to spend big in any position I'd get a quality, proven central defender. Ramage just isn't good enough in any position in my view, Huntington is far too inexperienced to be considered a viable short term option and I don't rate Bramble or Moore. Moore I feel is overrated by many fans and Bramble will always go through good periods then bad periods, he's a confidence player and always will be. Taylor is the one who has big potential in my view but needs a quality partner alongside him. When we defend as a team we can keep clean sheets but we're sacrificing far too much going forward. When we've gone for goal we've leaked at the other end. We've scraped past Reading and Watford at home with goals in the dying minutes but this has papered over the cracks.

I've never understood this obsession with Lucas Neill. He's always seemed to be an average Premiership full back with a nasty streak to his game, yet his agent links him with Liverpool and one or two others and suddenly people assume he's a top player. Benitez and his board were willing to pay only £2m which says a lot IMO, I certainly wouldn't pay more than that.

I think the left of defence is a bigger problem than the right. Both Baba and Carr are not good enough but I believe in Solano and the young centre-backs we can get by more on the right than we can on the left. When Baba is out there is noone capable of filling in, even against shite opposition. There is still a definite need for a quality central defender though. If the money was available and we had to buy for three positions, I would go for a striker, a left back and a centre back.

Maybe you can make that case for N'Zogbia but not for Duff. In fact, with his Premiership experience, I'd go so far to say that Duff has even less of an excuse than Martins, who was making his home debut and playing only his second game in the Premier League.

He had a poor game, like most of the team. He also had a poor game against Villa, like most of the team. I don't think anyone can deny that. Come on though, they sound like drama queens. 'OMG lol one ov the worst numba 9 performances eva!!!1!11!!'. Complete overreaction. When the whole team plays poorly and they single out one player, while praising others for their shite performances (Duff and N'Zogbia were very poor) then you have to admit it looks like there's an agenda going on there. Yes all eyes were on Martins for his home debut, but Duff was equally under the spotlight and they have written utter bollocks about him. It's total double standards and makes Martins look like he stood out as the worst player on the pitch - which is nonsense.

Of course... "one of the most inept, clueless and woeful displays that the famous number 9 shirt has ever witnessed" Those comments are loaded with emotion, they're way over the top and if Martins was a Geordie, you know they'd write something like "he needs to start showing his £10m form soon" or something much tamer along those lines. I take it they weren't watching Shearer last season and some of his 'famous number nine' performances? Or indeed most of the season before that?

Duff was as bad as Martins against Fulham. The difference is he's Irish and Martins is Nigerian, hence why nufc.com have praised one and slagged the other. Their match reports are becoming very predictable, I rarely read them any more which is a shame because they used to be my favourite Newcastle website. In truth, both Duff and Martins were dreadful. Luque has only started 6 Premiership games and already his Newcastle career has been written off. If Martins takes as long to get his first goal, will he too be dropped, never to be seen again? The club can't sustain this sort of policy.

My main concern is that Roeder bought him without any real idea of how he was going to use him. Let's face it, Duff is a player who has proven it in the Premiership over several seasons and he has struggled to make an impact in this Newcastle team. In three games against average teams we have posed very little attacking threat. The midfield are scared to push forward even in possession and are offering no assistance to the forwards. Until that changes whoever plays up front will have to fight for those long balls, skin the defenders and score all on their own. We could only put one goal past Ventspils in three hours of play and that came from a corner. A feature of our season so far and our pre-season has been that our strikers have rarely got a touch of the ball in threatening positions. Duff, Milner, Luque Ameobi, Martins, and Rossi have all played up front this season and all have struggled. It doesn't matter who we put up front, until we attack and defend as a team we're not going to get many goals. You can't expect Martins to do it all on his own otherwise he'll go down the same road as Luque.

I think it's clear to see now that Liverpool are in no state to push for the title. They beat Chelsea in the Community Shield so out came all the knee-jerk reactions. You can blag a cup because it's all about 90 minutes but you can't blag a league title, you have to sustain those performances over a season and they're not good enough for that. To finish ahead of Chelsea you need to win nearly every game.

In January I'd rather we splashed a few million on a younger striker, a good young target man. Even when Owen and Martins are both fit, it's going to be very difficult to accommodate them in the same team. Viduka may be a stop gap until June but I think this will be his last productive season and we would have to buy someone else in the summer anyway. We'd be buying him for 5 months, yet we'd probably have to give him an 18-month contract or more (and his wages are said to be pretty high indeed). With Owen, Martins, Ameobi and a young target man we'd be sorted for years to come, with Viduka we'd have the same problem a few months later of needing yet another striker. I haven't included Luque in that list as I expect him to be sold in January to fund a new striker and I hope that striker is not Viduka.

Something is definitely up here regarding Shepherd and McKay. Last year it was Boumsong and Faye, this year it is Sibierski and Bernard. What are the odds on a Willie McKay player joining Newcastle in January? I doubt the bookies would even give you a price.

Can't say I've followed his career, as he's a nothing player, but I always thought he was an attacking midfielder. People are talking about his height, but if they're expecting him to fight centre-halves and hold the ball up for Martins then they're mistaken. I don't see what on earth he could bring to the team. Utterly pointless signing. If Freddy wants to boost the numbers he should bring in Scaloni who is out of contract and will challenge Carr for his position. I can just imagine Freddy calling his friend Willie McKay late last night: "Willie, I'm in a spot of bother here, what have you got for me? I'll make it worth your while". It is no coincidence that in the last 24 hours we have signed two Willie McKay players, the same agent who oversaw the Faye and Boumsong deals.

As nufc.com said: "Frankly we're baffled as to why he's appeared and what we're going to do with him". All I can assume is that he is emergency backup, but I think I'd rather have someone like Pattison gaining the experience rather than see Sibierski coming on.

Unlike us, I'm sure Roeder knew what sort of money he was working with. If he knew he only had £15m then to spend it all on Duff and Martins was stupid and he has brought this on himself.

Is this one of the targets Roeder said he was in "pole position" for? Or was it a last-minute panic buy two hours from the deadline? Whatever way you look at it, it's completely indefensible. Roeder strung us along throughout August telling us we were on the brink of signing a few players, and many believed him. The writing was on the wall when he admitted he didn't have a contingency plan for the Martins deal, there was no "list". Disgraceful, utterly disgraceful. You cannot overemphasise what a hash Roeder and Shepherd have made of this. The two of them owe the fans an explanation, because this club has just taken another step backwards, while all around us are improving their squads. We go into the season with Ramage and Taylor covering the entire defence. It won't be long before we find ourselves looking for another Ronny Johnsen.

Sky say something and you believe it as fact? Get a grip. Roeder has stated many times that Milner aint for sale. Why not wait till Roeder confirms the rumour to be true before you start moaning and abusing him No. I was commenting on a rumour. Like Sky, Roeder says a lot of things. Do you believe it all as fact?