Rich

Inside joke, sorry. I would say the Ferdinand comment was more dubious when I look back on it. Worrying times.

Jonathan Woodgate - handsome lad, quality footballer, generally a superb bloke. David Ginola - wizard with the ball at his feet, was the most exciting player I'd seen when he arrived. Les Ferdinand - what can you say? Hung like a baby elephant, as well, if Rob Lee/Alan Shearer are to be believed.

Good Lord, we've reached new lows here - because I'd love to see how Milner/anyone else would have fared here had he/they come out and blamed Roeder for that defeat, rather than the frustrations of the supporters. Cracking idea to say they should come out in the media and say it's Glenn's fault - not theirs, or the fans. I'm sure that would go down a fucking treat. Who else blamed the fans, other than Milner, like? Aye they might make martyrs of themselves doing so, but they'd not have much of a future here and they'd end up having a tarnished reputation because of it. Deary, deary me. This thread is starting to look like Vic being chucked into a tank of piranha's - although he'll no doubt tell us he's the shark in amongst the little fishies.

Blasphemy. Infinite Ban. Only joking. I think it's feckin' superb. Would hold about 80,000 people as well.

I said yes when he was linked after Robson and after Souness and my answer still hasn't changed. Horrible fella, by all accounts, but he knows what he's doing and he'd probably continue to work wonders with some cash behind him. Thing is, he'll fuck off to the England job if he does well.

I heard that today we've announce plans to extend... oh... In fairness, I cannot blame people for not reading 9 pages worth of stuff - especially considering the usual quality of post.

He was going to be one of mine, but that whole Ian Rush, John Barnes thing was just a debacle that's better forgotten. Haddaway woman, that John Barnes was top scorer you know!? TOP BLOODY SCORER.

I liked Hamann, actually. My overriding memories of him are his cracking goals and his decent passing ability, aside from that I'll readily admit my knowledge of him when he was here is lacking. I was sad to see him go, like. It'd be interesting to hear more from you about him, or anyone else really. Bowyer makes sense, although I always felt he offered us something useful. Horrible bloke like. Darren Peacock is just out of order, though How can you dislike someone with that hair and with legs that were so obviously different lengths!?!

I thought exactly the same, even though I'm still not entirely sure what/who he was getting at.

Harsh. He's been poorly. The diseased, overrated, mediocre little s*** for brains.......ah, thats better. Unbelievable, tbh. Honestly don't understand some of the slating Dyer gets on here. Really? Oh well. Maybe, when you stop believing he is an international-standard, creative player who actually contributes anything tangible, you'll come to your senses. Good luck with that. Can I just point out, the word "an" can only be used when the following word is a vowel. As in: "an international"? Or was this just a general aside to things?

Cracking thread this, by the way. A pleasant change from slagging off the current lot... let's share it out in equal measure with the previous dross as well, it's only fair. You've been in fine fettle lately though Stevie, and I'm glad the Barton thing wasn't as irrational as I first felt it might have been, thanks to you and Yorkie/'s Dad. Let's not sidetrack it with bullshite though, eh lads? I'm sure this could turn out to be a quality thread if people's agendas are put to one side.

Warren Barton, John Beresford and Jermaine Jenas. Cannot explain the first two, apart from their respective hairstyles during the Keegan days, and surely the last one needs no further explanation. Thinking about it for a moment, I've just always felt that Barton was utter shite for the money we paid for him at the time and I can recall numerous costly ricks that riled me no end back in the day. As for Bez, he was probably a lot better than I remember him as being and he didn't exactly have an easy job standing out in amongst some of the players he had alongside him, but something just ever stopped me from appreciating him. Being more current, it's harder for me to name players that I like these days more than it is dislike.

Erm, sorry to bring reality into this fantasy land that most people seem happy to inhabit, but the financial accounts I read showed a loss, A BIG FAT LOSS!! I know it's boring and I know I say this all the time, but some of you lot really need to think about where the money's coming from. As I alluded to on the first page, they'll probably be forced to spend money even if it's not really there - although I certainly don't see us as being skint as some like to think and I most definitely think a lot more of Shepherd than the vast majority on here. Certainly if things get more desperate by the end of the season at least, we'll see money spent. If we are going to lose about 7 of our senior players (Bernard, Bramble, Emre, Luque, Moore, Onyewu and Srnicek at the least, I'd expect - and five of those seven will see us getting no cash at all) then it's going to take some fucking money to fill those gaps AND improve the squad elsewhere. It's going to be a mammoth summer, it simply has to be whether it be right or wrong, and unless we've got some aces up our sleeve it's going to be another expensive one. I sincerely hope we get our share of quality in on Bosman deals in order to soften the blow, or we at least get good money if Emre does go and something for Luque, because otherwise, as you say, things could get worrying. But really, we probably don't know the half of it when it comes to where our money comes from or where it goes, which is probably for the best. Roeder has been saying he hopes to loan out the likes of Carroll, Edgar, Huntington, Krul and Pattison (although obviously we should take that with the usual handful of salt) - but if those hopes are genuine then we'll surely be looking at replacing most of those seven players above man-for-man, at the very least, otherwise it's absolutely pie-in-the-sky to say that those younger ones mentioned can be afforded experience elsewhere. I'm not sure what Glenn's ideal squad number is, but assuming those said players do all go permanently/on loan, we'd be left with 17 senior players in the squad (Given, Harper, Carr, Solano, Taylor, Ramage, Babayaro, Milner, Dyer, Parker, Butt, N'Zogbia, Duff, Owen, Ameobi, Martins and Sibierski.) And who can say that Carr, Babayaro, N'Zogbia and even the likes of Owen or Milner will still be here come August? That, quite frankly, makes me shit my pants... and that's even before you take into account that about a quarter/third of those remaining probably don't deserve to be anywhere near the first team any longer. That's being fairly polite to some, as well. It's a bit surreal that it's come to this from the squad we had assembled when Robson was here, but we've come back from similar positions before in our recent history and I have to have faith that we will again and that Shepherd and the board will again provide the money that sees us alright, while keeping us in the top flight and offering us the fairly regular European adventure along with it.

Who cares? 'Whey, we've won nowt, but we hosted the final once!' It's good for the city and all that jazz. I'd personally like to see it happen.

Was thinking about this question myself today, as with the injuries mounting at the back and Man Utd still having to go to Stamford Bridge, I think I'm going to have a flutter on Chelsea tomorrow - 9-2 at PaddyPower, haven't checked anywhere else.

Cheers mate. I'll start preparing my Football Manager CV now.

It was the best corner I've ever seen, in fairness. It was effortless in execution. A true marvel.

Nicky Butt, set-piece specialist. It's got a nice ring to it, I'll give you that much. Can't help but think we're clutching at straws when we're on about one corner from an unusual source being positive in 94 minutes of football, though. He's also a miles better option in the box than Milner, Solano, Emre and N'Zogbia as well, so I'd still be dubious about it, despite the zany quality it has to it. Is this a serious post or not, by the way? The way things are on here lately I barely have a fucking clue anymore.

calm down.

There was that shakey point for Oliver last season when Shepherd refused to speak to him for a while, though, so the bloke does have the occasional brave moment where he'll tell it as he really sees it. I bet he fucking hates FS more than any of us do, really, I know it comes naturally to some people but arse-licking him and his cronies for this long must be fucking soul-destroying for anyone. It's a catch-22 really, the bloke is losing credibility with the fans as more and more have their eyes opened up to his true position, but he sees himself as being in an unassailable place due to his role under Shepherd/amongst the ignorant masses. I do genuinely think there'll be a lot of people in the region who take Oliver as their gospel on all things NUFC, which is a shame really because it continually allows the club to get away with murder in the way that Isegrim has suggested. Not for much longer though, looking at it.

I was reading from the initial article in the thread, which unsurprisingly says exactly the same as your selected quote, along with the fact that Roeder/the team "deserved" to be jeered from the field. So there's two "criticisms" for you, apparently - when really only the second one is such. What, exactly, is your point here? I've already said that he's disagreed about the relegation issue and that in the Damien Duff article (i.e. the one that this thread was started about) the players take all of the blame apart from in the two lines I've already mentioned. How many times do you want me to say it? The players take the vast majority of the blame in today's Chronicle and there are a total of three sentences specifically about Glenn Roeder, two of which are exactly the same as each other but in different stories. It's hardly a damning indictment from Shepherd handed down via Oliver, is it? He has disagreed with Roeder before, as well, over certain comments that he's made at certain times - I think it's Parky-tastic that people are picking up so highly on one line that is merely a journalist offering an alternative opinion to a manager. calm down. I'm alright man. I'm just at a loss to understand why you've told me to read the article "again" and then when I do and comment on it, you simply post a quote from another article that says exactly the same as one I've already directly written in a post. It's like you're walking in a big circle and constantly asking me to follow you because we're going to end up somewhere great - and I'm daft enough to keep going! I will admit that it's frustrating when I'm trying to have a reasoned conversation about a couple of pieces of news and I'm being condescendingly told by a lad who thinks Shearer offered NUFC "very little" in eight years to "re-read" the article because I'm disagreeing with him - in the vain hope that I'll magically see the light and realise I'm completely wrong about the way I've looked at it. The fact is, though, that Oliver again blames the players for lines and lines and lines and Roeder gets three of them of what might be called criticism over two whole articles. I'm just saying, I'm not sure he's a goner just yet. It's at times like these I can understand why Vic is an utter cycle-path on this board most of the time.

Have you missed the numerous posts/articles/links that state over and over that the money is coming from outside sources?

He doesn't exactly have an easy job, does he? I keep saying that while he has no excuse for being an arse the majority of the time, he does have an excuse for not being able to write his full opinions about the chairman/club. He relies on exclusives from NUFC to sell his papers and to upkeep his surprisingly good reputation, if you take that away then he might as well write for True Faith or the Journal. True but it's also worth noting that The Journal are much more objective in there coverage of NUFC. Oliver might as well be writing for the official website for all the objectivity he has. On a different note, Roeder's days are probably numbered once Oliver starts having a pop at him Oh definitely, but you don't see the lads from the Journal getting their mugs on SSN every time a story about the Toon comes out. I'm not saying it's right and I'm not saying I think Oliver writes better stories than the Journal lads (because he doesn't), but it's not hard to appreciate that he has to keep in with Shepherd to sell his papers.

I was reading from the initial article in the thread, which unsurprisingly says exactly the same as your selected quote, along with the fact that Roeder/the team "deserved" to be jeered from the field. So there's two "criticisms" for you, apparently - when really only the second one is such. What, exactly, is your point here? I've already said that he's disagreed about the relegation issue and that in the Damien Duff article (i.e. the one that this thread was started about) the players take all of the blame apart from in the two lines I've already mentioned. How many times do you want me to say it? The players take the vast majority of the blame in today's Chronicle and there are a total of three sentences specifically about Glenn Roeder, two of which are exactly the same as each other but in different stories. It's hardly a damning indictment from Shepherd handed down via Oliver, is it? He has disagreed with Roeder before, as well, over certain comments that he's made at certain times - I think it's Parky-tastic that people are picking up so highly on one line that is merely a journalist offering an alternative opinion to a manager.