Benwell Lad

Thing is it's really nothing new for them. Keane, Bruce, O'Neill were all worshipped like demigods initially before the rabble inevitably turn on them. It even extends to chairmen, coaches etc, Quinn, Short, Ball. Really strange behaviour and almost uniquely macum in character. Even the odd one who attains an education and escapes the wretched shackles of Wearyside seems unable to rise above it. "Wheeze Keeyze" in her role as a journalist for a left leaning newspaper seems unable to resist fawning over successive managerial incumbents, even a self confessed fascist. I guess spending their existence in the permanent shadow of their "big club" neighbours makes them welcome any kind of attention and interest, however negative.

Always looked impressive in the little bits he's played, particularly the 2-4 against WBA just before Christmas, season before last when he crashed one against the bar from about 30 yards.

Fuck me it's spread to the Bundesliga thread now Is there one remaining thread on this once tidy forum which has not been hijacked by the Pardew prophets of doom ?

Agreed. I don't know why people are surprised at this outcome, because they did say that they wanted to get away from sacking managers in reaction to one bad season. Just going from this board, over the last two and a half years there has been a wild swing in the general opinion of Pardew from zero to hero and back again. You can understand Ashley wanting to get away from that. Aye, the only thing that surprises me is that anyone is surprised at this statement. Agree about the coaches, they're great guys but I've often wondered if they were appointed in haste and in an attempt to gain some "local" favour when he was appointed. We need more strength on the coaching side and to move away from appearing to be a soft touch.

"It's a tough call as to whether this will be a longer summer for Sunderland football club or the Conservative party. On the one hand, you've got a rapidly-oxidising leader losing the confidence of his swivel-eyed loons, and on the other, you've got a rapidly-oxidising swivel-eyed loon seemingly losing the confidence of those he leads" ;D "One suspects Di Canio is so inflexible simply because that is all his nature allows him to be – and at a comparative church mouse of a Premier League Club" ;D "I tell you we made a miracle," he royal we-ed. "Previously eight games with three points. With Di Canio, seven games and eight points." As the calmer heads of Football365 pointed out, if you were to extrapolate eight points from seven games across the season, Sunderland would have finished with 43 points, as opposed to the 39 they ended up with. Miraculous indeed, if not quite loaves and fishes territory Amazing that this once proud football club built on working class traditions in a region of coal mining and ship building is now widely lampooned for it's extreme right wing leadership. The guy's gonna be a disaster for them.

Fucking loony more like it. Still the macums seem to think he's even more of a god than O'Neill was just a short while ago

;D Aye, we need something classy on it, like maybe Bet365, Zoopla, Genting Casinos, Standard Chartered or even Tullow Oil's Invest in Africa thing.

So the PFA say di Canio cannot be "a law unto himself". Obviously don't understand much about fascism in that case.

Thats it then. I'm never getting excited about a corner again.

Re the corners argument, I know our record is woeful, but can't ever remember it being good. As this thread went into stats overload does anyone know what is the average number of goals from corners per season and which teams are better than others ?

I can easily understand that - a car is a single, usually high value purchase for which the vast majority of people would struggle to find the cash in one lump. Like a house, for example. The high interest rate loans thing is a totally different kettle of fish because it targets the vulnerable, financially troubled sectors of society by dangling the option of very fast availability of cash, at an exorbitant interest rate. Kind of ironic, given the fact that the most financially prudent of us can't generate any income from savings because, errrm, the interest rate is so low. Good point re booze companies and gambling operations sponsoring football clubs by Benwell Lad, but I was actually talking about Wonga in a non football sponsorship sense. It's a commonly used argument against pay day loan companies but isn't it just as likely to be a trendy wannabee who wants a new pair of Armani Jeans to go out in on Friday night and can't wait until pay day ?

If you're thick enough to take a loan out with Wonga you deserve everything you get. Sometimes people don't have a choice. Exactly, and that is why Wonga do so well. Personally, I think the sort of interest rates they charge are entirely unacceptable - it is a dressed up form of money sharking as usually practised by criminals - but I feel pity for people who are forced into that situation where they have no option but to use Wonga. Assigning some sort of fault at those who use them isn't the answer. Regulating and limiting their voracious financial abuse of those people is. Don't really want to appear to defend wonga or any other financial institution but for those in desperate circumstances they're actually an alternative to the REAL loan sharks. An expensive alternative sure, but non the less a commercially regulated one. It's popular to use the huge interest payment arguments to criticise them, but essentially it's a product for short term pay back quickly loans, and used as such is often cheaper than banks or other lenders. Not many ideal sponsors in football and many would argue they're no worse than the alcohol or gambling based sponsors who can ruin lives and lead unfortunate people towards loan sharks.

Waving a big contract might convince a few mind. i.e. more over priced dross. And even today there are footballers with principles who will refuse to associate with his fascist leanings. Tough times ahead.

di Canio's Management by tabloid shock/horror style is going to be a great source of amusement to us as his uncontrolable ego brings all kinds of issues into the public domain for the world to chuckle at.

I don't know a single supporter in person who wants us to keep Pardew and all of the comments around where I sit were negative towards him yesterday. I wouldn't say this place is too far from expressing the feelings of the fans in general. I think there's always some protest or dissent around SJP before a manager gets the boot, going back as far as Joe Harvey being hounded out by the fans many years ago. Yes, the legendary Joe Harvey. Like you say there are plenty of negative comments about Pardew, especially on here, but nothing really tangible at the match itself. Certainly not an open protest or chanting that some on here wanted to see. The only tangible sign of dissent I recall was during the Reading game but it was short lived and never returned. Quite surprising really in what has been a truly awful season.

You would think that but I'm starting to wonder if being on here distorts our sense of reality. We seem to see something totally different to the majority elsewhere if Happy Face is anything to go by. That was why I went on a little posting spree in here last week. The anti-Pardew bile on this board does exceed the strength of feeling elsewhere.I don't think the feeling is "totally different" though. Everyone agrees that Pardew is an incompetent manager with an inability to get teams playing good football, poor man management skills, bizarre team selections and even weirder substitutions. What most people can also see is that we knew all of that when he was appointed too People have posted quotes from fans of other clubs and players that played under him going back years as evidence he's shit. Well no shit Sherlock, the same quotes were available in 2010. Why didn't Ashley heed them then? What reason is there to think he'll have any clue about the reputation/ability of the next man he appoints? People suggesting Graeme carr will have input....but he was at the club when we gave the job to Pardew. Knowing the general feeling on here, even talk of organised protest, chanting etc, and on the back of a third consecutive home defeat and a thoroughly miserable season, I didn't see or hear one bit of anti-Pardew demonstration at the match or in town yesterday. Some discussion about whether he should stay or go but that was about it. Surprising that internet sentiment is so different to the stadium.

Very good point.

Although to some degree I agree with di Canio's rant about player discipline/behaviour, if I were a mackem I'd be very concerned and probably quite worried about having this fascist loon in charge of the club. I suspect many of their more sane fans already are. Sunderland is the least attractive club in the PL for a player to sign for, which is why they generally end up with over priced dross that no one else wants. di Canio's statements will make it even harder for them to recruit anyone half decent.

Tempted not to hang around for the lap on Sunday but will do because this guy deserves an appreciative send off.

Happy Face, tbh it's you who is in the wrong here man. You're trying to see things through both sides and points of views but for me it's clear you don't know football. Most on here are very informed and knowledgeable from watching football from leagues all over the world who have seen other teams play 100 times and therefore have built there opinion on other than Newcastle. I've in my lifetime very rarely seen football played in such a cowardly manner as under Pardew. I have a family who we all grew up with football, I don't know how many times I have had to sit through Newcastle games even last season with criticism for Pardew. It was obvious last season and it's even more obvious this season. He can't adapt, he can't change and he can't manage a football club at the highest level. I'll be happy to be proved wrong, but that is dependant on him learning from mistakes which from his interviews is clear he doesn't see them as that. I think most on here have come to realize this and it's not weird we want the best for the club. To say we have been massively unlucky this season is also proof of being excessively lucky last season. This season we have had a fair few lucky moments in our favour too, Figueroa being harshly sent off, Evertons goal not counting while we've also had some unlucky and terrible refereeing calls. In the end we have a team good enough not to depend on decisions and something Pardew has not done. No one expects someone new to come in and make Mike Williamson play like a classy CB, but you look around the league and world and you have a lot of managers adapting players to their tactics and helping them improve while we have a manager who has stagnated players at our disposal. Last week* I had this discussion with Inochi and he refused to see it the same way as me and I respect that, but before Ben Arfa came into the side last season we won very few points, had we not had a great start to the season or had Benny come into the team to save us we'd probably have finished around the same. Credit where it's due though Pardew did get the team to play efficiently and that's why I've many times compared him to someone like Sven Göran Eriksson. Both have this inability to makes changes for the good, to see their blatant mistakes and try to correct them. If Sven managed us I'd see the exact same problem. It's a conservative style of football with no back up plan if it fails. Luckily for Sven his style worked for him many times, but it was very obvious it didn't always work. I'll never forget the 2002 world cup quarterfinal and I'll be forever thankful for England having Sven as a manager. Brazil up 2-1 with a man less with 20-25 minutes to go absolutely dominated the ball, England had no idea what to do when they were in advantage player wise. Instead of looking for a win they were left confused when a player like Roberto Carlos stole the ball, ran the length of the pitch, stopped, looked back and passed it back around to the defenders in a way not to lose the ball. I saw the same with him against other teams at World Cups. Pardew falls into the same category for me but obviously at a lesser level. With that said many managers can play defensively and still be good managers, look at Ancelotti, Capello, Tite etc. More boring styles of play are hard to find but they have a system in place and believe in their philosophy. You also have to Loco ones like Tele Santana, Bielsa etc. Drawing a conclusion from this, it's beyond me how anyone can be surprised that 95% (w/e that number came from) are completely against the bloke, but I can promise you HF that we will all be hoping he changes over the summer if his still here. tl;dr... Wat? It's the internet man you can say what you want. Especially if it's on N-O and relates to Alan Pardew,

Think of him simply being an upgrade on Shola. At the right price, he would be a fantastic addition. ...and those who bemoan our lack of goals from corners/free kicks (i.e. all of us) wouldn't have to wait too long to see us scoring from them again.

Wigan down. Clean as a whistle.

Just picture a demented dog chasing it's own tail around and you're about up to speed.

PL without doubt. Would have said different a few years ago but sadly the cup just isn't what it once was. Weakened teams, empty stadiums, final played at 5.30 on a day when other matches take place too. Still like to win it though.

Agree. The notion that Ashley will keep him because of a previous statement, contract, friendship or whatever is wrong. Ashley is a ruthless operator when it comes to running his business and wouldn't think twice about cutting his losses. That said, I think Pardew will be around next season.