Mowen

Shola isn't great. He's still our third best striker, however, and will be our second best whilst Owen is out. I can't really understand why his return to fitness would be a bad thing for us?

On current ability I would say Cesc Fabregas is up there. Yes he's excellent, and could well go on to be one of the best midfielders in the world, but at the moment he's not the best midfielder in the Arsenal team, imo. For a midfielder as attacking as he is not to have scored yet this season is a pretty poor showing.

I reckon Bolton are reasonable value, they'll react to their humbling at Spurs and will be well up for their biggest rivals in the league at home. My mate had a dirt cheap ticket for the Rovers Leverkusen game, so I went with him and thought they were utter wank. No creativity, no class. Working hard and being organised may work against flair teams, but not so much against Bolton.

I thought he looked pretty good in a more central role against Pompey in the Carling Cup IIRC.

Arsenal, Newcastle, Stockport, ICT, Chelsea and Bolton all to win. About 45/1 on Betfred's 7th heaven coupon.

You do the right thing not diving in, mate. I got as far as £500-odd off £20 in less than a month (bookies, not online), but got waaaaay too convinced i had it cracked, and chased the odds rather tahn the games. Then i had nothing. All too easy to do, sadly enough.

"I doubt Roeder knows he exist" - NUFC06 - Genius. How often is it said that Roeder won't have heard of a player? Coherantly? I think many people would have said the same of the Gooch. As far as I'm concerned, id NUFC06 thinks they're good, they'll do a job for me.

Congratulations.

Lost us the league! In a way.

Two that have really wound me up are Keith Curle (on at least two occasions) and Marco Materazzi. Absolute tossers.

When, where? In people's minds it did aye, on paper. If we cast our minds back, we had injuries on the right, so Souness tried Bellamy out on the right, like Mark Hughes often did, yet no complaints from the Welsh gobshite then.... I'm sure they linked up beautifully for an excellent goal at home against Everton, one of the few outstanding moments from that season that still sticks in my memory.

I had a dream last night where I was ragging Cheryl in her toon top. Well on topic.

Would be a bit of an insult is Le Sib got an extension and he didn't. I'd probably offer them both one year at this stage, with an option for a second year on Nobby's. Seems a good person to have at the club, particularly with a footballing brain like his.

Since he became permanent manager, satisfactory. Last season, very good to excellent.

I know they bummed him on TV, qand everyone here seems to think he played well, but Bramble's passing was fucking shite last night. Anything other than a short pass to Taylor and he was giving the ball away. Milner was very poor as well, lost count of how many times he gave away posession. Duff showed some good signs, shame about the cheating, and Baba put in a decent shift. Would probably go for Nobby MOTM myself.

Had a quid on Oba to score first, which hasn't been paid yet, so have sent betfred an arsey email, 20p on 4-0 and £3.80 on us to win with a one goal defecit. Makes a change to not be in loss after a Newcastle match!

That's what I figured. Thought it was a bit of a non-brainer. Could be wrong though.

It was cheating! Amazed anyone could say otherwise to be honest

Agreed. If Butt had been sold for next to nothing to save on wages, like many people (myself included) were happy to see happen we4'd be a lot worse off. I'm happy to hold up my hands and admit I was fully wrong on that count. Well done Glenn.

I agree. I don't think we will win, but it certainly isn't out of the question, and there aren't any teams I really fear left in the competition. My guess would be we'll be knocked out in the quarters/semis, but I'd love to see us go on and win it.

It hasn't started so well for you Steven

I'd probably go for, in no particular order: Woodgate, Gallas, Terry, Ferdinand, Toure. Although, for me, Gallas would probably be number one. Can't decide with the rest. All class acts in my opinion. Hounourable mentions would have to go to King, Eboue, Bridge, Vidic, Cambell, Primus, G Neville and Heinze. Can't believe Heinze doesn't play, I think he's absolutely excellent.

Probably: Cech, Shay, Van der Sar, Jussi, Foster. Robinson for me is an average mid-table standard keeper. He played above himself for a while and is currently playing below himself. In my opinion the media bigged him up too much, and he's currently getting more stick than he deserves. He's not excellent - as many would have had you believe a year ago - but he's also not shite - as many people would have you think now. In my opinion, anyway.

I've gone with Bolton, Fener, Benfica and the Toon at 16.5/1 on Betfred. Seems like good value. Couldn't believe I was getting 7/4 on Bolton, or indeed evens on both us and Fener.

The last time we had a chance to win it we didn't bottle it. The shithead manager threw it away to feed his ego. The time before that we bottled it though, don't you think? Granted we had an injury crisis, but even so....