Cronky

The reason I still believe in what Shola has to offer isn't so much the goal, which was a bit spawny, but that moment after an hour when he had the ball on the left hand edge of their penalty area, and beat his man with a really sharp change of direction. He fired in a cross which would have been a goal if we'd had Owen reading the game rather than Martins. Shola will drive you mad when he falls over the ball with his gangly legs, but once or twice a game he'll open things up for you, regardless of the quality of the opposition. I also thought he did well as a target man tonight. Mr Dunne has the bruises to prove it.

Should he fuck, Owen and Martins are both far superior strikers, both should be starting when fit, which they both should be on Saturday or Tuesday. Regardless of that, JK likes to have a target man, and at the moment, Shola is the best we've got.

I've long felt that the punishment for the foul in the goal-scoring position is wrong. It should be a penalty (regardless of where the foul is committed) and then a yellow. That would be just as big a deterrent and it wouldn't distort the game so much. Yes, Styles got it wrong, but it was a difficult one. Rather than examine the individual ref, I'd much rather the powers that be adjusted the laws.

Shola did a great job of keeping us in the game, and should now get a decent run in the side. Well done to Joe for believing in him and bigging him up beforehand. I'm disappointed that we didn't win, but we just ran out of steam in the end. Man City made the fatal error of dropping the pace of the game, and then when they needed to raise it again, they found it very difficult.

They play lovely football apart from in the two penalty areas, which of course is where it counts.

I think Shearer called it right on MOTD. Berbatov is just warming up and will get better. But bloody hell, Rooney what a player. That first goal of his won't get many replays but he had no right to score it. The defender and keeper did nothing wrong but still it went in.

Three sounds like too low a number to me. What about six? The real problem isn't so much the length of these exchanges as the content. They often degenerate into bickering and a raising of old arguments which aren't interesting to anyone but the participants. People have to make their own decisions about this, but it doesn't do any harm to let the other bloke have the last word now and then.

This. I was only pretending to be pathetic. A lot of people on here think I've got a vendetta against Owen.

If Martins is fit, then I'm not too bothered, but that's just me.

Effective, but I think we can do better, and will need to do better, in the course of time. We rely a lot on Rooney to make things happen for us. We'd look very predictable without him. We still don't look that comfortable in midfield, in keeping and using possession. It would help is we had full backs who were more assured on the ball and who could help out more effectively. For me, in midfield the only certain starters should be Gerrard and Barry. I'd like to play them with SWP and Joe Cole out wide. It might be a bit lightweight, but I'd give it a go in a friendly.

Number 2 is Freddie Shepherd. The others are all rock stars. I thought you said it was going to be difficult?

I saw him against Portugal, and he was superb. Quick, strong and decisive. He'll struggle to get a chance at Chelsea so we should definitely go for him if / when he becomes available.

Are you sure about your information here? You're saying that Keegan was effectively paying for the privelege of managing Newcastle United. That's a new one on me and I have to say it sounds a teeny weeny bit unlikely. As we say - source?

No it isn't.

The biggest wasted opportunity was appointing this very good manager who had the unanimous support of the fans and players and not supporting him fully, preferring instead to put the entire running of the club outside of selecting and coaching the players in the hands of inexperienced, agenda driven, detached from the football team part-time employees who together operated a flawed system that has failed the requirements of the football team they were employed to serve. That is where the wasted opportunity rests, big time. And then he sacked him. I am of course talking about Sam Allardyce which your comments could well describe for a short while under Big Sam until the poor results. I mention Big Sam because structures and plans are not as important as the manager who is and always will be or should be the driving force behind any club and not this multi-layered management structure (or new age set-up brought in by Big Sam when he was appointed), as we are painfully finding out now. Thus far this "professional approach" is responsible for the following: The ST fiasco The manager resigning The lack of extra quality in the side The lack of depth to the squad The overwhelming media storm following the club The unrest of fans The drop in attendances This approach you talk of will also add the likely event of one Michael Owen leaving before his contract is up at a huge financial loss to the club and another few years of transition under new owners to their list of mistakes, failures and downright mismanagement. But hey, at least that debt is now gone though eh... Well I disagree with a lot that you've said there, but to take one particular point, I'd dispute what you say about the squad. I think both the first team and the squad have improved since last season. We've had a very tough time with injuries and suspensions over the last few weeks, but I think the next half dozen games will demonstrate that we've moved forward - particularly now that we've got a manager. And the improvement in the squad is down to the sons of Beelzebub in the recruitment team. It's not a dramatic smash-your-way-into-the-top-four improvement, but that's not realistic.

Crumpy Gunt seems to have a similar approach but I'm not really too sure if it's too far from what they're really thinking in any case. Personally I don't like either attitude towards Keegan, whether it's belittling his past service to this club (which is massive and unrivalled) or believing he is infallible or incapable of putting himself first before the club. It's perfectly possible, of course, to give due credit to what he did for the club in the past, whilst acknowledging his faults at the same time. He was the right man for the job in 1992, and the wrong man in 2008.

Agreed - it it's funny how it's the younger supporters who are pouring scorn on us older lot. I've been called paranoid and unrealistic recently by fans who can't remember this club prior to 1992/93. The danger signs are there for all to see, but will folk listen? Will they bollocks. I'm 50+ and have supported Newcastle all my life through thick but mainly thin and along with many others I think Ashley's method was the best chance we have had to finally become a serious football club. It's all about opinions but I don't think age has a lot to do with it. Just to join the Crinklies Convention here, I'm with Benwell Lad on this. Ashley's approach was something new and I fear that we've wasted a good opportunity. We looked to be getting the infrastructure of the club right, with a long-term plan and a professional approach. Unless you've got Abramovich-style millions, throwing money at the first team isn't going to get you anywhere in itself.

What I meant was that theres been so much BS surrounding all of this, theres no good reason why I should implicitly believe or trust Harris because of some notion of him being a reputable man. He works for an investment company - I wouldn't automatically trust such a person if they told me 2+2 =4. He may be telling the truth but even last week Kinnear said that he'd been told Ashley was talking to people. Before a bid comes in, a certain amount of talking will go on. What's the problem? I do think Kinnear would be better off saying nothing on this subject and just referring any queries on those who are handling matters. He makes these throwaway comments and then people start poring over the details to check whether it ties in with the exact wording of other quotes - a lot of which aren't first hand.

Around the NE I speak to a lot of supporters who I think will subscribe to the popular press view that Ashley and Wise are the axis of evil and should be hounded out but I'm surprised how many are sympathetic to Ashley and think he would have meant progress. Most of these people are long time fans, getting on (mainly 40+) and attend matches. The degree of hostility seems to be much higher in the press and among the small NUSC mob than it is at street level, notwithstanding the staged for TV protests by charvers (most of whom never enter SJP) in the wake of Keegans walkout. I was asking because I do think that the best hope for the club is for Joe Kinnear to make a success of his interim spell (which I think is entirely possible) and for the hostile mood to die down sufficiently to encourage Ashley to stay on. It seems that he'll have genuine difficulty in selling at the present time anyway. Perhaps that's all a folorn hope, because Ashley is probably thoroughly pissed off. He doesn't want to be a nominal owner. He wanted to sit in the stands and have a drink in the town afterwards, and that experience is probably closed to him now.

I'd agree. Gerrard didn't have a good game yesterday, but he and Rooney are the first two players that I'd put on the team-sheet. Both are players that you feel can turn things round for you even if either they or the team are having a tough time. Lampard is a good player all right but you get that feeling that if the team is struggling, he struggles as well.

The poll results so far are interesting, but I've noticed on this Board that the initial anti-Ashley reaction has died down, and a lot of people are now prepared to see both sides. I do wonder though whether the general mood locally is still much more hostile than this particular Board reflects. Can those from the North East comment on this?

I'd play SWP instead of Walcott. We've been reading too much into that hat trick against Croatia. Walcott loses the ball quite a lot, and in SWP we've got a very good alternative. And Owen's an irrelevance at the moment. The problem isn't the strikeforce.

This will probably blow up in my face, but I'd take Walcott off. He's done nothing this half but give the ball away.

In games like this, it'd be nice to have a bit more quality from the full backs going forward. They can do a lot to open things up. Walcott is very frustrating. His first touch is so poor at times, but with that pace of his, he will also produce two or three good situations for us. I don't think we're playing all that badly. If we get one, that'll relax them and we'll stop snatching at our chances.

Never liked Cantona, with his arty-farty superior ways. Scholes was and still is a great player, but he always seems to play especially well against us, without looking like he's even trying. That is a major irritant.