UV

The danger with this kind of contract of course is that it promotes short term thinking, where getting a result today is far more important than long term planning. Either consciously or sub-consciously it can affect the decisions the manager makes and the risk he takes with players. Will youngsters get chances in the first team in games you "should" win anyway which might make them a better player in several years time ahead of playing your experienced players week in week out to make "certain" of the win? If for example you're getting a £25k bonus for every stage you get to in cup competitions, will this affect your decisions in who to play to the possible detriment of the next league game?

I don't understand why KaKa's so keen on Bothroyd tbh http://www.newcastle-online.org/nufcforum/index.php/topic,56003.0.html Now the obstacles of the ill informed Keegan and a lot of the high earners have been removed, and we have a manager on the same wavelength as the owner, you must be aiming a bit higher surely?

That's a bit stupid, when most of our signings have turned out to be very good. It doesn't stop it from being true, and apart from Tiote who would you say was "very good" without qualifying it with "for the price"? Best Routledge Xisco Shall I carry on? Please do, it's hilarious.

That's a bit stupid, when most of our signings have turned out to be very good. It doesn't stop it from being true, and apart from Tiote who would you say was "very good" without qualifying it with "for the price"?

Why would Cardiff want to sell their top scorer (by a long way) for a minimal fee in January when they are sitting in an automatic promotion spot and one of their other strikers could be locked up? If these talks are for real, it must be regarding a deal in the Summer surely.

IMO risking Nolan & Barton, with the latter so he could be played out of position on the left wing was a worse decision than bringing on Tiote, and just because neither of them were actually sent off or got injured doesn't mean it wasn't a poor decision to play them, especially if they were as fatigued as Pardew says. Squad permitting, none of our key players should have been on the pitch from the start IMO, and Guthrie & Ferguson should have started, with Nolan & Barton only coming in later if needed. If squad players aren't considered good enough to start against a side in the bottom half of League 2, then what are they doing even on the bench in Premiership matches?

Precisely. Players for the most part know themselves when they're not playing well. I'm sure it was no revelation to Krul that his kicking on Sunday was appalling. So it beggars the question as to why does the manager need pick that out as one of the main reasons for us playing poorly and losing the game? It's pointless other than as an exercise in blame shifting away from himself - it's not my fault we lost I had to play a kid in goal who was shit. That's right Alan, don't bother telling your young inexperienced keeper to start laying it off short to the defence during the game when you see his kicking is off, just wait until after the game and single him out for criticism. The ability to scapegoat and shift the blame onto others may be the type of thing Ashley was looking for in an "experienced" manager, it certainly fits his style, but it's not a quality I rate highly. Sorry, but this is in no way motivational to a young player: Criticising something like a player's effort, tracking back, concentration, etc is understandable as that is something they can improve on in the next game and is amenable to motivation. Criticising a technical part of someone's game when they have an off day simply puts them under more pressure next time they play knowing that people will be focussing on it and comes straight from the Souness book of top tips for real managers.

That's rubbish. I work in Liverpool and Hodgson was what a lot of people wanted. Like Lawro, they thought he was a good choice at the time, especially after the Europa League success he had at Fulham. They were willing to give him time. So what happened? Start of October after 7 whole league games: http://www.redandwhitekop.com/forum/index.php?topic=264227.msg7500158#msg7500158 I have no problem with the way Roy is managing the team 14 (0.6%) Give him until the end of the season to prove his worth 251 (11.2%) Give him until Christmas - Let's see what he can do 611 (27.3%) The derby is his last chance to turn it around 513 (22.9%) Out now. We've seen enough 851 (38%) It seems for 60% of them the famous "Liverpool way" of having patience with a manager gives you 8 games, and for nearly 90% only up to half a season. It's a bit like Allardyce coming here. We thought it was alright appointment at the time and after winning our opening game 3-1 at Bolton, we though 'great'. But after 6 months of watching the long ball game, we were sick of watching rubbish football and crap results. Same with Liverpool fans and Hodgson. There was a lot of complaining about how we were playing, but nowhere near the hysteria going on at Liverpool. Our equivalent thread at Christmas: http://www.newcastle-online.org/nufcforum/index.php/topic,48146.0.html stick with - 343 (50.7%) get rid - 333 (49.3%) We are notoriously fickle, deluded about the quality of the team, and think we have a divine right to be challenging for the league though.

OMG they're MID-TABLE half way through the season!!!!! He's the worst manager EVER, not just the history of Liverpool - taking a mid-table side with a couple of good players and turning it into a mid-table side with a couple of good players who aren't playing very well during half a season where they've changed owners!!!! Sacking him now is too late, he should have gone ten games ago! Yanks MkII OUT! It's the Liverpool way! http://i.imgur.com/DqUyd.gif Surely Souness for one did more damage in his time. There may have been other factors, I don't know, but they went from years of finishing 1st or 2nd in the league to 6th, 6th, & 8th once he came in, and while they improved once he'd gone they've never recovered from it.

The fact that there are no obvious whipping boys means that it's less likely you'll need over 40 points to stay up this season. When West Ham went down with 42 there were 2 abjectly poor teams - with West Brom on 26 and Sunderland on 19. The bottom teams are on around a point a game. One or two may drop below that ratio, but that's probably how it will end for the 18th place, so I reckon 39 points or 38 points with a decent goal difference will keep you up this season.

It goes without saying that there must have been something to put him off working for the best owner/chairman the club has had in at least half a century, the only logical reason can be that he was scared off by thoughts of a lad with a misspelt banner and the protests the NUST organised before they were formed. The man can't be expected to leave the security of his current job knowing he'd probably be hounded out by the fans just like all the managers have in the last few years. Once again the club has been let down by these so-called supporters who dared to show their faces as we were relegated with the highest ever attendance figures in a relegation season, and no doubt shamefully continue to go to games and try to create an atmosphere in the ground. How on earth is Mike supposed to run the club successfully under impossible conditions like that?

Seems to make sense, given what we've said in the thread already. What kind of things would the players have been told in private that would give them faith in the regime? Lies?

Whatever he's on that contract was handed out during Ashley's initial big spending phase which ended with us getting relegated. I don't know why people keep chiming in with Colo's supposed wages, does anybody seriously think when his contract is up he'll get that sort of money again? At least Colo's a foreign mercenary and stays fit. What's local lad Taylor's excuse for wanting to screw his home town club? Colo's hardly a mercenary. “At the end of a player’s career, the only thing that counts is their checking account, they don’t feed themselves with cups neither with medals, and I fear he could miss the contract of his life. “The pay rise is very important for Fabricio,” he added. “Here (in Spain) you have a better life, but a player’s career is very short" - Colocinni's agent around the time he was threatening that he'd leave Depo the following season on a Webster if they didn't let him leave to come here.

Just ice for the 96

It'll take a while to make back all of the £43m playing the Next Blackburn Manager betting markets you know. At 33/1 - no problem

Just seen this horseshite For example - per season - turnover 80m, expenditure 60m, 20m to pay back his loans Make sense? would still take 5 years to get just his loan back let alone his full investment which would take 15 years plus Also, surely we're still making a loss? Why do you think that? Since the last time we were in the premiership, basic TV revenues have gone up £8m per club (and we're on all the time this season for which we get £0.5m per match), we have instalment payments coming in for all the players we've sold in the last few years but will have very few instalments going out (as we've paid up front for a good few years now), the wage bill is significantly down, then there's all the advertising revenue we'll be getting from Sports Direct , etc I'll repeat what I said back in July: The above didn't take into account Summer transfer activity which will have been around the £5m mark? If the wage bill really is around the £50m mark - which I think is a reasonable estimate - then unless we've somehow picked up some significant extra costs along the way, by my reckoning, we'd have to have a turnover of less than around £80m to not make an operating profit this year, and we've not had a turnover below the mid 80's since 2002.

Nah, I don't think I'll ever believe that no matter what he does. Pretty much everything he has done (especially in the last couple of years) can be explained away by the way he runs his other business. It's worked for him there and he's arrogant or thick enough to believe he can successfully run a football club in the same way. I'd claim great powers of foresight if it wasn't so fucking predictable:

But think about the consequences!!11!!! Didn't need to be Golfmag to predict you'd dig that one up again for the 37th time. Difference between Ashley and Shepherd: the latter was vulnerable to attacks on his finances. Hell, one chant of "sack the board" and he'd run off and blow loads of money we didn't have on a Luque or Owen. Protest, as you correctly pointed out earlier, is unlikely to affect Ashley's actions in any way whatsoever. Not THAT hard to understand, is it? I'll dig it up every time I see you hypocritically telling people they shouldn't protest because protesting is bad and will have dire consequences. You encouraged protesting against Shepherd during games or boycotting games altogether despite acknowledging any reduction in income would directly affect the club negatively. You thought exposing FIFA corruption before the WC vote was the right thing to do in spite of the threat of losing votes. But you don't think anyone should air their anger at Ashley for sacking "a great young manager" - your words last month - for fear of the consequences despite acknowledging any reduction in income will have little effect on how he runs the club or any decision to sell? That's pretty hard to understand. It's almost as if you just don't want people to protest against Ashley and are using a false argument you don't believe to try and scare or guilt people out of it as you know you're not going to get anywhere arguing against protesting on any other grounds.

But think about the consequences!!11!!!

A show of support for Hughton achieves the same thing without the fallout afterwards. Fallout afterwards my arse. Ashley will do what he wants regardless of a protest. You're an idiot if you think the minor and brief protests after Keegan are what prompted him to announce the club was for sale the first time or prompted any of his actions thereafter, and the meek acceptance and lack of protests upon relegation certainly didn't stop him from putting club up for sale the second time. Short lived protests wont get Ashley out or affect what he does in any way, but they at least show to the world that we as supporters are not complicit in his crassness. Besides you're living on another planet if you think you can realistically have a show of support for Hughton without any criticism of Ashley.

If I was a player who liked Hughton and thought his sacking was completely unjust, I'd expect the supporters to share my feelings and voice their disgust at the people responsible to the world for me. If they didn't bother, I'd think they agreed with the decision and have nothing but contempt for them.

Only an idiot wouldn't take survival this season. In the grand scheme of things, what's the difference between finishing anywhere between 11th and 17th? about 2.5-3m Exactly. Basically nothing. Actually it's about £5m. Which could double our transfer kitty for the next 2 to 3 years!

A well respected and liked manager has been sacked for getting a newly promoted team into a mid table position to the incredulity of anyone who is not mates with Mike Ashley. Hey, but remember what's important, please don't let anyone see we're bothered about it or the media might have a go at us!!! Oh, and if we get relegated it'll be your fault like it was the fault of the kid with the boycoutt banner we went down last time.

he hid for quite a lot of the relegation season and the start of our promotion season. He started 6 games in the relegation season and 6 last season before injury. So if you call being injured "hiding", I guess you're right. Coincidentally, we won the first 2 games he started in 08-09 which were our first wins in 8 (and he wasn't hiding when he took the pen instead of Martins against West Brom). We were W4 D1 L1 in the games he played at the start of last season (the draw and the defeat were away at the other 2 teams that got promoted, 2 of the wins were against 4th and 5th) but in the next 5 after his injury we went W1 D2 L2. He's a massive miss.

Good work, however I think doing it on league position can distort it as it all depends on how all the other teams are doing and this year the table is especially congested. I realise that all that matters is league position at the end of the season, but I think doing the analysis on points per games played would give a better picture of how we are doing relative to how previously promoted teams have done early and then later in the season and may put some perspective on our early season performance and how it is likely* to tail off. *I think - I've no idea how it would turn out as I've not done the analysis myself I'm just going on gut feeling, it might prove me wrong but I'd be interested to know either way.