Wullie

Not saying you're wrong but hasn't it always been up for sale really? Unless he's prepared to take less money for it than before, what makes now any different and what form does "being on sale" take in this instance?

I don't want Pardew to fail any more than I want Shola to fail. But they're both shit. If Shola comes back against Liverpool and scores the winner, he's still shit. I don't know why this seems to be such a difficult concept to grasp for some people. They become desperate for the man to have "credit" for a decent half here or a decent half there (let's face it, it's never been a full game for a long time). I don't change my mind on a player's long term suitability based on 45 minutes especially if they have a second half catastrophe, why is the manager different? Pardew "turning things round" and getting the absolute consistent best out of these players is as likely to happen as Shola turning into Didier Drogba. Feel free to hope as much as you like but don't whinge when other people call you out on talking nonsense.

Is there a back four among the leagues best 7 clubs you would not swap with? I'd prefer to have the ones we've got being coached correctly before I'd go rushing out to swap anyone. What's the next painfully depressing and wildly incorrect prediction Wullie? Took us 2 games to rise above the 16th position we supposedly wouldn't move from all season. I leave the painfully depressing stuff to the "8th is fantastic" brigade. Brett? He's quoted it like i've said that. Wullie thinks we should be pushing into top 6 but thinks we are in a relegation battle, ambitious pessimistic clown What on Earth are you talking about man? My position has always been that the players are comfortably good enough to compete for European qualification whilst the manager is not close to being Premier League quality and drags them down, fails to get the best out of them and leaves us constantly less than the sum of our parts. How does any of that contradict what I've said? I think you're sitting on the fence a bit, if we finish top 8, you'll say well so he should with that group of players, if we finish in another relegation battle, you'll be blaming the manager and not the players. Fwiw i don't think even a good manager would get us into top 6 this season, i think Everton have themselves a good manager and a similar standard of squad to ours but don't think he'll manage it, they will be similar to us where we will try and fight for it but will come up short in the end. Sitting on the fence on what sense? I think the manager is obscenely shit at his job. What part of that sentence constitutes sitting on the fence?

i apologise You're spot on. just my perception. Probably clouded by Wullie's insistence that things have never been this bad in 15 years It's much easier to cope with the manager if the players are bollocks. Having to be in a position where players with real talent and pedigree look absolute toss and we can't accommodate Hatem Ben Arfa because he doesn't graft enough is unbelievably depressing. I've never been more frustrated as a Newcastle fan because I can see how close it is, that doesn't necessarily mean things are at their worst.

The greatest piece of managerial footballing recruitment in modern football history was Arsenal plucking Wenger from the J-League. Incredible.

Ed Malyon certainly earning his corn there.

Is there a back four among the leagues best 7 clubs you would not swap with? I'd prefer to have the ones we've got being coached correctly before I'd go rushing out to swap anyone. What's the next painfully depressing and wildly incorrect prediction Wullie? Took us 2 games to rise above the 16th position we supposedly wouldn't move from all season. I leave the painfully depressing stuff to the "8th is fantastic" brigade. Brett? He's quoted it like i've said that. Wullie thinks we should be pushing into top 6 but thinks we are in a relegation battle, ambitious pessimistic clown What on Earth are you talking about man? My position has always been that the players are comfortably good enough to compete for European qualification whilst the manager is not close to being Premier League quality and drags them down, fails to get the best out of them and leaves us constantly less than the sum of our parts. How does any of that contradict what I've said?

Is there a back four among the leagues best 7 clubs you would not swap with? I'd prefer to have the ones we've got being coached correctly before I'd go rushing out to swap anyone. What's the next painfully depressing and wildly incorrect prediction Wullie? Took us 2 games to rise above the 16th position we supposedly wouldn't move from all season. I leave the painfully depressing stuff to the "8th is fantastic" brigade.

Is there a back four among the leagues best 7 clubs you would not swap with? I'd prefer to have the ones we've got being coached correctly before I'd go rushing out to swap anyone.

You just talk at constant cross purposes Brett. You're incredibly proud of this team and think they're "very good" but only good enough to finish 8th, absolute maximum? Coming in 8th out of 20 is something that would please you. That just absolutely boggles my mind. It's average, it's mid-table mediocrity. It's absolutely fuck all to be proud of.

Yep. A mid-table position does not fit my definition of "very good for this league".

Well i meant a very good side for this league, wasn't talking about world football. I'm sure league 2 fans will be saying we've got a really good side here, but meaning in terms of their targets, not comparing themselves to Barcelona. You must be confident of at least Europa League qualification then?

Should have no bother turning over one or two of Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs in the coming weeks then? To be fair to Pardew, his 2 wins against top 6 opposition last season, and the year before that, is more than we've managed since 06/07. We only managed 1 win in 07/08, 08/09 and 10/11 and were in the championship in 09/10. Think it's always tough, but he's been better at turning over top opposition than our other recent managers. He's failed to get as many draws as we've managed previously like. Like I say then, I'd expect a "really good side" to be winning at least one of those games and not losing more than one - and certainly not conceding goals by the bucketful. I think Spurs are a better side than us but they just conceded a bucketful off West Ham, football isn't as simple as you think it is Wullie, saying we should be beating one of the three no bother because we have a very good side is naive. It's a tough league, results this season have been rather random and everyone seems to beating each other and nobody really looking like a class above. With our team there's no reason why we can't beat one of them three sides, but if we don't, it doesn't mean to say we aren't very good. The league position and points total will probably suggest otherwise.

Should have no bother turning over one or two of Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs in the coming weeks then? To be fair to Pardew, his 2 wins against top 6 opposition last season, and the year before that, is more than we've managed since 06/07. We only managed 1 win in 07/08, 08/09 and 10/11 and were in the championship in 09/10. Think it's always tough, but he's been better at turning over top opposition than our other recent managers. He's failed to get as many draws as we've managed previously like. Like I say then, I'd expect a "really good side" to be winning at least one of those games and not losing more than one - and certainly not conceding goals by the bucketful.

Should have no bother turning over one or two of Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs in the coming weeks then?

Norwich have been absolutely robbed here like, there was only one winner five minutes ago and now they're buried.

This is how I feel. Despite the 433's there hasn't been much pace on balls across and in to him in the box. Of course he's had chances and he should have taken them all a lot better bar his header. I still don't think he's getting the chances he needs to break his duck and kick off again. I'm hoping he does. I think balls slid into his feet are where he really prospers when he can get a shot away first time but that's a real rarity now whereas in his first few months we played on the front foot and gave him those opportunities all the time.

I'm still very much supporting Cisse, don't think we play a game that suits him though.

Us under Gullit I think.

They really should have tried to appoint someone immediately. Which manager in their right mind is going to want to take over a team six points adrift and looking unable to buy a win? Fair enough, you've plenty of time to make up the ground and if you do, you look like a miracle worker but far more likely is that you end up with a relegation on your CV through no real fault of your own.

I only managed to watch the second half, I assume the first was better because that was fucking appalling. Extremely valuable three points though, we'll need these.

He's dropped Anita?!? What an utter sack of shit the man is.

As has been said, not many of our players are in good form. Only Remy, Anita and Gouffran can be considered to have played well recently. We obviously can't drop everyone but we have to drop some of the players who aren't performing. For example, we've persisted with Cissé mainly due to lack of an alternative. Now Gouffran and Remy are playing well Cissé can be dropped. Would anyone be upset if Dummett started over Santon? Most people would be happy to drop Debuchy but we don't really have a natural replacement for him. I did say that Ben Arfa has no replacement. Ben Arfa doesn't track back. If that's the case, tell him to stay up the pitch and have the left and right backs stay back. Santon and Debuchy bomb forward but rarely create anything. We'd probably be better off if they stayed back. I would happily have a different manager to Pardew but we're stuck with him at the moment. I'm sure other managers could do better with our team. I'm not sure two games comprises enough sample size to drop a player who has earned us 6 of 7 points almost single handedly. Even counting the Everton game in is a nonsense. He was out of position, had our only shot and the whole team touched the ball about five times in the first half. Reminds me of games at Blackburn and Brighton two years ago where we made absolutely no attempt to attack and Ben Arfa got all the blame. For the record I've said plenty of times that it doesn't matter who you select, or buy, under this manager. They'll all turn to absolute shit eventually. Dropping X and bringing in Y is just going round in circles because in a month people will be crying for X to be brought back because of how shit Y has been.

Does my fucking head in like. The manager tells the other players "just give it to that bloke, he'll do it all himself" so they do it and the other team put three players marking him to strangle him out... And our fans think he should be the one dropped?! That's not to mention the preposterous decision to move him out of the position he's become used to in the first place. Our entire attacking game this season boils down to: Ben Arfa cuts inside and shoots. So he moves him over, Ben Arfa can't cut inside and shoot and apparently that's Ben Arfa's fault.