TRon

Exactly. This could be the weakest PL for a while, and therefore a golden opportunity to progress. It's a shame we haven't taken it. For me, this window was 5/10 - we signed some good players but also sold some of our best and most influential. Our squad hasn't really improved, in my opinion, except in the midfield area. I'm hopeful that some of our signings can push us on, but this depends on whether they settle in quickly. Unfortunately, we've sold many of the 'characters' in our dressing room, so it may take longer to integrate them than it would have otherwise. Hopefully some of our youth - Krul, Sameobi, Vuckic - really come through this season. Yeah, but there is a reason that all those other clubs haven't invested, and those reasons all apply to us as well. Overpriced players, clubs with massive wage bills, banks reducing cheap lending, owners finding their other business interests squeezed in the economy, financial fair play on the horizon. Of course you could argue that when other clubs don't invest then that means we should invest more to overtake them, but that's a bit simplistic IMO. Ian, do you have any conclusions to draw about how we ended up bidding for Bryan Ruiz at the 11th hour rather than negotiating successfully through the summer to land our striker target on time? Bear in mind that someone even posted a thread yesterday predicting we would have a final day transfer failure?

Boo hoo you spoiled child. They say it takes a bigger man to walk away. Dont see why anyone should be abused for not wanting to let Ashley rub shit in his face each week under the pretence of 'supporting the team' I see absolutely nothing wrong with that stance. Ashley has quite cynically calculated that he could spend the bare minimum in the hope that fans will be deluded enough to keep buying season tickets. That attitude doesn't deserve to be rewarded. Even though I hate to see St James looking less than full it's perfectly understandable for people not to buy into his make do and mend crap.

If you look at the quality of the players we now got, I don't think MA is falling on his fat arse yet. HBA, Mav, Sammy, Sparky, Vukic, Ferguson, Colo, Santon, HBA, Cabaye, Taylor, Obertan and Krul. Except colo, all are young players with great potential.. The futre is bright, the future is black and white Let's hope that Sammy and Vukic are up to being thrust into the arena. Until HBA is fit and able to turn out consistently they are the best options for plugging the striker gap which has been left gaping in the first 11.

If HBA isn't playing then who plays off Ba? Lovenkrands? Obertan, Vuckic Obertan isn't likely to get goals IMO. Our best bet is that Vukic or Sammy are given the responsibility and step up to the challenge.

What difference does it make? the fact of the matter is players are choosing Swansea and Fulham over us due more to incompetency and tight fistedness than any genuine football reason. We can't sign the big money players and now we are losing out on the cheapo youngsters as well. It beggars belief.

I don't really care about Shepherd any more. I couldn't stand the fat oaf and no doubt he had us spiralling downwards. But Ashley needs to be judged on his own merits and he's falling on his fat arse big time right now.

As if Bendtner would stay longer than a season in that dump.

I was going to right pretty much the same thing ,if Pardew had any balls he would walk away imho but we dont know what sort of hold they have over him (casino debts) or he might not give a s*** and take one for the boys .His press conference will be very interesting and hopefully the red tops will give him the right questions and make him squirm and rightly so. "If Pardew had any balls he would walk". What good would fucking that do? People need to come off that shit. I'm really glad he's hanging in there. We'll be in total mess if he leaves. This. For God's sake get a grip everyone. Yes he tends to put his foot in his mouth but while these owners are here we aren't going to get any better. All he needs to do is shut his trap, coach the side as best he can and try and keep the spirit up.

Very good post.. And I don't think people would have been happy if we had blown our money away on players like Crouch, Jerome or SWP either.. I'd have been quite happy to have blown that money on Ruiz though instead of watching Fulham blow us out of the water while we scrabbled about at the last minute like clueless spastics. In Ruiz' case it wasn't about money. We offered a better contract, but Fulham nursed him for months.. Well yeah. It's what you do when you genuinely want a player rather than piss about under-bidding for players who aren't available.

Agreed. Unfortunately the owners have given the Barton fanboys all the ammunition they need and there's not much anyone can do except take it on the chin. It was the failure to bring in a striker which has hamstrung our season not letting that twerp Barton go.

Hope Pardew doesn't try to rush him back too quickly to save himself from abuse.

Very good post.. And I don't think people would have been happy if we had blown our money away on players like Crouch, Jerome or SWP either.. I'd have been quite happy to have blown that money on Ruiz though instead of watching Fulham blow us out of the water while we scrabbled about at the last minute like clueless spastics.

If HBA isn't playing then who plays off Ba? Lovenkrands?

Two words: Bryan Ruiz.

I hope Ba gets on the goal trail pretty quickly because he'll quickly become the scapegoat otherwise.

I think he just needs to shut up and get on with picking his Sholas and Lovenkrands. He can say what he wants but the bottom line is we know we were strung along and his job is to dress mutton up like lamb. By all means do that but please shut the fuck up.

If anything Im worse, i gave the bastards the benefit of the doubt, tried to stay with their plan, got twitchy a few weeks back...but its all mapped out how i hoped it wouldn't Same here. What went on yesterday with the Ruiz farce dragged our name through the mud for nor reason at all. Every time I see Shola or Lovenkrands on our team sheet it will feel like a punch to the gut.

I'd love to see how Henderson and co would look without Suarez and Kuyt playing up front.

I was honestly really pissed at our hierarchy until this twat piped up. Just fuck off and concentrate on your own club you fucking charv prick.

Why? It's been obvious to most for months and months that this is what the plan is. Barton is just saying it, nothing wrong with that. It really hasn't. There's no way the club is actively planning to sell Tiote and Krul. Obviously if Chelsea come in with a £40m bid we will probably sell, but the vast majority of clubs are in that position. I am worried about the contracts of the likes of Colo and Jonas though, as they must be on more than we're offering to new players. You and a few others must be living on a different planet if you think that's not the case. It's become quite clear that ANY player has a price on his head and it won't have to be a large amount (as shown by the Enrique departure). Ashley is happy to keep us in the PL while recovering of much money as possible. Barton probably has a better idea of what's happening than us, it's worth listening TBH It would be if he hadn't moved for money reasons in the first place. Piss off you fucking has been.

Fuck Joey Barton. He's a QPR player and getting well paid for it so should just concentrate on his own club. Or West Ham if he'd prefer to be there.

I've never said anything to oppose this. Just the negativity stinks. People can't seem to differentiate the fact aye, Ashley & Llambias are cunts, we've made profit, but are still looking a good prospect this season. Just look at the views of the Villa & Everton fans on here for a bit of perspective, two clubs who we'll be competing with for a top 8 finish imo. And even if we spent another £20m or whatever I'm not sure we'd have made much of a dent on the top 6 anyway. That's not the point though Nut, those clubs have never hid the fact that they were hard up and weren't looking to make big signings. We were strung along we were after a quality striker and ended up being outbid for our 6th choice by a small town club in London on the last day. How can we justify that?

We are doing a great job at scouting promising players for lower profile clubs to cash in on

mongtastic bullshit which we could do without.

I would be very surprised if that's the case. More likely they just spotted him first, convinced him to join them and he liked the idea of being massively paid to live in luxury somewhere in West London. Really don't think players have as depressing an outlook on Newcastle Utd as the fans do. Except the ones we've forced out of course. In which case why did we even bother making a last day bid for him?