HawK

Saw Palnese's sig when checking the match thread, thought I was back at Burnley again.

I can only assume you mean the first half because the 2nd was nothing like you've described. Apart from lacking ideas in the final 3rd I'll give you that. Don't blame anyone turning it off after the first half tbh. Best part of the first half for me was Burnley scoring, actually woke their fans up and we had some banter with them

In the second half we actually had a plan of note, quite genius by Pardew standards. Push up on the left as much as possible to give Janmaat space for when the ball is switched across. This gameplan didn't involve Gouff at all though lol, poor bloke is completely lost and broken.

I honestly didn't know he was playing until 20 minutes in when he got the ball near our corner flag. Towards the end of the game he was actually running away from the ball, he was getting no end of shit from the crowd.

I could see the shot coming 5 minutes before Elliot did and I was 20m behind him, like f*** it was close range.

Needs to learn to drop his shoulder and he'd be twice the player. Dances around bolt upright with no way to get past people at speed.

The whole stand was standing at Turfmoor today for the duration, could of used some leaning rails tbh.

Literally just back from the match. What a s*** stadium, s*** manager, s*** performance. I knew all this was going to happen before I even went so why I bothered I have no idea. Only Cabella and Steven Taylor looked arsed and wanted the ball, Janmaat played a professional game and christ Rob Elliot must be 16 stone, he was fatter than the ref.

Semantics. changed

Yes it is. The performance of any organisation chiefly falls on the shoulder of the owner or person calling the ultimate shots. Good players sometimes ultimately fail to shine at certain clubs. That's life. Some of those - have been given plenty of opportunities and have basically sucked - in one aspect or another. Sanon can't defend and isn't effective in attack and Cisse has been terrible. Cisse's not a SBR or Keegan player at all. Cisse arrived and played pretty much like he did in the Bundesliga, then due to bad management is the player what he is now, the club's recruitment infrastructure cannot be blamed for this. He was a very good signing for a club of our position. Santon arrived after being praised by a pretty honest manager (tried to tell us not to sign Damien Duff) who also happens to be one the best managers of all time who believed he would go on to great things. It was a coup to get him to us considering we had zero Italian presence in the club (Zamblera?). I was ecstatic when we bought him as I couldn't believe we'd ever get a left back better than José Enrique. I hate how the club is run, I hate Mike Ashley, I don't hate the players he's signed but I do hate that he doesn't invest fully in the club and that we could have potentially done even better. With a proper manager, the players that we have had over the past 5 years should have seen us regularly top 6 or 7 in my honest opinion, with the potential of further with the additional attraction brought to the club by success in the league.

It's not Mike Ashley's fault that Alan Pardew can't handle the obvious talent coming into the squad (other than the fact that he is ultimately responsible for his appointment). Cabaye, Sissoko, Santon, Cisse, Debuchy, Janmaat, Yanga-Mbiwa, (Siem) De Jong, and Hatem Ben Arfa wouldn't have looked out of place in any squad of Keegan or Sir Bobby's best. What can be accused of Mike Ashley is having the manager take a big cut of transfer profits which was widely reported at the time, contributing in some way to how Pardew deals with players he doesn't like. Anyway, 1 senior striker? I hope you're just being flippant Ron.

We'd have a ridiculously talented team by even just signing Carr's little findings as well man. Remy, Ba, Ben Arfa, Cabaye, Sissoko and hell perhaps even Grenier, Cabella, and De Jong all mixing it up together. Insane amount of fun talent that would have us high up the f***ing table under a proper club (owner/chairman) and manager. Hard to say a bad word about the owner when it comes to player recruitment.

Really?

We'd never win a match so why bother musing. The more injuries and the less variety available in team selection the better with this cretin in charge.

Going to this god help me.

Aren't West Ham without their two in form strikers or something? It's going to be tomorrow. I've thought West Ham would be the ones to break his run. Going to Burnley (A), it's gonna be then I bet.

In the latter stages of my ACL I went to a different physio and before I told him what leg it was, he knew from how I walked into his office which one it was immediately. And I thought I was walking completely normally :S

He was injured for the whole of january. his Premier League career.

He's the wishmaster.

But glaciers are unstoppable! Unless they get too hot, then they melt and have to be subbed

I think there's something to be said for the fact that every year, Ronaldo gets faster, stronger, more lethal in front of goal. For a player that came onto the scene as a skinny winger with step-overs is phenomenal, I don't know of any other player to improve so significantly year on year from where they started out. If Messi is as good at 30 as Ronaldo is as good now, that'd be something. FWIW IMO Messi>Ronaldo, but Ronaldo has to go down as one of the greatest players of all time also.

Can see him going to City in January to be Toure's successor.

I think if that Ronaldo actually stayed fit I would have considered him to be better. He was without description before his injuries but alas not to be. I make a rule to never compare players of different positions, there isn't much point. Ronaldo could have been the greatest striker to have ever lived. Messi is probably the best wide attacking midfielder of all time. Like trying to say who was better for United, Schmeichael or Cantona.. they were both truly great in both their positions but incomparable.

He's not, obviously. It's direction from the manager.

I'd say nowadays that Messi can take shots in a most unorthodox manner, toe-poking shots from outside the box while in mid-stride, gives the keeper no chance to ready himself at all. All of a sudden, running along, and bang, the ball's in the net and he didn't even break stride.