Rich

you can't push up - you'd be exposing the youngest and most vulnerable section of our team they should be protected at this delicate time in their lives (right before they get the sack) Vic, if you're taking this so personally the least you could do is debate the points in a sensible manner. sensible debate is overrated imho :lo: like I say, the time has passed for defending the indefensible, theyre not good enough and they need to know it Roeder's practically said certain players let him down, he could mean Parker Solano Sibierski for all we know As for protecting their fragile egos for Chartlon, honeslty can't see the point meself Still only 6 points off 6th, amazingly. I know it's an incredible long-shot, but we have one of the best-looking run-ins out of all of the teams who are challenging for Europe. Even if we don't think it possible, surely Roeder/the players should? It would be just like us to scrape 7th again after last night and I hope we do it. I do agree with your general stance, btw, as in that even if Roeder does get the boot then who will we replace him with? The rot starts at the very top, but at least we seem to be in a more "stable" position these days, both financially and in other areas. So Glenn does deserve credit for that. Also, if he does get us to a respectable finish in the league, it's more ammo for your current policy of defending him - surely that's motivation enough for wanting us to beat Charlton, etc.

you can't push up - you'd be exposing the youngest and most vulnerable section of our team they should be protected at this delicate time in their lives (right before they get the sack) Vic, if you're taking this so personally the least you could do is debate the points in a sensible manner.

I'd rather he didn't single them out, Vic. Out of the entire team last night he's picked on the youngest section of it to place the blame, when the fact of the matter is that Martins, Dyer, Duff, Parker and Butt were as bad, if not worse, at doing their own "jobs" than the defenders were. It's a laugh that everyone has been saying exactly what he's come out with for seasons now regarding Bramble and since Huntington's debut a good number of people have been certain that he was never going to be good enough, especially at left-back. But now, when the pressure is really on, Roeder reverts from type and changes the record to shift the blame to the usual section of our team. Like I said, I've never been one to lambast Roeder for everything and I do realise how much of a difficult position himself/the team has put him in last night, but I just think it's exceptionally poor man-management to come out and say that your players, who you pick, are not good enough when all of them are still going to play a big part in the final 9 games of the season. I would have preferred if he'd held his hands up, on this one occasion, and say that he was tactically outclassed by one of the best managers in the world. To say that the entire team did not do their jobs properly and that it is not the sole responsibility of the defenders to stop the goals. Given wasn't exactly blameless for either of them, yet he gets praised to the hilt? It just doesn't sit right with me the route that he's taken after this game. To blame the referee, as well, after Taylor didn't even see yellow for the elbow, after Huntington's foul right on the chalk of the area wasn't even given in the first half, Nicky Butt only getting yellow for a blatant kick and after multiple other occasions in both ties of the round where the referee treat us extremely favourably is another example of nothing else but blame-shifting. We had the better of both referees in both ties from what I could see, yet Roeder is using their decisions as an excuse as to why we lost? It's extremely poor form from a man who has always gone out of his way to appear to take the moral high ground... the fact that he's now decided to pull out the injuries "excuse" is another nugget, as well. Not that he hasn't used that one before, like (in a less than direct manner, of course.) I'm not saying "Roeder Out", but I am severely questioning his tactics/selection during the second-leg and his media response after yet another low point in his reign.

Him blaming the defence makes me feel more than a bit "off" with the bloke. How low can you stoop when you're blaming two young lads, who you "coach" every day and who you select to play in your team, along with an ageing right-winger filling in at right-back and a player who has a consistent track-record of failing to turn up in the big games? Aye Glenn, it's their fault that they're not good enough to play for Newcastle United. Never mind that Huntington never had an ounce of help from Parker, Butt or Duff, never mind that Nicky Butt didn't seem to turn up and did absolutely zero to protect the back-four, never mind that your long-ball tactics were utterly futile, as usual. There are plenty of other reasons why we didn't go through tonight, it's not just because the three defenders we did play are not good enough to play at this level. I've been fairly even-handed with Roeder, but to absolve himself from the blame in the way that he has done in the media last night/today is a fucking wretched way to conduct yourself for someone who still has to pick his players up for the remaining 9 league games. "Aye lads, you're all fucking shite and you're getting replaced in the summer... now here's how I want you to play against Charlton... I don't expect anything less than 100%" Unbelievable.

Aye, KD is alright. The other fella had to go, though.

He's banned, mate.

Channel 5 proving it's newfound cult sporting status by making all of us grin after such a shit night. The fucking legends.

I did. I thought the difference in commentary from the pro-Spurs stuff last night was remarkable. And sickening. Entirely agree. Spurs were fairly mint to watch, which was sickening enough in itself.

Aye, was exasperated from the word go when the programme started 5 minutes before kick-off... then it went to adverts when I was hoping to see/hear the players walking out... then when Champion and Beglin started calling for Taylor's head... etc. etc. Channel 5 was fucking mint compared to this dross. Did anyone else find themselves doing the "whistle" tune from C5 when a break came on?

Aye, there's nowt we can do about it and tonight has set in stone for me the fact that it's a complete waste of time spilling your guts about an NUFC performance on a message board. If people feel that strongly about things then we should be taking some sort of action, no matter on what sort of level, to do something that makes a difference. It's a complete waste to whinge and moan after every single bad performance from a football team, other than to get things off your chest. I'm all for debating why things are happening and why things go wrong, but to be anything other than frustrated about it is starting to feel daft. I do appreciate that people need an outlet, though, but the apathy is starting to strangle me.

You're blaming Parker, alone, for Butt having no passing options. That's when you know you're past the point of no return with an opinion on a player, mate, it's nothing but bandwagon. I don't like Butt much, but I appreciate when he does something well and I certainly don't blame him when other players' shortcomings are mentioned. Think it's pointless continuing this as you obviously have your opinion set in stone on El Capitan and I'm not going to agree with it just yet, so I'll bow out.

Do you think Butt was better than him? I've made a point of watching both closely since the anti-Parker bandwagon started up and I thought the Manc was absolutely anonymous for the vast majority of this game. His passing is consistently terrible, he's slower than a tortoise running in treacle, he's impetulant and he cannot tackle for toffee. Neither of them are great, but from what I see I think Butt is miles more inferior. You're spot-on about Roeder's decision-making, though. Emre's just returning from a massive injury and it's our biggest game of the season, it would have been a massive risk for both him AND us to start him tonight. He simply cannot be match fit after playing 20-odd minutes of football in over 2 months. I know the team that was selected was utter dross and that Emre might have made a difference if on from the start, but we can never say for sure that it would have seen us through. We could have lost by a landslide, or he could have been badly injured. I'm just glad he got another piece of a game under his belt and that he looked miles better than both of our other central players when he came on.

Didn't you just say in another thread that no manager could work with these players?

I am fighting the urge to abuse you.. Then again,can't say you didnt deserve to win.. f*** fighting the urge, just tell the Dutch cutn to f*** off to his own board. Bellend. Howay man, he wasn't particularly offensive with that post. He wasn't,just bad timing..very bad timing.. It has to be accepted. It's part and parcel of football, fans baiting each other. Let them have their moment.

I agree. We weren't set up for counter-attacking football at all. I'd have kept Duff on. The reason he was quiet in the second half was we weren't giving him the ball. I'd have put on Emre and Milner for Sibierski and Parker. I don't think Parker played that well at all. It was the usual story. Good at closing down the opposition, poor in possession. Once we went 2-0 down that wasn't what we needed. This. Exactly fucking this. WHEN are people going to wake up and realise that Parker is not the fucking answer? Emre offered us sooo much more tonight. Aye his set pieces were gash, but at least he offered a threat going forward. He was better than the vast majority, mate. I didn't see anyone else putting the ball in the net towards the end of the game. He ran his bollocks off, as well, which is more than a fair few did tonight. Emre was very good when he came on, I thought. Shame he wasn't fit enough to start. How do you know Emre wasn't fit enough to start? I reckon he was. Parker runs around in Circles and offers very little in terms of retaining possesion. I would never sign him again given the chance. He didn't look at all fit to me when he came on, if he did start then he'd have had to come off at half-time or on the hour I'd imagine. In any case, Roeder was never going to make the decision between Butt and Parker, was he?

Similar here. I can feel the anger inside of me and I feel like snapping, but I'm becoming conditioned enough to tuck it away and keep a level head. It's more hard work than it's worth getting upset at yet another exit from a cup competition.

I am fighting the urge to abuse you.. Then again,can't say you didnt deserve to win.. Fuck fighting the urge, just tell the Dutch cutn to fuck off to his own board. Bellend. Howay man, he wasn't particularly offensive with that post.

Caught between a rock and a hard place going into this game seems to be the way we looked at things as a club, we didn't deserve to go through on tonight's performance.

I agree. We weren't set up for counter-attacking football at all. I'd have kept Duff on. The reason he was quiet in the second half was we weren't giving him the ball. I'd have put on Emre and Milner for Sibierski and Parker. I don't think Parker played that well at all. It was the usual story. Good at closing down the opposition, poor in possession. Once we went 2-0 down that wasn't what we needed. This. Exactly fucking this. WHEN are people going to wake up and realise that Parker is not the fucking answer? Emre offered us sooo much more tonight. Aye his set pieces were gash, but at least he offered a threat going forward. He was better than the vast majority, mate. I didn't see anyone else putting the ball in the net towards the end of the game. He ran his bollocks off, as well, which is more than a fair few did tonight. Emre was very good when he came on, I thought. Shame he wasn't fit enough to start.

he was bloody awful, you could equally say "huntington couldn't keep a cool head alongside such and such" or "solano couldn't keep a cool head" etc etc. load of crap to say he's some put upon hero a la Maldini who is wrongly suffering due to his team mates, he made by my count about 15 or 16 INDIVIDUAL errors tonight, which is pretty incredible. awful even by his poor standards. Yes, yet there's a thread exclusively for him! The whole defence was shit. What would you expect from this CB you evidently wish was out there in his place? A god-like saviour amongst schoolkids? It says much for your tenuous stance that you would count his errors alone, after he'd been one of our best players recently. I take it you counted the errors of Oba Martins? Butt, maybe? Shay Given? Pathetic. Trying to scapegoat a god-awful team performance on any one player is worthy of Andy Townsend, brother. Tend to agree, I thought Butt was worse than anyone for the first 60 minutes and yet he seems to be escaping from most people's criticism. People DO have favourites and they DO have players that they simply dislike and want to see the back of, it's just nature. Not sure you can blame people for picking scapegoats after that performance Ank, he was fairly abysmal - but as you say there were plenty on an even keel with him. I think the main point of people's frustrations is that he's still here after multiple performances of a similar nature over a number of years.

At least they have that nutball in goal again, let's hope he continues from where he left-off last time around: by that I mean with his constant fannying around, not that save he made from Martins.

I completely agree with the Nut here. I thought they were fairly fucking terrible at SJP and incredibly boring to watch, aye we know you can pass the ball between the defenders and the goalkeeper, well done. Their lack of a right-back was something else I picked up on, one of their centre-halves was always yelling for somebody to track back and cover Duff. They do seem to have pace either side of Arveladze and Dembelele starting will probably make a difference to them, but I'm still confident we'll go through. 2-2 draw or something along those lines, but I favour us to win over them. Hope this doesn't come back to bite me on the tukkus.

Only until Saturday, pet.

'Cos that pink BLATANTLY clashes with that blue collar.

Would people be accepting of a pink trim, to match the sponsor?