BlueStar

Y'know, get this managerial appointment wrong and they could end up in some serious shit, we've already proved ourselves that it's pretty easy to manage to go from European qualification to comedic free-fall in a relatively short space of time. Hire someone pretty uninspiring, don't get the results and get the fans worked up, piss off a few players and have them leave, string together just enough results to be backed by Lerner, make his own signings, have another shit run, sack him without a replacement, you all know where it goes from there.

Maybe not the government, but I can imagine there would be a huge campaign with the media, celebrities and every publicity hungry twat coming out of the woodworks to demand that whatever needs to be done to save them is provided at any cost. Certainly would put pressure on the Glaziers, HMRC, the Prem and the Government to be lenient and encourage any bored billionare who fanices an ego trip to become a supposed national hero.

Perch Williamson Colo Jose Tiote Routledge Jonas Ben Arfa Keane Carroll Although maybe that would work in FM better than the real world So there'd be no place for Nolan, Barton, Guthrie, Smith or Gosling. I know it's a squad game but something has to give. I think the only one out of those I'd be sad to see out of the starting 11 would be Barton, but I'm sure Hughton thinks differently, what with Nolan being captain, and I can't see him going for a midfield diamond anyway.

Perch Williamson Colo Jose Tiote Routledge Jonas Ben Arfa Keane Carroll Although maybe that would work in FM better than the real world

It's alright lads, the mackems showed the delegation the most striking and unique feature of the Stadium of Light http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/aug/26/world-cup-england-2018

I think it's worth reminding ourselves that the reason he turned down Real was because they have much better players than us which meant he wouldn't get a game lads

They reckon we'd swap Colo, Nolan and Barton for Bramble, Henderson and Riveros

I'm actually starting to hope for mid-table rather than just survival

Can imagine his testamonial would be piss funny, 85 minutes in, both teams and the ref all trying to conspire to let him get a goal and Shola shinning every chance into the ground.

Yeah, think he was probably playing joke.

Maybe we're getting closer to cracking Hughton's Enigma code. Speculation = Definite No = Maybe Hopeful = Fuck knows

As long as it's not "We've concluded he's going to liverpool"

Some more: The British harshness can do only good to l'enfant terrible of French soccer. Then someone's saying he won't play 25 games for us because he'll have a strop before he reaches that Again, great business for OM, sell Ben Arfa for three times less than we paid to Lyon! Who's in charge of recruitment at OM??? HBA was liquidated (wasted?), unfortunately Newcastle was in the strongest position! Their leaders knew that Marseilles needed rid of HBA, and they just let the price fall! On the other hand, I've had laughs from reading this story for 3 weeks on HBA.. Always the same story, and now it's done.

Few comments from OM fans on that article: Why do this to reduce the wage bill? Is he still paid if he refuses to play? What's the point of this clause? The less he plays, the better the deal, no? In any case, it means we lose another player and Ben Arfa is worth 15m. Marseilles has an attack of fire and an iron defense but in the middle Kabore Cisse Cheyrou is not the best of the best. This season scares me. A big club that (I'm not quite sure what he's saying here, someone about us just missing out on Europe, or maybe on the Europeans capital of Culture thing). Well Arfa, signs for them. It was written.

5-6 million euros translates to £4.1m to £4.9m at the moment, 24 games should surely show us if he's worth that.

The days keep coming, and the destination keeps changing. The day before yesterday he was going to Liverpool, yesterday to Werder Bremem, Hatem Ben Arfa was linked to several clubs since his refusal to train with OM two weeks ago. But it is finally Newcastle where the attacking midfielder will attempt to restart his career, according to L' Equipe. He visted the home of the Magpies fifteen days ago. The newspaper has announced that he will be flying to London today to finalise his transfer. More precisely, his one year loan, with option of understood purchase of between 5-6 million euros if he plays at least 25 matches this season. For OM, his departure will reduce the wage bill, but will not raise cash to buy the defensive players desired by Didier Deschamps.

Apart from score with his head and feet That's not how you spell face and shins

Dunno if this has been posted yet http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,11741_6339483,00.html Brighton boss Gus Poyet remains hopeful of bringing Newcastle's Kazenga LuaLua back to the south coast. LuaLua, who enjoyed a successful temporary stint with the Seagulls last season, played for Newcastle in their Carling Cup win at Accrington on Wednesday night but is likely to find regular first-team football hard to come by at St James' Park. Poyet wants to bolster his squad with up to four players ahead of the transfer deadline and has earmarked LuaLua as a top target. "I hope we are going to get four players in by the end of the window," said the Uruguayan. "I don't know how it's going, though, because it's not all in our hands. There are agents, the players and the clubs involved so we'll wait and see. "Kazenga LuaLua is one of the options we are still working on, but we'll have to wait and see what the outcome is."

The way they were downplaying it when they started going about the @ symbol I thought they were suggesting more along the lines of SPORTSDIRECT.COM@ ST JAMES' PARK Not SPORTSDIRECT.COM @ST JAMES' PARK Like in those plans

Wow, this is looking promising again. Be interesting waiting to see what happens after his 24th game if these are the terms, rememeber boro having one of their best players sidelined on 99 games because of a payment they'd have to give to Portsmouth after his 100th that they couldn't afford.

They're currently celebrating the 11th anniversary of the 2-1 on RTG, think it's a national holiday on Wearside.

Well moaning about it isn't going to help. The correct course of action is to jemmy them off with crowbars at night or get rampaging drunk after a defeat and set them ahad.

Do we have any players on existing contracts over £60k? If he's asking to be the best paid player at the club he's having a laugh.

Don't really need him, would hope this is sell to buy rather than sell to recoup what we've spent but it seems unlikely. But then would Ashley allow us to splash cash without being absolutely sure we could sell him and for how much? Also, isn't announcing that we want rid of him kind of showing our hand and lowering the likely fee?

As much as I'd love them to crash and burn, I just can't see it happening. There'll always be some rich 'fans' or people who see it s an opportunity to own such a big name that will bail them out, plus the Premier League will bend over backwards for them.