Wullie

Easy to forget just how astonishingly bad Perch was at right back last season. Rather see Ferguson given the nod.

Perch best in the air.

The irony is that when they're penned in is often when they don't do it - see Simpson passing to Ben Arfa along his own by-line the other night instead of getting rid.

I'll be absolutely amazed if we make Europe like.

Another very fair and sensible post. On the latter point, certainly quotes like the ones from Carver about 4 days with Pardew defending, 1 day with him attacking do nothing to inspire my confidence that we're working on the right things. Although I know nothing about football coaching, it seems to me an odd way to coach anyway - it's a team game and one that often requires defence turning into attack very quickly. It shouldn't be a case of "when you have the ball, do this, and when you don't, do the other", I think that's overly simplistic and not really reflective of how a game flows. I think this could be a reason, for example that there cannot possibly be a worse team on the counter attack than us, we never even look like starting one, never mind being in a position to finish one off.

It's all about expectations I supposed, I'll be absolutely disgusted if we finish 8th or 9th.

There's that "attractive football" thing again - is it not possible to have a middle ground between this sensational football that you think we're all demanding and continuing to try and attack when we're 2-0 up against Wolves (in complete crisis and missing several of their best players) at home? Or getting totally dominated in possession by the likes of the mackems, Blackburn, Brighton?

Everybody knows where we are in the league, the idiots are the ones who think everything is going well and couldn't see our poor performances coming. They even still try to find excuses for the inexcusable. Yeah...playing poor football but sitting in a european spot in our second season back is totally inexcusable... We're not in a European spot.

"Magic football" ffs.

It bothers me that we seem to have four number 9's, and no-one who really looks the part as secondary striker in a 4-4-2. (Jury's still out on Ben Arfa) We'd all like to see Ba and Cisse in the same side, but maybe we have to go 4-3-3 for that. From what I've seen so far, and admittedly it's early days, I've got my doubts in this area. Ba's reputation has been built on his goalscoring, not his link-up play, and we've bought another goalscorer. They don't yet look like a combination to me. Ba's been at his best this season playing as a number 9 not as a secondary striker. Maybe people just have different ideas about what those terms mean, but for me he's at his best when he can get in the box and be the prime recipient of chances, having another player doing work for him, not the other way round. This holds true whether it was Shola putting himself about, Best being our target man, or Ben Arfa dropping deep and linking. Not saying him and Cisse can't work together, but it will need some hand's on tinkering from the manager (if he can be bothered to take his eyes off defence) to slightly adjust their natural playing styles. Both of them have good link play and movement so as long as they take turns being the poacher it should be fine. Ba's a bit stronger and better in the air so it makes sense to have him a bit more central, while Cisse's a bit quicker out of the blocks so perhaps let him roam a tad more and exploit space out wide. Oh, and long ball isn't an option if they're both in the team - not even a plan B imo, it's as good as giving the ball away. There's no merit to this idea that he needs someone alongside him "doing the work", as if van Persie plays alongside Heskey, the only way you need that is if you are going to heave balls up in the air that need bringing down. Enough pace and width in the team with players getting ahead of the ball and two good strikers can prosper quite nicely, thank you very much.

Liverpool don't play them till next Wednesday. Very odd little weekend, Fulham vs Swansea and Wigan vs West Brom on Saturday, MOTD should be absolutely riveting.

Just started listening to the Tuesday Club, first comment about us: "I was surprised they weren't more dangerous, all they did was fire high balls at Ba and he couldn't hold on to them"

That's the entire point, it doesn't have to be brilliant stuff, that's what the people saying "you just want us to play like Barcelona" don't seem to grasp. We dominated that game from start to finish. I want us to dominate games, have most of the ball and most of the chances, whether that's direct or not i'm not bothered, I just think that particular style doesn't suit our players and won't have us dominate games. Ironically, Stoke do that nearly every week at home, completely boss it without "looking like Barcelona".

Even if you take Everton as a comfortable win, which i'm not sure I would, we still created remarkably little, and scored through a ridiculous own goal which Howard was poised to claim and a real wonder goal. We had wonder goals to thank against Wolves and Villa recently too having created very little at home. This is a real worry to me, our lack of genuine chances. Despite Man United, I still have Stoke down as our performance of the season, really thought we might have cracked it.

I was at Bolton as well and we were absolute dross until we scored, crowd were very restless about the amount of long balls being pumped at a permanently offside Best.

Blackburn away? We got absolutely battered!

Take away deflected goals? Take headers off too while you're at it.

It's annoying that there's no place online with easy access to statistics, number of long balls etc.

Perch against Holt and Morison again? You're not serious?

Sewelly

"World beater" Has anyone ever actually said that about any player in history?

Next week: who was better, Shearer or Brian Pinas? We answer the big questions.

Look at the difference between players when they move clubs or go on international duty. Actually I can't even believe we're having a conversation on a Newcastle United forum regarding whether managers make any difference to how the team performs, fuck me.

If players get the best out of themselves, what's the point in having a manager? Ludicrous comment.

"playing for liverpool isn't like playing for newcastle or sunderland, this is a special club' They can't be that special if that cunt Bellamy plays for them.