Flip

And we'll be proven right All Hail Ben Arfa

I agree with your point on VDV, however the thing with him for me he's just so much more naturally suited to the role in that he's not particularly greedy, he knows when to try something flash and when to keep it simple and most importantly he has a great footballing brain in that he's a thinking man's footballer, a Stop it right there, Ben Arfa isn't a greedy player, actually I'd say the opposite, last season at Everton he was trying all these through balls for Carrol and against Stoke the same instead of shooting. This season it's a different story, but that's because he wants to show what he can do and trying to hard. If he can just get back to his natural games, he'll get more assists than goals. And you'll change your opinion.

You must have been licking the gravy off your dinner plate during a lot of key goal moments this season, then. Let me ask you, was Best involvement in Ba's goals against Stoke and Blackburn because of hid hold up play? If not, then no I was not licking the gravy off my dinner plate.

Zlatan has no balls. Barcelona shits on him. And Swedish national team are better without him than with him. Fucking ego.

Nothing this season suggests that Best is better in holding up the ball better than Ba. Actually Ba drops deeper and holds up the ball more often than Best and brings other into play. Best on the other hand wins more headers and is crafty up top with his hardwork. But I have rarely seen his hold up play result in a goal for us. He usually gets at the end of stuff to score and his hold up play is limited as he always plays it back to someone while Ba at times turns his defenders. I think its not more than fair for Best to get a starting role on Saturday, but I just can't see how much longer he'll stay there if we don't get wins. And if he plays like he did at Stoke for the remainder of the season he'll be there, but if he doesn't and plays like he has for 50% of his matches this season I can't see Pardew keeping Ben Arfa on the bench. Players have come out and said that Barfa is fantastically talent, now its all about getting it shown on matchday and getting match fitness up. I have no doubt that he'll be starting every match from January on if his fitness permits.

Sounds like Best has been excellent the whole season...Best is undroppable. Ben Arfa and Ba to fight for the spot next to Best.

I fall into the Ben Arfa 'fan boy' camp, but I agree wtih quite a few points, I feel Ba has can play higher up the pitch as well though. He didn't seem to be dropping quite so deep against Stoke and he more than held his own against their meathead back 4. His link up play was much better than usual with his back to goal, held the ball up really well, played some nice passes and little lay offs after shielding the ball. By all accounts, he did well and worked his bollocks off against Blackburn, on his own up top as well. When Ba plays with Best, he does tend to drop deep and I think he's instructed to, so far so good and I don't think it should be changed just yet. However, I would suggest Ba is versatile and good enough to be equally effective playing with HBA. From what I can see, he isn't as good as Besty in the air and maybe not quite as strong, but he still has the physical attributes and intelligence to do well with Hatem. Far too early for anyone to suggest they won't work together.

Pip, I fully agree with you. But there's no way he should play, I mean Ba and Ben Arfa will never work and Best will win us the Champiooooons League.

So not only do we want to split up a very good partnership to accommodate Ben Arfa but we also want a striker that has scored 8 goals in 9 league games this season and 15 in 21 in 2011 to change the style of play that has been very effective for him to accommodate the lad too? No, it's just that I don't agree with that's whats been working for him. He does more defensive work right now than he should, I don't see how playing Ben Arfa would change his offensive game. You move him higher up the field when defending instead of him tracking back the whole time. He hasn't played behind a striker, all his goals bar one or two have come from being inside the box, not from coming from deep. You can definitely let Ba play like he has been without the tracking back and accomodate Ben Arfa. No doubt about it.

So not only do we want to split up a very good partnership to accommodate Ben Arfa but we also want a striker that has scored 8 goals in 9 league games this season and 15 in 21 in 2011 to change the style of play that has been very effective for him to accommodate the lad too? You'd honestly think we were talking about Gonzalo Higuain or someone of similiar ability. Ludicrous. Higuain Well done. Top stuff.

Yeah think it may have to be Ben Arfa or Ba rather than together, or stick Ben Arfa out wide, I agree inferior position, and I've argued against it but not a terrible idea really. You mean it should be Best along with either of our two best offensive players, instead of playing our two best offensive players together? It's football, you should always be able to accomodate your best players together.

We will never know if they can link-up or not if we don't play them together. I have no doubt that Ba can play off the last defender instead of dropping deep. I also think he wouldn't get as tired if he did, since he's running so much, he's knackered after 65-75minutes. Ba's goals have come from a position where nothing suggest he can't play there, as they have been from inside the box and not all of them have been from coming from deep. Against Blackburn he held up the ball and smashed it and why wouldn't he be able to do it on a regular basis? I feel its more that Pardew wants him to drop deep since Best won't to the same degree, but nothing suggest his game will not be as good if he doesn't drop deep.

Don't necessarily have to play him against the Manchesters side if he has a good game against Everton, but I hope to see Ben Arfa getting at least a half in the three-four coming games. I just think that our best chance of hurting Man Utd and particularly Man City is a flash of brilliance from Ben Arfa. As far as I'm concerned we've got nothing to lose in those games, so give HBA a chance to go crazy. True, I'm all in favor of starting him this weekend already, I won't be disappointed for him not play against the big sides in the beginning, but I think his brilliance can hurt the small teams the most, where we struggled last season.

Don't necessarily have to play him against the Manchesters side if he has a good game against Everton, but I hope to see Ben Arfa getting at least a half in the three-four coming games.

There have been people writing him off though. They're taking a lot of risks Ba-Best partnership was generally good (very good against Blackburn at SJP) since the start of the season, but to say that it's better than HBA-Ba partnership or that HBA can't play behind Ba is a very...fast conclusion. Comparing a partnership which got a lot of hours and games on the pitch, which got time to find automatisms, with another potential one isn't very serious. In France, the best seasons of HBA careers were 2007/2008 at Lyon when he played behind Benzema, and the first 3 months of 2008/2009 season at Marseille behind Mamadou Niang. He's much more influential in the center than in the wings and his vision of the game, an unknown aspect of his football but the best one for me, prior to his dribbles, is just amazing. Je suis d'accord avec vous monsieur garrincha. People have drawn the conclusion after he played more or less 180 minutes in this league. And yet won us 3 points on his own from those minutes.

His performances against Spurs, Wigan and Wolves were below average. Not saying he was the only one, but was much more visible against Stoke then against any of the other teams possibly this whole season. And like Pip said, maybe we don't need to change right now, but at some point Ben Arfa will have to get in if we want to challenge for a top 6-7 spot.

Thank you for knowing your stuff and agreeing with me.

There have been people writing him off though.

Some people are crazy Let the boy get some time, get up to speed. Then we will use him, he is just to good for us to have on the bench in the long run. Him and Ba on top Ben Arfa - Ba upfront should scare defenders more than Best - Ba. Can't wait to see Ben Arfa at his best again, he just needs to get a few more games to get into that groove.

At times your clueless. Your love for Best makes you blind when talking HBA and Best. Ba and HBA would work very well, don't see why it wouldn't. Just because Ba is not playing as high up the field as Best doesn't mean he cannot do a job there. Actually I think playing HBA would make us better in the sense we wouldn't be relying on sending long balls for Best to win them. Like best a lot but he's not better than HBA, and HBA can start with Ba upfront, don't see why it wouldn't work. I'm clueless for not wanting to break up a partnership that has us 3rd in the league in order to accomdate a player who a lot of us see as being stronger from a wide position anyway? That's a new one. So well argued too. No, you're clueless for thinking that Ba - Best partnership will hold on for the whole season and saying that for HBA to start he has to play on the right (at some point we won't be 3rd and won't be winning every game). Ben Arfa against Wigan although not at his best was brighter than Best has been for many games this season. Best will hold up the ball well, but rarely looks dangerous and his play with the ball at his feet is very very average. Ben Arfa would bring far more to this team than Best if he could get fit. Against Stoke he had a very very good game, but Spurs, Wolves, Wigan were below average performances. All this is completely irrelevant if you were arguing that you think Best should start on Saturday since I agree with you

At times your clueless. Your love for Best makes you blind when talking HBA and Best. Ba and HBA would work very well, don't see why it wouldn't. Just because Ba is not playing as high up the field as Best doesn't mean he cannot do a job there. Actually I think playing HBA would make us better in the sense we wouldn't be relying on sending long balls for Best to win them. Like best a lot but he's not better than HBA, and HBA can start with Ba upfront, don't see why it wouldn't work.

£12m profit in a year is definitely something ashley would look into.