TRon

The one thing I will say is, we can't rely on other teams to just give up and die. We thought Fulham were nailed on relegation certs and they pull off a great win. We thought Reading were dead certs and they suddenly start getting points. It's still in our hands but we need 4pts from the next two games. Tomorrow will tell us a lot.

Outstanding post, agreed with almost every word. Someone said it earlier, how many supporters of leading clubs would be happy if he was appointed at their club? Man U? Spurs? Liverpool? Arsenal? I've just fed the figures into a computer and my opta stats indicate 98% of them would tell him to fu... ...er furget about it.

Which players is he referring to then? He bought Smith and Barton (to play Ramos football no doubt ) and he gave Butt a new contract. He didn't play Enrique, another one of his signings. Which leaves who? Owen? He was picked ahead of Martins so who's fault is that? Given, Duff, Owen have made remarks, cant think of them atm but they definitely have. Was going to say Charlie but then he is never happy. Allardyce picked all three ahead of other alternatives, so again: who's fault is that? Just becasue he picks them doesn't mean they have bought into his methods. At the same time he is not going to play poorer players because they have. As he said he believes over time he would of turned it around & with his success at Bolton he will belive that. Am I glad he is gone? Yes. Do I think he could of turned it around? No. Can I see his point of view? Yes. His point about Ramos is complete hogwash though. Ramos doesn't play long ball football. The players he was picking to play direct football obviously weren't suited to it, and neither were the ones he bought in. If you wanted to play football like Ramos why would you buy Alan Smith? If you are going to defend then you need players with pace to hit on the break, not players like Geremi, Barton or Viduka who are slow. Shame his fucking opta stats couldn't tell him that you can't play football on the break if you fill the team full of plodders.

Which players is he referring to then? He bought Smith and Barton (to play Ramos football no doubt ) and he gave Butt a new contract. He didn't play Enrique, another one of his signings. Which leaves who? Owen? He was picked ahead of Martins so who's fault is that? Given, Duff, Owen have made remarks, cant think of them atm but they definitely have. Was going to say Charlie but then he is never happy. Allardyce picked all three ahead of other alternatives, so again: who's fault is that?

Which players is he referring to then? He bought Smith and Barton (to play Ramos football no doubt ) and he gave Butt a new contract. He didn't play Enrique, another one of his signings. Which leaves who? Owen? He was picked ahead of Martins so who's fault is that?

The comparison to Ramos is comical. Ramos has set his team up to play quick, counter-attacking football on the deck. I said even when Allardyce was here, I don't have a problem with setting up defensively if you can hit decisively on the break. But Allardyce went on record as saying he didn't like playing out from the back, which leaves you with no other option but to lump it high and long, which is what his team did. It's what Bolton did and it's never been what Ramos does. No amount of re-writing history is going to change that.

Fair call - "significant money" is a relative term though. Significant compared to Ashley's personal fortune? Or relative to the club's bottom line? I dunno - I see all these responses assuming an enormous transfer kitty for Keegan but I'm wondering where all the positivity comes from? Look at the gossip gdm shared - Scotty Mac for Christ's sake? We've already got Shola and Carroll - another fat Aussie (disclaimer - I too am a fat Aussie!) will not catapult us into the Euro places. If we sell little Mickey then we need to trade up, not down... And even if 24m is a number made up by the press, does anyone think 24m will buy the six-eight international class players we need to compete for Europe, or even the cups? Maybe I've read too many posts by NE5 - but maybe he makes a good point when he suggests we are blinded by love for Big Mike? Nobody really knows anything so anyone can believe what they like. At the moment I prefer to support our Chairman and manager's stance which would appear to be very ambitious. If anyone else prefers to be suspicious or negative good luck to them.

Keegan is seriously beginning to worry me. With being based in Glasgow, and otherwise taking very little interest in the game over the last 3 years, these are probably the only up and coming players that he knows. Having done nothing in the January window, does he really have a clue about where the talent is, on a more widespread basis? The same thing crossed my mind. Just because he has been in Scotland for some time, shouldn't really translate as the best players available all playing Scottish football. Might just be paper talk though. We'll see.

If the club were offered £9m for Owen I'm sure they'd rip their arm off they'd take it so fast. If we sold Owen for £9m it wouldn't mean his replacement would have to cost £9m maximum. Mike Ashley is loaded! Having said that, we'd possibly use the scouting network to identify up and coming strikers in Europe rather than blow fortunes on already established 'super stars'. Without wanting to sound like a well known poster - the evidence thus far indicates that transfers are to be self-financing. Ashley has given no indication he intends to spend bucket-loads of cash... Or maybe the current predicament has me so down that I'm simply worst-casing everything... The evidence thus far indicates that Ashley didn't want to release funds to a manager he didn't believe in, and he has indicated that Keegan will get significant money to spend in the summer. There is no other evidence.

Some people might have short memories but I won't forget how he went to places like Derby and Reading with ultra-defensive line ups. We were thrashed by Arsenal juniors in the Carling cup as well.

Sometimes you can put too many players into the same area of the pitch and they just get in each others way, it doesn‘t always work. Sounds like the midfield area to me. Four useless cogs in the engine room without a shred of teamwork between them.

Keegan's said there will be one or two changes because what we have been doing isn't working. I'm just starting to get a feeling he might drop Smith and Duff in a best case scenario. If not, at least one of them, which means one less passenger.

Someone mentioned playing all three forwards who are capable of scoring goals in the Brum thread. I suppose it could be argued that three decent strikers (Viduka, Martins and Owen) is preferable to playing four shit midfielders.

Souness wasn't just a shite appointment, Shepherd almost preceded this by another kingsize clanger, by approaching Steve Bruce. Not only one of the most witless managers in football but targeted for totally the wrong reason, i.e, because he was a geordie. All be it, one who is diluted with Manc leanings. We'd have been better off setting our sights on Biffa Bacon. Whey aye man!

he's rob leeish.....more goals and marginally not as good defensivly. you've got your head up your arse if you wouldn't want him here. I know it sounds ludicrous, but Lampard really isn't the type of player I want in midifeld. Yes he's better than what we've got but that's not saying much. We need a Gascoigne or a Beardsley, players who can make a killer pass or change the game with a bit of vision or skill. I know they don't grow on trees, but before Lampard has the opportunity to tell us to fuck off I'd like to get my retaliation in first. Frank, thanks but no thanks

I would definitely take 107 goals in 337 appearences from a midfielder over what we currently have. (smith, barton, butt and Emre who have about 3 goals between them in the last 2 years) Like I said, a goal-scorer playing in midfield. If he was 24 fair enough, but at his age, no thanks. Let's look for a genuine playmaker instead.

I think Lampard is highly over-rated tbh. He's not a playmaker, he's a goal-scorer playing in midfield. I'm quite glad he's too good for us really.

He signed some very good players for us. He should've we were the 2nd best team in the country, one of the richest in the world and in the Champion's League. and those players still took us from that position to mid-table. given time i'm sure he'd have done better but he did a poor job short-term. The football we played under Dalglish was atrocious. He did make some good signings in Given, Solano, Hamman (for that 1 season) but made some equally bad signings like the jobs for the boys (Rush, Barnes, his son etc), Des Hamilton, Andreas Andersson, Lionel Perez...... falling out with Ginola,selling Ferdinand and replacing them sub standard players. Everyone goes on about him taking us to 2nd place in the CL, but that was with Keegans team. The season after was his team......the one where we performed so miserably, playing largely boring negative football and finishing 13th. Hardly his fault Ferdinand was sold though. i'm no apologist for dalglish but to underestimate the effect losing shearer had is to do him a massive disservice - was the best striker in europe at the time and would have affected everything maassively agreed. The point about Dalglish is that, at the time, he had a winning record better than even Alex Ferguson, he appeared to be a top, top appointment, of the calibre of Fergie, Wenger, Mourhinho etc now. He had also taken a great team on at Liverpool and improved them, and with flair players too. Exactly what we wanted here at the time. Then won the title with another club, a feat few have equalled. Won 3 manager of the year awards, and 4 titles in all. Saying he was crap or anything like questioning why he got the job, well the reason he got the job is for the reasons above. These hindsight merchants really make me laugh. Dalglish was an excellent appointment at the time, which is why I've never slagged Fat Fred for it. You are right in highlighting just why he looked such an attractive option back then. But his limitations became pretty apparent the longer he was away from Anfield. I think the dissent only set in with the consecutive appointments of Souness and Roeder, both terrible decisions from any angle. I hardly think a manager with all those honours could be termed as "limited" however I'm pleased that you acknowledge that for 7 out of 10 years you were quite happy. By the way, Roeder also came 7th in the league so make it 8 years out of 10. Hardly the sort of figures you would associate with a shite board. They say that Greggs pies are especially nice these days. I wonder how many company chairman buy them with company funds, despicable practice. Truly only shit chairman do such things. You know you're the only one who mentions pies these days Leazes? If you dropped that side of your attack I'm sure a lot more people would agree with your posts. maybe so, but they didn't agree with them at the time. Maybe some people could admit that being a fat bastard doesn't really have any relevance, although its all quite a lot of people said. Nothing whatsoever has changed in my comments about the old board BTW, but thats because they were based on facts. The fact that after sacking SBR, Fat Fred wanted to hire thick Steve Bruce, got knocked back, then hired Souness who proceeded to destroy the squad, followed by appointing lame duck Roeder? Are these the facts you are referring to?

Revised team (4-4-2) : Harper Beye Faye Taylor Enrique Geremi Butt Barton N'Zogbia Viduka Martins I can't believe I've gt Butt and Barton in central midfield, but against a physical Birmingham I think we need Faye at centre back, and I refuse to play Duff any more as he hasn't provided anything all season.

Why are so many people picking Emre? Is he fit?

He's called Bentley Bentley isn't that fast. Excellent player but not because he's got blinding pace. And Lennon really isn't an appreciably better player than Milner at the moment. Certainly has more potential though. Bentley looks quite slow to me for a winger, although his use of the ball is faultless.

In their report on the wolves game under SBR. They spent the remaining part of SBR' managership sniping at him and generally leading the cheerleading to get him out. Nice one lads I hope your happy with the last 5 years but lay off the hypocrisy of other fans expressing their views eh? POT KETTLE BLACK. Ha ha. Glass houses. I don't think we were in a relegation battle back then, just another season going nowhere. A small but crucial difference.

He's got 10% of the work ethic of Smith, yet has still brought 100% more to the club this season than Smith has. Exactly. Aye he's overweight and he's not quick (fuck's sake, what a comical accusation of a player who has never relied on pace), but he oozes class when we actually get the fucking ball into his feet. I'm going to go out on a limb and call him our most important player - Martins included - out of the dross that is our squad. He has been involved in the majority of the good that has occured this season, much like Oba and N'Zogbia have. He has also scored goals which changed matches when we were playing dire football early in the season. Allardyce had a lot to thank him for. Although staying fit would have helped. We knew what we were getting when we signed him though, didn't we? He's the sort of player who will keep us up, much like he did for 'Boro last season. He was immense in the latter stages for them lot. He was. If he can stay fit for even the last 9 games and scores the goals which keep us up, everything else will be forgotten and we can move him on in the summer and start again. The thing is, if he does stay fit he will score the goals. I don't really doubt it.

He's got 10% of the work ethic of Smith, yet has still brought 100% more to the club this season than Smith has. Exactly. Aye he's overweight and he's not quick (fuck's sake, what a comical accusation of a player who has never relied on pace), but he oozes class when we actually get the fucking ball into his feet. I'm going to go out on a limb and call him our most important player - Martins included - out of the dross that is our squad. He has been involved in the majority of the good that has occured this season, much like Oba and N'Zogbia have. He has also scored goals which changed matches when we were playing dire football early in the season. Allardyce had a lot to thank him for. Although staying fit would have helped.

Thanks for reminding me - before we turned to Saviour Souness we actually approached and were turned down by Steve Bruce whose main qualification was that he was a geordie and his team played rotten football. Yet more evidence of Freddie Shepherd's football knowledge