Rich

If Bellamy indeed DID beat Riise with a golfclub, then it's surely not much of a stretch to say that Barton probably hasn't done anything that bad this season! Nothing reported, at least. Surely that bit is undeniable, though?

I'm still at a loss to when "this year" was mentioned. I've read back over the thread again, and looked at both GeJon & HTL's posts and can't find HTL saying anything about "this year", the couple of years comments were made and then it suddenly just changed to "this year" a bit later, but not from the auld bugger. Apologies if I've missed something, I'm just trying to dull the bickering by discovering that there's actually nowt to be arguing about at all, hopefully bringing an end to this latest episode of spoilage. Barton and Bellamy are both prize arseholes by all accounts, it's not something that we can really measure either. This apparently happened after the anger management, an' all Guardian Story For the record, I don't think I'd want either at Newcastle at the current time anyway. I'm not on any side here.

The arse incident was this year, wasn't it? Are we talking 2007, or this footballing year? Was it not the "past couple of years" asked about? I did read the thread previously and I can't recall HTL asking about "this year" in particular (all 7 weeks of it!) In any case, do you actually believe Barton has reformed his attitude that quickly?

Didn't Barton put a cigar out on a youth team player's face? ...And show his arse to away fans at the end of a game? There has been more as well IIRC. Certainly been in about as much bother as Bellamy has since leaving us. A lot of footballers are utter cunts though, they're only human like. Meet plenty more cunts out on a wander through the Toon than you would find in a dressing room.

Never said he was cured, but it's food for thought. Certainly a lot more depth to it than your bandwagonised opinion on the subject! "Aye that Woodgate, he'll never get fit like." Also, I never said we should spend £7m on the lad but we should have certainly been in for him on loan, which you were also against. If he had of come back here, he could have been crocked again, I'll openly admit that. But you've been in numerous posts lately laughing at the notion of Woodgate ever putting consistent runs of games together and talking down to people who suggest we might go for him and based on this season, i.e. "the present", he's starting to disprove his reputation. I was surprised to see how many games the lad has played so far this season (was amazed when I compared it to our players), I don't see what was so wrong with pointing it out. I have previously considered him a crock as some of my older posts on here have confirmed, but maybe he's improving because 'Boro are taking proper care of him. He might get crocked again very, very soon, but 21 out of 24 league games since joining 'Boro is impressive.

Gilardino with perhaps the best dive I've ever seen tonight. Cunt. Mainly flicked between that and Madrid, the other two looked like snoozefests in the first-half. David Beckham was mint, but Munich are crying for a decent left-footer in midfield. Emre could be brilliant for them.

About Jonathan Woodgate: Woodgate has started 24 games this season for 'Boro, Jon (finished 22 of them) in all competitions, plus his game for England the other week. That's more than we've had out of Bramble, Moore, Owen, Carr, Dyer, Duff, N'Zogbia and Babayaro (plus others). It's the same amount of club games played this season in all competitions as Shay Given, amazingly (and we've played much more than 'Boro). Puts things into perspective a bit. 21 games out of a possible 24 for him in the league he's played for 'Boro (he was signed after their first 3 games). Just seen you laughing about Woodgate staying fit a fair bit lately, when he's got a better appearance record this season than about half of the players we would probably consider to be first-teamers when they're not injured. If Jonathan Woodgate had started 21 games in the Premiership for us this season he would only be behind Martins, Milner and Parker out of the ENTIRE squad - they all have started 22, just one more game than him (and Milner and Parker have been here since the start of the season!) If we include substitute appearances, then only Nicky Butt would move ahead of him (to 22). Really amazing, I've only just found this out when looking into it.

http://img473.imageshack.us/img473/4214/tablekq4.jpg Looks realistic enough to me with these results... D, W, D, W, L, D, L, L, D, W, W = 4 wins, 4 draws, 3 losses. Fairly pessimistic I'd say, so here's hoping for a few more points than 51 come the end of the season - blimey, I've just realised this is the same total that Northern Monkey has predicted we'll get

The fact that you quoted Prince of Thieves in that post means I am in complete agreement. Brian Blessed IS a legend, as well.

Think he was pointing out left-backs, mate.

A Geordie John Terry would be ideal, because I'm not sure if he'd be as good as he is for Chelsea playing for Newcastle. Obviously he'd still be a quality player, but would he really be THAT brilliant for us in terms of leadership/popularity with the fans/relating to the club? I know it's speculation, but there's food for thought there. He embodies Chelsea, much like Shearer embodied us, it's hard to replace that at a new club. With that in mind I'd go for Cristiano Ronaldo. Exciting to watch, improving all the time, nerves of steel and the best player in the business at running at people and committing defenders. I'd offer him more of a free role than he gets currently at Man Utd and I'd basically let him rip people a new arsehole. He's proving all the time that he can score goals with either foot, he sets up a fair few and he's decent in the air. He's about as close to an all-round attacking player as I can think of.

I agree with this as well. To me Roeder seems like a bloke who has his head screwed on and who could be a massive asset to this football club for years into the future, but personally I'd prefer a stronger personality as the manager. For now he's doing a good job on limited resources, but the real test comes when he has most of his big players fit and he has to decide between people, and when the summer transfer window rolls around, of course. Fact of the matter is that next season finishing outside of the European places will simply not be acceptable, he's got away with it a bit this term because of the number of injuries we've had and the amount of games we've had to play, not to mention what appears to be a lack of funds in the coffers (January-wise.) How's this for an analogy? He's been handed a huge hole to dig and at first he had a JCB to do it with (the upturn in mood after Sourmess left), then in summer he was downgraded to a shovel as we didn't have enough money to totally overhaul the squad, but enough to get some decent players in. January saw Roeder with only a spoon to dig it with (Gooch on loan), he's getting there but it certainly won't be a quick process. Let's hope he gets the shovel back this summer, at least. That's brilliant work, I reckon.

Just did a quick search and you are indeed right, News of the World says that a £3m fee has been agreed for a move in July... being the NOTW I would hope that it's nowt but rubbish.

I think the Spurs fans were saying they'd signed him on the 31st January (that never happened, obviously.) I certainly remember KingDawson on here talking as though the deal was signed, sealed and delivered only for it to never be announced in the media. I don't personally recall anything to do with them signing him on a pre-contract, although admittedly I might have simply missed the news.

Nice to see that LB is "probably" the priority... but does anyone think we could better spend the money on a proven fullback instead of Bale? Wouldn't turn my nose up at any of those three coming to us, although I highly doubt we'll be allowed to snare all of them.

Roeder is off to Coventry tonight with David Mills to watch Gareth Bale in action and is also still monitoring Giles Barnes and Curtis Davies. Funnily enough, last time I played Football Manager they all ended up at Newcastle... www.icnewcastle.co.uk/newcastleunited

I have to say, as fickle as it sounds, that clip has made me like the Chelsea lads a bit more. Makelele's laugh is legendary. EDIT: Just watched it again, it's fucking mint.

Mosley!! I am increasingly shocked at your cheekiness. ...Used to be a lovely lad

Baggio, I completely agree about our defenders' ability with the ball at their feet. All the best teams have at least one centre half who has something about him in that he can play as part of the attack when necessary. I wish we had a player with that confidence (Taylor/Edgar both look decent with the ball on the deck to me, although I haven't seen enough of Gooch yet to comment, but he looks clunky like Bramble and Ramage.) We do have to remember that Man Utd and Arsenal have coached that way for bloody years now, it hasn't just happened with a click. I do think we're improving though, but also that the likes of Bramble, Ramage, Babayaro and Carr will NEVER be able to play as you suggest. I also think that our defence is too scared to play with any flair right now and that we seem intent on doing nowt but "preventing goals" in a direct manner. Whereas, as you and NE5/HTL suggest: there's more to defending than headers/marking/tackling, etc. There is still hope for Taylor, Edgar and Huntington because all seem to have decent levels of technical ability (Hunty to a lesser degree) - Solano is obviously exceptional in this area and will hopefully be kept on at RB (or at least as back-up.) I do think we need at least a left-back to be added to the squad, and along with a striker that is the absolute key area we must see to in the summer. Both are as important as each other, IMO. As for Craig Moore, the bloke has been a lot better than expected and does have an awful lot of good points about him when he's actually fit, but if memory serves he's been directly responsible for a bucketload of our conceded goals this season - mainly from set-pieces, I think. If I get the time tomorrow I might look into this further. He's too old, slow and injury prone to be kept on in any capacity and by all accounts he wants to head back down under anyway.

How dare you!

Renewing.

I'm going, on a kid's ticket. £20 to play Zulte Waregem in the freezing cold, when it's on the telly? Nah.

Chelsea already have their general play sorted. In the end you need top class players throughout a team to be good enough to challenge for the title, I don't see anybody saying that isn't the case. What is being discussed here though is the priority for improving the team with a finite budget. If we maintain possession better and offer a greater attacking threat to the opposition we will concede less goals as a result. If/when we then improve individuals at the back and improve our organisation throughout the team AND at the back we will in turn concede even fewer goals. This is what I mean, I'm not sure how anyone can argue with this particular post?

Spent ages this morning trying to push this point on to a few of my mates. Apparantly, Newcastle fans are 'delusional' because we think that Bellamy and Woodgate are top class players. Your mates sound thick, but so is the concept that it doesn't matter at all what a player does off the pitch as long as he does the business on it. If that player is a disruptive influence who takes a golf club to a team mate for the crime of not duetting with him on the karaoke, then I would say you'd have to factor that into your assessment of him. Good man management doesn't mean telling the rest of the squad that they have to put up with criminal behaviour because the lad does the business on a match day. Exactly my thinking on this. That's looking at something from more than one angle, folks.

Can't help but feel that people are simplifying football to an unacceptable degree here and the debate, as usual, is doing nowt else but circles. Can we not simply agree that having quality defenders AND quality strikers (as well as quality everywhere else on the pitch, and in the dugout, and in the board-room) would equate to a better performance from the club/team? It's absolutely basic logic here... are we really trying to decide whether having good defenders or good strikers equals less goals conceded? How could we ever prove that beyond reasonable doubt? There are arguments to be made on both sides of the coin with this - and I must agree that the Chelsea example can be used here - Chelsea are a far worse team when Terry is missing, as they are when Drogba is missing, when they are BOTH missing they look nothing like the team that they do normally. Of course it helps if you have top-class defenders in the team and of course it helps if you have forwards who are elementary at relieving pressure from the defence. It all depends on how you view the game and what type of a stance you have on how football should be played. There is no definitive method here, as proven by the numerous managers/coaches/teams who have tried an infinite number of set-ups and players with varying degrees of success. Some teams will emphasise defence and be successful, others will concentrate on attacking and scoring more than the opponent. At the current time with NUFC as far as I see NEITHER our defence or our attack is performing to a completely acceptable level... but what are we aiming for here? Perfection? The debate is so mightily complex that I can't, quite frankly, be arsed to delve into all the different levels of it - but there are other things to consider here than quite simply buying defenders or buying strikers, things like: ¤ Having a settled pair of centrebacks that don't change with every match, this would arguably greatly improve our defensive ability (even if it was just Taylor and Onyewu). Defending is drill, etc. It's very hard to defend properly as individuals, which is basically what we've been doing for the past seasons. Other teams enjoy CB pairings that are together in almost every game (think Henchoz and Hyypia from a few years back, Campbell and Toure at their peak with Arsenal, etc.) Who have we really had that have played THIS many games together? ¤ Having fullbacks who don't change with every match, much the same as the CB issue. Some of the best defenders in the world haven't exactly been great footballers and some of the greatest strikers in the world haven't been the best at holding up the football, these two factors are not the be-all-and-end-all of why we concede goals. I've waffled so much I haven't even been able to get into stuff like: who the opposition is, whether a team is at home or away, whether a team has injuries, etc. For people to make blanket statements like "Chelsea concede more when Terry is missing" or "Chelsea score less when Drogba is injured" takes nothing into account of the circumstances in which games are played. There are so many contributing factors to shipping goals that you simply cannot debate it at such a simplistic level and achieve any joy or any agreement. Basically, instead of all of that above I should have simply said: this debate is pure wank.