Shak

Shay Cristina Barcelona strikes again.

Do you have any idea how crazy you are?

Shay betting the last desperate shreds of his forum rep on this thread is as predictable as it is depressing IYAM.

I think Osula would benefit a lot from starting every week in the Championship, to be honest. Clearly has something about him but extremely raw. I think he’ll find significant playing time hard to come by next year and he needs it more than most. I can see the logic of keeping Wilson as third choice if we get a quality second striker in, and I say that as someone who thinks he’s absolutely finished. Would prefer we got someone else, but it’s third choice striker (and really if Isak and our new CF were both out we’d possibly start Gordon CF ahead of Wilson)

I suspect that wouldn’t be the plan at all

I presume if we do get Delap then the pitch to him will not have been that he’s coming to be Isak’s backup. There’ll definitely be plans for them to be on the pitch together quite a bit. Remember how utterly fucking devastating they were together when we would start one of Isak/Wilson and then bring the other on for the last half hour, Isak on the left and Wilson through the middle? Think there’s a fair chance the plan would be for them to start alternating games, playing 90 minutes when they start and then being on the bench for the next game with a guaranteed half hour against tired legs. It’s plenty of football for both of them IMO, and there’s scope for us to start them both on occasion too. Would possibly mean one of Gordon or Barnes becomes expendable though.

My suggestion to sign one player to be first choice LW, first choice GK, first choice CB and backup striker wasn’t entirely serious.

Nonsense. This new one player that I obviously intended to be our only signing of the summer can cover striker too and will also solve our CB and GK issues.

I’d not be opposed to moving Gordon/Barnes on and replacing him with a top quality creative LW type who can shift inside to play LCM in games like yesterday where we expect to have plenty of the ball and need to break teams down. Someone like Eze for example would allow us to go with this against stronger teams where we need to win the midfield battle. Tonali Bruno Joelinton New RW Eze Isak Then against weaker opposition (or if we’re chasing a game and need to change it) we bring in Barnes for Joelinton and go. Tonali Bruno Eze New RW Barnes Isak Operating closer to a 4-2-3-1 with Eze playing more advanced than Big Joe does generally. Went with keeping Barnes because I think it’s easier to use him more rotationally, I don’t know if Gordon would accept it. I think with CL football there’ll be plenty of football for both of them but I don’t think it’s ideal that both of them seem only capable of playing (or willing to play?) in one position. There’s been little to suggest that the two of them can play together and be effective, which isn’t great. Eze is also just an example, I’m not sure he’d be the best player for the role but just the idea of someone who is first choice LW but also us the versatility to play inside and be more of an asset in breaking teams down.

The ref has to take full blame. The moment he blew the whistle the play was dead, I think the VAR probably looked at it and saw it wasn’t a foul but they can’t award a goal because the ball hit the net after the whistle.

Ideal scenario for me is we buy a couple of RWs who can offer something different. Mbeumo and Dibling for example. Add those two to the squad with Longstaff and Wilson leaving and that’s a really nice group with a lot of versatility. Mbeumo would primarily be a RW but can also play up front when Isak is out and we still have a really good footballer in the position. Dibling has the benefit of being able to play LCM too when we need something a bit different. The player in that position that we want Willock to be in terms of his ball carrying and getting beyond the striker. Not necessarily those two players, but I mean more the type of players they are. Those two would be lovely, but I don’t know if we can manage it financially. It’s perhaps a little harsh on Murphy as it would knock him down the pecking order quite a bit in theory, but he’d still get plenty of football IMO.

This Charlton manager is a bit much like

It’ll be Willock, for sure. Think the role in our system requires a lot of running and I don’t think Miley can cover the ground. Tonali could do it with Miley playing as the #6 (or Bruno back to #6 and Miley RCM) but Sandro has bossed it to such a massive degree in that spot that trying something else before such a huge run of fixtures would be a bit mental.

I may be wrong but I don’t imagine that the competition for starting places in the Canadian team is particularly brutal.

It’s not just that they’d be rotated, either. I suspect that if we signed Delap and Isak stayed they’d be on the pitch at the same time quite a lot. Our system has looked as much like a 4-4-2 this season as it has a 4-3-3, particularly out of possession. Murphy plays far deeper on the right than Gordon does on the left, with our LCM being asked to do a lot of the hard work in covering the LB. Suspect Isak in that Gordon role playing off a CF would look dynamite. So rather than rotating with Isak, you’d have a situation where Isak, Gordon and Delap are sharing two positions, which with European football next season would mean more than enough minutes to go around for all three of them. I think on balance signing someone who is very versatile and can backup Isak while also being comfortable playing wide would be ideal, but if they go after Delap at the price he’ll be it’ll be because they think he’s going to add a lot to the team beyond being Isak’s understudy.

Buckled at the idea of Amorim identifying Longstaff as the player he needs to make his system work Surely nothing in that? Only thing is with how much of a squad overhaul they need and PSR being restrictive they might have use for someone who isn’t going to set them back much as a CM squad option while they spend money elsewhere? I just think that surely you’d be better off taking a punt on a young unproven player from abroad that has some scope to be better than what Longstaff will provide.

I think the idea would be to sign a more versatile player rather than a strictly backup LW. The issue is that Gordon and Barnes both seem like they can only play LW. In a world without PSR, us having Gordon and Barnes rotating at that spot would be ideal. But it’s still a balancing act in that regard unfortunately. I think if you sell Barnes (or Gordon… we’d get a lot more for him) you use the money to bring in someone with a bit more versatility. Ideally sign a LW who is also comfortable playing CF. Or maybe you sign a CF and use Isak left at times, though I’d prefer the previous option. Could sign another CM option with Joelinton playing left when needed. Osula seems like he’s better suited to playing wide rather than through the middle, left would suit him better too you’d imagine. Sanusi might be sniffing around the first team soon enough also. I think ideally we’ll keep him and have two very good LW options. But I can see the logic in him being moved on to give us PSR wiggle room. There's also the issue of how Barnes feels about it. He'll get plenty of football next year but when push comes to shove I think Gordon will be the one in the starting lineup for bigger games.

Think he will get an extended run at LW even when Gordon is back. Eddie is big on merit and the fact is that Gordon hasn’t been in the best form and then went and got stupidly sent off, something that was a huge factor in us being knocked out of a very winnable cup competition. Barnes on the other hand was most recently a significant cog in one of the most important victories in the history of the club. I think there’s still a decent chance Barnes gets moved on in the summer but right now it should be his position to lose.

I’ve seen a few people say Delap isn’t gonna move to us sit on the bench but I think he’d play a lot of football here. Obviously with European football there’ll be games when we need to rest Isak but I think there’s also plenty of scope for them playing together. Our system functionally isn’t very far from being a 4-4-2 at times, with the LCM getting very wide and Murphy playing far deeper and having more defensive responsibility than Gordon. I think you could very much play Isak off Delap, particularly in home games where we’re confident that we’ll be taking the game to our opponent. Two years ago when we had both Wilson and Isak fit and firing the ability to have the two of them on the pitch together was so often game changing for us. It’s entirely possible that Delap would rather go to another team where he has a clearer path to being the first choice CF, of course. When push comes to shove in the biggest games, Eddie is almost certainly going with Isak leading the line. If not Delap though, I still think a genuinely quality addition at CF is one of the most important additions we can make this summer. Think you’d probably be looking at Barnes moving on, then basically having Gordon, Isak and Delap rotating in the two positions. Joelinton can play left, Osula seems like he might be better suited to a wide role from what we’ve seen so far and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Sanusi in and around the first team squad too. Ideal world we could keep Barnes and having cracking squad depth but he seems a logical PSR sacrifice to allow us to strengthen elsewhere. God it’s gonna be so nice if we go out and recruit heavily this summer, really excited to see what the squad looks like after the summer.

Man, what a day. Every single player was excellent, about as complete a team performance as you’ll ever see. For them to produce that in a game of such magnitude is an incredible feat, huge credit to them all and of course to Eddie too. It’s particularly sweet as it was likely the last chance for a lot of this group of players. We may go on to bigger and better things in years to come but this will always be special, the first trophy that most of us have ever seen us lift. It’s so fitting that players like Pope, Trippier, Burn, Schar and Murphy were in the team that did it, that players like Willock, Wilson, Krafth and (almost) Longstaff played a role off the bench. Even Lascelles being there, after how much he’s given to the club. A lot of players mentioned there will be gone from the club quite soon, and others will have diminished roles. But they’re Newcastle legends forever now. So happy for everyone on here too, I suspect the vast majority of you broke down sobbing at full time just like I did. We’ve been through a lot with this club. Saw some great teams with great managers that just didn’t quite manage to win a trophy. Saw some awful teams too, endured some dreadful managers. Had an absolutely vile human being cynically run our club into the ground for a long time, broke some of us along the way. Can say with absolute certainty that if it wasn’t for this forum I would have packed it in during those Ashley years. So thank you all for being here, I hope you all loved yesterday as much as I did. Howay the Lads.

Only time I remember is starting Isak left and Wilson central was at Leeds at the end of the season we came 4th. We were shite first half, went a goal down and Leeds missed a penalty. Lucky to get a point that day. The ability to shift Isak left or into a #10 position with Wilson up top was a huge weapon that season, but it’s something that worked well because we only started one of them and then sprung that for the last half hour or so. I’d very much like to see us target a CF this summer to give us that option again but Isak has been too good at CF to do that to accommodate a rusty and possibly finished Wilson. He’s a clear A also.

Aye it's like Bryan Adams never existed as far as some on here are concerned.

They've done it a few times earlier this year and looked good. The Chelsea cup game, Arsenal home in the league and then at Forest we had that setup and won all three. Biggest issue with it was it forced Gordon to the right, where he didn’t look comfortable. That’s not an issue for the final. Meanwhile Barnes has been in the fringes of the team all season, has struggled when he has got on and doesn’t work very hard off the ball, I’m not sure what he’s done to be worth starting?