Cronky

Given - 7 Pulled off some decent saves Rozenhal - 3 Horribly lacking in confidence. He can do better than that. Faye - 8 Held things together extremely well. A real cool head in a crisis. Taylor - 6 Erratic, but kept going. Enrique - 6 Seemed to suffer from the general confusion. Duff - 8 Back to his best. Smith - 4 The worst I've seen him play, and I'm not usually one of his critics. The combination with Butt was crap. Butt - 5 Typically won a few challenges, but no leadership qualities and can't pass. N'Zogbia - 7 Looked likely to make things happen, if frustratingly naive at times. Viduka - 5 Looked cumbersome and slow. Owen - 4 Struggled to get involved. Lua Lua 8 - A very, very promising performance. No sign of nerves at all and eager to take responsibility.

Looked more like the new Lua Lua to me. He looked better than both. I hope we've got him on a long contract.

Well thank fuck that's over. As a team we're very short of confidence - players passing when they should shoot, tentative passing, standing off challenges, no anticipation of what a colleague is going to do. There was a lack of pace and movement up front. In a 4-4-2, I think one striker has to drop back to link with the midfield like Bellamy or Beardsley, but neither Owen nor Viduka are comfortable doing that. The bright spots were Duff and Lua Lua. Faye was also very good. I hope Senegal get knocked out of the African Nations Cup pretty quick because we're really going to miss him.

Butt and Smith are having mares. We're crying out for a striker who can drop back a bit, and a central midfield player who can get forward. The link between strikers and midfield isn't working with any confidence. Duff and Faye have been brilliant.

Shearer is an intelligent guy with leadership qualities. On TV, he analyses games in a shrewd way, so potentially he's a very good manager. The thing that worries me is he comes across as a small 'c' conservative bloke who might not be an innovator. I sense that he's a believer in a traditional English 4-4-2 and I don't know how receptive he is to new ideas. I don't think he wants to manage at the moment because he wants to spend time with his family. But one question he has to consider is - would a big Premiership club want to take a risk on someone who's got nothing on his CV, no matter what his potential?

A clever guy who couldn't manage people.

With his all-round qualities, Shearer was the best striker of the Premiership era, but I think you'd be hard put to find a non-NUFC supporter who'd say he had a better first touch than the likes of Cantona, Berkgamp, Di Canio etc Likewise Beardsley. He'd probably win the award for the quickest feet though.

Matt le Tissier springs to mind. If only he'd been able to run as well.....

This is just a lazy piece of hack journalism. Listening to Alan Green commentating is like being stuck next to one of those irritating loudmouthed twats who are planted at strategic points in every football ground just to ruin people's enjoyment.

and the decent replacement would be....? Please, no one say Anelka. You might as well say Ronaldhino. I wasn't thinking of a player in that kind of price bracket. I just don't rate Martins that highly. I'd like us to sign a busy, quick player in the Beardsley / Bellamy mould who can make things happen for us. I like the look of Arshavin, as an example. If City were to offer us £8 million plus Vassell, I'd take it. He's not the most skilful, but his technique is better than Martins, he's quick and he puts in a lot of hard, intelligent work for his team. He's underrated and he'd be a good option to have in our position, even if he wouldn't be a long-term first team regular.

I voted for Woodgate, despite his injury problems. This season, we've missed Dyer. Given that he was discontented, perhaps we had no choice but to sell him, but we miss having someone with pace in the midfield who can really spring forward.

Very good player, and better than Viduka. I'd like to see him here, but our priority is to get in a striker with pace, as well as technique.

Sell, if we can get a decent replacement. If this is true, I think those other clubs are over-estimating Martins' ability.

Not totally surprised that Man U are reluctant to sell a player who's been more or less a first team regular, in the middle of a title chase. It's vital that we sort the centre back situation out. If you look at the top five teams, I'd say they also have the top five centre back pairings, and the top two have the best of the lot. It's the one area of the team where you have to be strong.

He was a great player, but not as talented as Maradona when it came to creating something out of nothing. IMO Cruyff was better than both, and the best of my era. He could raise the performance of an entire team.

So Liverpool build a stadium that they can't afford, and Everton build a stadium that no-one wants. Is there a solution here?

With every club that he has managed, O'Neill has taken them forward. I'm pretty sure he'd have done the same with us. Incidentally, in his first season at Leicester, a large number of fans were calling for him to be sacked. Then he got them promotion, two League Cups and their highest ever League position.

I used to think that until this season. Google for a clip of his goal against Everton this season where he plucked the ball out of the air from a 70 yard punt as if it had travelled a few inches, and with one flick swept it past the keeper. A truly majestic goal. Try also his goal against Sheffield United last season, which was a stormer. He's also pretty good with his head (Wigan this week, Blueshite last month), tracks back like it is going out of fashion (which I suspect is the real reason MON loves him) and never stops running. I'm actually struggling to think of a goal this season in which he relied on his pace. There are goals that Martins has scored where his first touch looks brilliant, but I see it as the law of averages. Every now and then, no matter how bad your touch, the ball is going to fall where you wanted it. I think Agbonlahor has a lot more skill on the ball than Martins, but from what I've seen his asset is pace rather than skill. That sort of player tends to get found out at the very top level. Far worse players have played for England, but I'm not convinced he has a long international career ahead of him. The player I would like to see partnered with Rooney is Dean Ashton. He's slow, but he manages to create things from very unpromising situations where his space is very restricted. That's the sort of player you need at England level. Confident, able to take responsibility and good in the air as well.

That is precisely the reason why Sam has decided to use him as a left back. Just because he does well attacking from defence does not mean that he'd be even more effective if pushed further forward. Zoggy's assets are his pace, his acceleration and his change of direction. If given time and space, he can use those assets. Unfortunately his touch on the ball is not great, and if he receives the ball under pressure in a tight area, as wingers usually have to do, he more often than not loses it. This becomes even more obvious on the occasions when he gets shifted into the centre, when he looks completely lost and unable to retain or use the ball constructively.

Plenty of effort today, but in the end, Chelsea were better. It was a relief to see that the players are still battling. Weird decision for their second goal. I can only assume that the linesman thought that the ball had come off one of our players rather than Pizzaro.

Even though Chimbonda is a right back? Not him then.

In the last two games, lots of people have had their wish and Milner has played on the right. He's looked better on the left.

I'm beginning to wonder whether Enrique is lined up for a move and there will be a new LB coming in. Hence, Big Sam is protecting him from injury so the deals don't fall through. Enrique for Chimbonda? Just a guess.

They are mates aren't they. I'm sure he's got our best interests at heart...Like fuck he has. He just looks at it as an easy six points as long as fatty is at the helm, taking him one step closer to the title Now come on, guys. In your hearts of hearts do you really, really believe that? Ferguson thinks Allardyce is a crap manager and he wants to keep him here in order to keep the threat of Newcastle at bay? If so, Fergie should have added 'paranoia' on to 'impatience'.

This is quite honestly the most sensible post I have ever seen on any NUFC board. If Mr Allardyce could explain his reasoning behind such negative away tactics and team selections - and it made any sense - then yes - we would give him time. At the moment we make it easy for every single team we play - they know exactly how we are going to play. The way it looks at the moment ain't nice - we are without doubt the worst footballing side in the Premiership. And it really does hurt me to say that. We go out not to lose and the problem is we do lose - and against very very poor teams. 100% agree ! Hang on hang on. Big Sam does explain his team selections and his tactics and is more open about that than the majority of managers. A lot of people disagree with him but he can't be accused of being silent. For example - he has said that Enrique is still not used to Premiership football, and he sees Zoggy as a more effective weapon from left back as he then has space to run into. He's more difficult to mark out of the game, if you like. As I say, disagree if you want, but he's made his reasoning clear.