Tisd09

If him an Tiote hit it off we could have hell of a midfield. Based on blind optimism, I believe we are going to have a good season. Check back with me about 19.35 Saturday evening, my optimism may be in tatters over a few bottles of Coors Light! Nipples talking to me as well.

Not a huge fan of bentdner, but can't believe we are happy to turn our noses up at him yet we were all jizzing in our pants at the prospect of Gameiro that many of us knew feck all about.

Shola gets way too much stick. He is massively frustration to watch a lot of times but he has had his quality moments for us at times. I'd much rather see him on the field than Ranger and Loven at the moment. We are not in a position to lose any more strikers until one comes in at least. That being said I wouldn't be broken hearted to see him sold. I think he deserves a little respect though. #nottheworsepersonatNUFC

Shola's on the ticker bar, he's on the ticker bar. Get in wor Shola. :-) :-)

I think the clincher was that picture of him riding the bike and eating an apple. To be honest I doubt that Lionel Messi could do that. Who needs Gameiro, Gervinho or Erding?

Maybe he's got a French granny or something?

OMG is Sam trying to be the biggest Cunt in football. Yeah all the managers had to mop up after you, you big fat bastard, surely he is on the wind up, you would think so if this was the first time he came out with this shit, but its not.

Vaseline WTF he looks like some kind of drag artist. Surely he needs a power ranger dressing gown??

One thing I do like is that this has come pretty much under the radar, was it Wednesday or Thursday he was first linked and now it looks fairly nailed on. SteveMc you make a good point if the Barton shot had not had happened but Routledge was sold and Obertan brought in I think a lot would see it as far more positive. As it is some think its Barton's replacement/our badly needed striker. Lets hope he is Routledge's replacement?

The way I see it is that he is no worse than Routledge but is un-tested in the Premiership, he could turn out to be a good player he could turn out to be shit, but in my opinion he strengthens the squad, Pardew has no confidence in Routledge and would have only used him at the very last resort, you would think that Pardew actually wants Obertan so is more than likely to play him, so in that sense we have improved the squad. However, he could turn out to be an awful player, just haven't seen enough of him to make my own judgement either way.

I don't know what to say about this transfer? I haven't really seen him play. I know he's bald and French so maybe we can get away with calling him the New Zidane??? but whatever, it does give me even more of a reason to buy the French away kit.

Excuse my ignorance here, but say Valencia buy him outright can they sell him a year or so later to say Barcelona for megabucks?

Dennis Wise didn't seem to have problems signing players. ;D

this summer would be seen as a gamble,involving mimimal expenditure I'm assuming that a new left back, Barnetta and striker would cost a bit more than agent fee's and tarmac mind. But given what we've had in from Carroll, Nolan & Enrique (probable) then expenditure would be minimal. Any transfers are a gamble but replacing very experienced and influencial players like Nolan, Enrique & Barton makes it even more of a gamble. A lot of us wanted to see Nolan out of the team anyway, the Enrique seemed adamant for a move after selling Carroll and regardless of blame it seems it would be a bad idea now to keep Barton, IMO that situation has gone past the point of return regardless of who's fault it is. So it seems like its a gamble we needed to take? I don't know maybe I am a glass half full person and looking at the situation with black & white tinted glasses on?

I just can't think of a forward that would fall in to our remit to be honest. I'm hoping we are holding out for a loan deal for Sturridge but I think thats very wishful thinking. If reports are true that Villa-Boas does want Pato then it could open the door as they will have 3 marquee forwards in Torres, Drogba and Pato. Kalou & Anelka were reported to be leaving in the Pato deal.

How would this summer be seen if we did sign a good left back, barnetta and a good forward, but losing Enrique and Barton? I think it is a gamble losing 3 influencial players like Nolan, Barton & Enrique but on paper our squad would look stronger than last season especially when you consider the return to action of Ben Arfa and Gosling. In an ideal world we would have a centre half back up but I think given how its gone so far that would be greedy?

So we ignore Barton's behaviour the past couple of months? He's made a few twitter posts man, yes we should just ignore it. We certainly shouldn't f*** with the clubs future and just give the bloke away for free Would your boss ignore it. Regardless of the fact its professional football I know my employers would look dimly on me if I slagged them off in a public domain. My old company withdrew a job offer of an employee because of his negative comments against the company on a message board. Another employee was put on a final warning for critising a business decision made by the directors.buod[ /quote]With all due respect, I doubt it would be a great loss to the company if they were to lay you off (I dont know what you do so im just speculating). Barton is our best right midfielder, and to be fair, we need him next season. "cut your nose off to spite your face" comes to mind, it would be f***ing idiotic to let him go. Wullie – I kind of knew that as I was typing, comparing the real world to football is pretty pointless but I was more trying to make the point that slagging off your employers in a public domain should not be taken lightly. As for me my current employer they probably won’t be that bothered to lose me – I’ve only been there 4 weeks 

So we ignore Barton's behaviour the past couple of months? He's made a few twitter posts man, yes we should just ignore it. We certainly shouldn't f*** with the clubs future and just give the bloke away for free Would your boss ignore it. Regardless of the fact its professional football I know my employers would look dimly on me if I slagged them off in a public domain. My old company withdrew a job offer of an employee because of his negative comments against the company on a message board. Another employee was put on a final warning for critising a business decision made by the directors. EDIT - I am pissed that we are giving him away for free though.

So we ignore Barton's behaviour the past couple of months? You seem to be ignoring the form of the 2 players for the last 12 months, so yeah why not. Where have I ignored the form of our best two players? I think Barton was a very important part of our team last season along with Nolan, Enrique, Colo and Tiote. I really didn't want to think of our team without him for this season, Nolan slightly different especially after we signed Cabaye not that I know much about him but reading reports, the fact he is a French international who helped his team win their Championship gave me confidence that it would be ok to move Nolan on especially if his demands are true. It doesn't need explaining that we should fight harder to keep our better players but people are outraged by the behaviour towards Barton. There are two sides to every story and I would like to think I'm being fair to Barton and the Board. This is a complicated situation. The Twitter things have made things worse, I got a feeling if Barton hadn't joined Twitter they may have been hope of a compromise?

So we ignore Barton's behaviour the past couple of months?

you what? because we want the club to hang onto it's best players for f***s sake I think we should hang on to Barton too, in an ideal world he and the board would have come to an agreement that suited both, that didnt happen, Barton has not handled himself well IMO. People seem to think he's been treated badly, yet nobody has come out in defence of Smith, surely if Barton is being treated badly then so is Smith. The crux of a lot of peoples arguments in this thread is that the club have acted badly towards Barton, I'm guilty of that too as the club could have acted way better than they have but like many others I've been willing to forget the fact that Smith has been treated in the same way, all because he's been shit for us.

I have no resentment to Alan Smith, the situation with him is not his fault. See Albert Luque, Xisco et al. The Nolan situation is an interesting one, and I agree with how it was handled. Barton's is a completely different situation imo, a player who could offer what he does now for years and years to come and arguably our best player. I agree that over all those players Barton was the one I would want to keep the most, but he's been told he can find another club and on the face of it has done fuck all to the club, he hasn't publically crticised the club and seems to be towing the line yet he has been canned pretty much no one is bothered by his treatment.. The situations are different but I think our judgement is a bit clouded as his quality is important to us. If we did sign Barnetta and that defensive midfielder from France - forgot his name now then I don't think people would be as up in arms at the treatment of Barton? Just my opinion!

By the way, Smith has done fuck all wrong apart from being shit, why aren't we up in arms at the treatment of Smith? Because he's shit its acceptable, same if this happened to Shola we would all just shrug our shoulders, but we are up in arms over Nolan and moreso Barton because they are tidy players.

Whilst I do understand the point and being an isolated incident then it wouldn't make any sense to release him BUT its not as if its the only controversy he's been involved while at the club is it? That being said we should have made it one of our top prorities to find common ground with him and his agent and try to have compromised on a contract that would have pleased both sides. Thing is Barton comes across untrustworthy just like Ashley and Lambiarse!!!!!!!!

My heart skipped a beat then. you Bar Steward