TRon

I think it's ridiculous how much Hughton's tactics are being criticised tbh. I laughed at the naivety of it before, but it really does seem like a lot of people think it's as simple as putting (what they think is) the best 11 players on the pitch at the same time all the time. This gives absolutely no consideration to the fact that the manager has far more information about the players to go on than we do. He sees how they perform in training, no doubt trying different formations, he gets fitness reports on them, he should even give consideration to their mental state and what's going on in their personal life. He also has to try and balance playing the best team every week with rotating things to make sure the same players don't wear themselves out over a long season and that fringe players are not frozen out. We've got 5 games in 16 days coming up next, but I guess that won't come into the equation when people convince themselves the 11 players they put in a formation on a message board would have played beautiful flowing football and won every game 4-0. The fact is Hughton has very limited options to change things in any significant way as the players we have are limited in their ability. We've been very limited in terms of numbers in wide players, and in central midfield they are all much of a muchness except that Nolan has a knack of scoring goals. The players are good enough to get results in this league in the style we've been playing, but no way in the world is it going to be pretty no matter who plays or how they line up, and if we did try to change it there's absolutely no guarantee that "better" football would even maintain the same level of results let alone improve them. Here's some of my favourites from the crap that comes out: "He'll never drop Butt" changed immediately to "he'll never drop Smith/Nolan" once he did in fact drop Butt. I'm not sure who exactly is supposed to play in midfield once we drop Butt, Nolan and Smith. Guthrie and Vuckic I suppose, even though Guthrie's been equally poor when played central and hardly anyone's seen anything of Vuckic so he obviously "must be better". Lovenkrands dad died and because soon after he played one game and scored, that's all gone away and he should be playing week in week out again without a care in the world. "Why didn't he play <insert recently or even currently injured player>?" which of course would turn into "Why did he play <insert previously injured player> rushing him back too soon?" if any player who's been injured in the last month gets injured again. "When player X came on he changed the game". Of course this is used not as a compliment of a good substitution that a player was saved to be fresh coming on against a tired defence/midfield, but as a criticism that the player should have played from the start (where he may well have been far less effective pacing himself for a full game and up against a fresh defence). I swear even if Wenger or Ferguson were manager half of you would be criticising their tactics week in week out. Surprisingly good read that, although I don't agree with it 100% you do raise some decent points.

Because people like you keep posting in it

Haven't seen this yet but this is exactly the reason why I won't be tuning in. The new talk in on Radio Newcastle started off ok but as usual it's being gradually overwhelmed by whingeing mackems. I only listen to it driving home from work and it's quite possible to hear a mackem whining for 20 mins with the rest of the time filled with ads.

A midfielder would be ideal but I'm fairly certain that's all the transfer business sorted for this season. I'm not going to complain, at least it was all sorted fairly quickly without the last minute let downs of previous years.

True, I think he was just trying to endear himself to the fans and/or he just couldn't help saying what (as a fan) he thought needed to be said. That's a cardinal rule as a manager though, to back your team and not tell the world how weak you are in certain departments, even if it's obvious. It might make fans and MOTD viewers happy but it didn't really get a great response from his players.

They had been split for months. Still could have ran it by him to let him know, seeing as they were best mates.

Before Saturday I never believed he would be subbed, so you never know, even if it's unlikely. Nolan has got goals so it would be a brave decision to drop him when our strikers aren't netting consistently.

Obviously it does if it's his best mates partner and they are both in the squad. Maybe Bridge should step down from the squad while Terry's captain if we can't bring ourselves to remove Terry. Leaving out Bridge because of this would be disgusting, surely? "The captain's had an affair with your missus mate, sorry but he's better than you so you've got to stay at home." I hope that Capello wouldn't be involved in anything as shabby as that. I was thinking more in terms of Bridge stepping aside voluntarily as he himself seems to have a problem sharing a dressing room. Other than that I don't think we can drop Terry but I don't think there should be complaints if he's stripped of the captaincy which is I think the correct course of action.

Williamson from what I've seen so far. Routledge will have a harder job because as a winger, not only does he have to provide good service, he also needs to keep possession well. He was running into blind alleys a bit against Leicester so the jury's still out.

Obviously it does if it's his best mates partner and they are both in the squad. Maybe Bridge should step down from the squad while Terry's captain if we can't bring ourselves to remove Terry.

doubt it. neither nolan nor smith will be dropped till barton is fit to start. You're probably right but he did sub both players for a change and Nolan was supposedly kicking off with Hughton about it after. Don't know why, we looked ten times better once he was off the field.

Far too early to write off Shearer on the basis of 8 games but for me he made two crucial mistakes: 1) Was too quick to brag to the media about the changes he'd made behind the scenes and enjoyed the limelight. I always wonder if the lacklustre performances at the end of the season were down to players just not playing for him. 2) He took himself out of the running for the job by making demands that Ashley wasn't prepared to meet. You need a far better CV before you can start setting tough conditions in this game.

On Saturday he got it badly wrong in both team selection and his delay in making changes but for most of this season he's been quite canny in his use of subs so I wouldn't hold that against him too much. I've seen managers who have been far less decisive in making changes here, even surprisingly KK.

Agreed on that point. It's pointless for that reason to use the lack of goals scored in higher leagues against Beckford, or at least it is for me. He looks a natural goal poacher and IMO would have far more chance of getting 10 goals from now to the end of the season than Best. Anyway, it's a moot point now, let's just hope Best shows us all that there's more than meets the eye.

I'd agree with those ratings as Championship players. As Premier League players: Simpson - 4 Williamson - 6 Routledge - 5 Best - 2 The contract lengths for these players scare me, and don't make me optimistic for next summer at all. The contract lengths won't bother Ashley though as even if we don't get promoted the wages are low enough for the Championship.

Considering Shola's fitness record Best will be playing quite a few games then.

I can only assume that although we have plenty of big target men, Hughton doesn't actually rate them that highly at doing that job. Ameobi and Carroll are big, but neither of them really hold the ball up well. Probably the best in this regard is Ranger, but he's not fantastic in the air and is still very inexperienced. But yeah, I wish we had got in a Moses or Beckford rather than go the target man route. If we get promotion though, there's nothing to stop us from having another go for Beckford.

I have always been a bit suspicious of the signings from Spain considering that Freddie Sheperd's son was in charge of doing the deals and we went out and whacked £10m on the likes of Luque from the middle of nowhere. Ashley has continued in this vein with some strange signings from Depor.

Never thought we would sell anyone despite what many doom merchants were predicting. We've done ok, although whether we've made any real impact signings is yet to be seen. Certainly better than I was expecting, although I did think we migh have got Beckford at some stage.

Wonder if we'll see Jonas and Routledge start in the same team?

boro lost out on Routledge and Best to us by all accounts. They seem to have a particularly shite window so far.

Is he faster than the Love? He doesn't look particularly pacey on the Youtube clip. Similar to Carroll I would say, maybe a bit quicker.

Why not just start one...seems easy enough.

Not convinced we really went after our top targets with enough real conviction but at least we've added to the squad. Williamson looks a good signing, Routledge should be useful and I really hope this lad comes off. Best of luck to him.

Would imagine he'll replace Carroll as first choice striker on Friday.