Shak

We need a striker, one of them. And not a big money player, just someone who offers us something different from Owen and Martins. Should be affordable at a reasonable price. Shola will do as 4th choice. The big money has to be spent on a CM, a playmaker who can make us tick through the middle and get some goals as well.

I entered this thread with the intention of buying the shirt when I'm over for the match this weekend. Five pages later and I won't be. It's very close to being a nice jersey, but there's something a bit wonky about it. Can't put my finger on it, but it's something.

http://games.atari.com/playgames/monopoly/lobby.jsp

Owen is very good at holding the ball up if you get it into his feet, but if we did resort to long balls I agree we'd fail.

Isn't he generally unhappy wherever he goes though? Great ability, but his tendency to fall out of favour worries me.

Milner on the left and Martins drifting in from the right tbh. Seriously though, I'd be excited to see what Milner could do in this system. Free him of defensive responsibility and he could really breakout. Look at how Ronaldo has done at Man U now that he's not really playing as an orthodox right winger. Obviously, Milner is no Ronaldo. But the theory in how much he could improve is the same as they're both wingers who like to run at people and have a shot.

At the start of last season against Arseanl at Highbury we went with a 4-5-1 I recall and looked very sharp with Dyer on the right and Jenas, Emre and Parker as our 3 CM's. Loathe Jenas as I do, he was very good at getting forward which allowed Parker and Emre to be a solid pairing in the middle and we were looking very good that day until the ridiculous sending off.

Mikel just has one of those faces you'd love to punch, he looks like a right wanker.

He's added a stone of muscle don't ya know. He wouldn't be a lone striker though, is the point. It'd work as long as we gave our wingers very little defensive responsibility, like Barca do. Saviola has less presence than Owen, but as he wasn't marooned up front and isolated he was very effective for Barca there when played this year.

Wouldn't say it was a bad miss though, tough chance.

Could have been twice as long tbh, I'd paragraphs about Allardyce planned as well as comparing different style of the formation. Thought it might be a bit much for the likes of Jon though.

Been thinking this for a long time, and with Owen hopefully ready to go for next season I really think it would be for the best. As organised as teams have become at the back these days, a basic 4-4-2 is generally pretty easy to shut down. Teams need to be more flexible going forward if they're to cause problems consistently, and 4-4-2 is just a bit too rigid for me. Building a team to play 4-4-2 with the players we've currently got is going to take near total overhaul. - Martins and Owen may be successful as a partnership, but I'd be truly shocked if they were. One of your strikers must be the link man, who drops deep and gets on the ball. Owen would be wasted in this role, while Martins isn't technically good enough on the ball. - Dyer isn't a orthodox winger, and Duff I don't believe will ever be effective again playing as deep as a 4-4-2 makes him as he's lost the ability to beat two or three men at a time. - Parker, Butt, Emre, Sidwell (if he joins). Pick me an effective partnership from those four. It's not possible. Of the players we have in midfield, only Milner really fits a 4-4-2 (To save me going on an angry tangent, I'm excluding N'Zogbia from this, as he's on his way in the summer tbh). Even still, Milner would be even more suited to being one of the wingers in a 4-3-3, particularly if his crossing and shooting continues to improve as it has this year. Switching to a 4-3-3/4-5-1 would immediately help a lot of our problems in center midfield. Any two of the four I've mentioned above would be well suited to playing in a 4-3-3, as two of the CM's generally form an engine room and aren't really expected to get beyond the front men. Essien and Makelele at Chelsea or Xavi and Iniesta are good examples of this. As poorly suited to playing together as they are at the moment, I actually believe Parker and Emre could work here. Emre is born to play in a 3 man center midfield IMO, as he doesn't track back well enough to be a top DM, while he doesn't get forward enough to be an AM. But he's a neat little player who would really flourish playing balls from deeper if he had a genuine target drifting round in space in front of the opposition back 4. Duff, Milner and Dyer would be quite well suited to playing as wingers in the system, as playing further forward would allow them to get at the full-backs 1 on 1 more often. Owen would be the central striker, obviously, and I think he'd be suited to it as long as we added some players at the back with at least some degree of quality on the ball. If we resort to hoofing long balls at Owen all day we're fucked, no question. But we'd be looking to get the ball to our wingers moreso than Owen when building attacks. Obviously, for this to work we badly need a playmaker, someone to be our Deco. Dyer could play the role at a push, but he's not reliable due to injury and doesn't pick his momenst breaking forward very well either. I think he'd be better as an option on the wing anyway. We'd also need to invest in full-backs, particularly on the left, as they'd have to have quality on the ball so they can find our wingers/playmaker or else we'll end up belting long balls all day. Solano could get away with it for another year I reckon, but a LB and CB to play with Taylor are essential. The potential odd man out would be Martins, but I'd think he would have at least a shot of playing as one of our "wingers". In the 4-3-3 your wingers can drift inside ala Messi or Joe Cole. Even Rooney has been used as one of the wingers along with Ronaldo at Man U. As long as one of your wingers gives a genuine threat of width, which Milner can do, then the other can play a bit more tucked in. So I'd think Martins could have a shot at playing on the right with Milner on the left, just off Owen. Thoughts?

I doubt Glenn is in any way aware of the irony of these comments considering how many games Milner has played this year. Moron. Anyway, won't suprise me at all if N'Zogbia is off to Arsenal in the summer and it's all been arranged already. Pre-contract is the wrong word I suppose, but I'm sure it's possible for it all to be aranged by now. Shocking waste, take a fucking bow Glenn.

GUILTY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This would be wasting Tevez though in my opinion. What he'd be so good at is dropping off from the front and giving an option to our midfielders, a player to build through. Playing all three would mean Tevez would have to do a lot of work in midfield and play deeper in general, meaning he'd be doing his good work in the wrong places. Playing him up front, just off a partner, he can drag defenders out of position and get at the other team near their own box. Tevez and a fully fit Owen would be a very good partnership in my opinion. I like Martins but with Owen sniffing round the goal and Tevez dropping off and linking with our wingers I think the chemistry would be very good, which I'm not sure it will be with Oba and Owen.

He's just the player we need. Someone with the ability, and desire, to drop deep and get on the ball and make us tick. Neither Owen nor Martins are that type of player, Tevez would improve the quality of football we play immeasureably. Doubt we've even considered it though, sadly.

----------------Harper Nobby -- Taylor -- Bramble -- Baba Milner -- Butt -- Emre -- N'Zogbia -------Martins -- Tha Big A.C Though we'll probably see Dyer, Parker and Sibierski instead of Zoggy, Emre and Tha Big A.C. >

We'll agree to disagree then I suppose. Personally thought his link play was brilliant, always showing for the ball and rarely losing it and moving it on to the next player, the type of player Newcastle need above all IMO. Maybe then we'd keep the ball for more than fifteen seconds at a time.

I'd agree that he isn't the best player in the world, there are a few I'd take ahead of him. However, I really don't see how he went missing last night. He basically ran the show in the first half and was well on his way to doing the same in the second until Gattuso went off. Once that happened Man U were dominating everything in midfield and the only times the ball went near Kaka really were hopeful punts forward towards Gilardino, who inevitably failed to get possesion.

Spurs targetting central midfielders again for some reason. He'd have a better shot of playing more often here so that could be to our advantage, can't say I've seen a lot of him tbh so can't really comment on how useful a signing he'd be.

Allardyce O'Neill Pardew

Swap Milner for Dyer and that's how I'd want us to play in most away games. For home games, also swap Parker for Emre. We'd get raped in midfield if our four players were Dyer, Duff, Emre and Tevez tbh. You need someone to anchor the midfield and get stuck in defensively, none of those four could do that.

I'm a big fan of Martins actually, just think that Owen and Tevez would easily form the best partnership of the three. That leaves Martins as the odd man out, though we'll need squad depth for sure.

I know that, I'm just ignoring it as it makes me sad. The CM in that line up would be very important someone who really can run the show in the middle. Therefore, he'd probably cost a bit and may be out of reach this summer. Think we could get away with Emre/Sidwell in there for another year, though it's not ideal. Since Tevez would have to be gotten now and we can probably get away with Nobby at RB for one more season my priorities this offseason would be Tevez Quality CB Quality LB ----------------Given Nobby-- Taylor-- Quality CB - Quality LB Milner -- Parker -- Emre/Sidwell -- N'Zogbia -----------Tevez --- Owen Subs: Martins, Dyer, Butt, A cheap experienced CB, Harper Would do me for next year, then the following summer get in a top class RB, top class CM and maybe add some depth and we'd hav a good team IMO.

Tevez isn't a CM though. If he plays CM he'll have to help out defensively quite a bit and be somewhat of a box-to-box player. That'd be a complete waste of his qualities, namely dropping off his strike partner and being the link man between the out and out striker and the midfield. It'd be like playing Bergkamp in CM, basically. ------------Given RB --- Taylor --- CB --- LB Milner - Parker - CM - N'Zogbia -------Tevez ---Owen We could probably build that team with quality players filling in the blanks over the next two summers, and we'd be very good IMO. I think Tevez and Owen would be a match made in heaven tbh.