Rich

Nicky Butt is a fucking dumpling, misses the game against Charlton now because of his booking. (Sorry if this has already been discussed.) And I know nobody played like Glenn Hoddle today, but his passing in particular was fucking disgraceful for a central midfielder. Feel a bit Grimbo here, but I'm sure there was a prolonged spell in the second half where he gave the ball away every single time he got it. I am getting near the stage of counting how many times he loses posession/gives the ball away/misplaces a pass, such is my utter frustration with our supposed "best player this season" He's vastly overrated, although I do acknowledge there were a lot of poor performances on show. Also, for an apparent defensive midfielder, did he once collect the ball deep from the centre-halves in the second half in an attempt to start off a move himself? I reckon it might have been extremely helpful, had he done so. I hope to high heaven that N'Zogbia gets a run in the centre and makes the position his own, alongside Parker, until we can address this area in the summer. I know everyone is going on about getting fullbacks, centre-halves and strikers - but central midfield is becoming a massive headache from where I sit, if Emre is finished then we look utterly devoid of a ball-playing central midfielder and it is an absolutely ESSENTIAL part of Premiership football these days. Christ, it's a bugger these days, isn't it? I've never known a time where so many of us on here have been so disillusioned with each and every player on our books. Is anyone exempt from criticism lately? I can't help but feel that seeing the likes of Man Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool and Arsenal (along with most Spanish teams on Sky) playing some absolutely exquisite stuff every week is raising our expectations of how NUFC should play, it's a real pisser.

Could be a great weekend for us, this, but we're relying on Watford taking something off Everton and Portsmouth going down to Blackburn, Spurs/Bolton is a bit of a dilemma, but I'm hoping for a draw there. Really doubt we'll catch Bolton anyway, but a draw would be decent enough.

Seriously? Find that very dubious, personally. Football Manager?

I hope it's a draw. Three London teams getting relegated would be magic.

Taylor will play LB, with Gooch partnering Bramble on Sunday. Not saying it's the "right" choice, but remember, Roeder doesn't make decisions, he avoids them as best he can.

BBC Match Report http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42604000/jpg/_42604103_duff270.jpg Yack.

He makes an excellent lasagne.

Slight injury, "should" be okay for Wigan.

1 - 10 Well, that's utter stroganoff because I barely saw Bramble, Taylor or Babayaro up their end of the pitch for most of it. Seriously? Did we have Luque on the left, Milner in the middle, Duff on the right and Dyer up front? Was that supposed to be what was happening? Why does Babayaro seem a) afraid of sprinting and b) afraid of getting beyond Duff and into a useful position? Observation: first time I've seen us play the "killer pass" this season (between fullback and centre-half) and we score a goal from it. Magic. Martins and Dyer need to make a lot more runs like this, and so do the wingers, because from all the football I watch it seems like the pass that equates to the most goals and is the hardest to defend against - Arsenal play it for fun.

What formation were we playing during the middle third of this game?

Good to see PSG/Benfica, Sevilla/Shakhtar, Espanyol/Haifa and Vigo/Bremen in there, all decent enough teams, so it's good that 4 of them will be going out. Ours looks to be one of the biggest games. Very tough draw when you look at some of the other teams we might have been pitted against. Should make for a good night at SJP, though, it's just a shame that we have to play home first.

Thrilling.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

AWOOGA!

Please God, let Fener beat AZ.

I was once like you, giving it the soopafan bollocks. However, I, like you, was, in the main, talking shit. Comma overload, dude!

Lads, if Martins scores a cracker tonight then get this song rolling: "Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy Obafemi.... OOOH, AHHH! I wanna knowohhhhhohhhhhhohhhhhhohhhhhhhohhhhohhhh how you scored that goal." Seriously.

I can't see season ticket prices going up again this term after the bother the club had shifting them this season. If they do then I would expect some top-class signings in the summer to draw more punters in, because otherwise we'll be looking at another decrease in the uptake.

Free-kicks would be advantage enough if referees kept the wall back the full ten yards, it's absolutely ridiculous how they do not seem to follow this rule on some of the biggest stages. I know it's a bit rugby-esque but why can't they walk ten yards and drop some sort of marker so that they know exactly where to stand the wall and so that the members of the wall know that they can't go beyond it? Doesn't have to be anything huge, or obstrusive, there must be something that can be done. If free-kicks were set-up properly then there'd be no need to take them quickly.

Summary: ¤ Charles N'Zogbia back for 'Boro clash, hopefully. ¤ Peter Ramage could be looking at the same game to return to the squad, he's suffered a minor set-back. ¤ Stephen Carr returns to training next week (hooray!) ¤ Shola Ameobi should play before the end of the season. ¤ Michael Owen is looking top-notch in training and is "flying". ¤ Craig Moore is back in training. ¤ Shay Given is back at the weekend. ¤ Emre's "injury" is showing "no sign of healing" apparently... what a surprise. ¤ No mention of Tim Krul, like. ¤ Parker might play tomorrow, but if he doesn't then he will definitely start at Wigan. Disappointed about the farcical Emre situation and that Krul must still be struggling, not to mention that Carr isn't far from making his 34th return from injury since joining... but all-in-all I'd say that's the most positive piece of club propaganda that we've had for ages.

Home, definitely.

I enjoyed that, for the most part!

On ITV teletext now, as well... might as well sign up.

Has there been any news on N'Zogbia, Emre and Moore yet? NUFC.com reported last week that all three had returned to training, but I've heard nothing from any official sources. Hopefully Emre will resurface for Wigan, along with Given, and we'll pick up no more injuries before then - with Gooch coming back into contention as well the squad could look stronger than it has done for a long, long time come Sunday. The mighty Ramage was also saying that he should be back for around the Wigan game as well, so in a week or two we might finally be moved from the top of the Injury Table. Fingers crossed. PhysioRoom Injury Table