Sifu

correct me if I'm wrong here but didn't they finish 6th last year? so they've spent 100m and on the evidence so far its to go backwards, oh and win the Carling Cup on pens against a championship side Progress

Yeah, Martinez is doing his best with what is a shite squad. He is attempting to get the team to play some good attacking football but the lack of resources at his disposal is really preventing him from properly implementing his plans.

17 points. Danny Graham did nothing.

Dick

1-0 to WBA

Ha! Pieters has the right attitude already. Sign him up!

QPR 1-1 Everton.

1-0 to Everton in their game against QPR.

Birmingham lead 1-0.

Seriously, if that is the mackem lineup (especially that defence) then we should have enough about ourselves to win. But really, some people have already mentioned this, the atmosphere at St. James' will be as important as anything tomorrow.

Tim is a Geordie really

Let us know how Tavernier gets on!

No changes this weekend as such. Made Danny Graham my captain though. Let's see how that goes!

Ah, another cheap, tacky looking addition to the stadium. Urgh.

Another piece of fantastic news. Tim has also been a key player for us this season. His goalkeeping has arguably won us a few points here and there and to have him for many seasons to come is just brilliant. Of course, he's still young (for a goalkeeper anyway) so he is still developing. I, for one, am very excited to see him develop into a world class keeper (he's not quite there yet but he is definitely getting there!). The future's looking bright

This is fantastic news. A brilliant start to the weekend. Captain Colo is arguably our most important player, he's such a rock in defence and securing him for the long term is nothing but a massive boost. I'm so delighted!

I think Pardew now sees Ben Arfa as a wildcard which is definitely the wrong role/description for the lad. A part-time role will do Hatem no good whatsoever - it simply won't get the best out of him. Having said that, I'm still going to keep telling myself that things/the situation could yet improve (this is perhaps a futile/stupid thing to do but I honestly think that all is not lost yet).

Just no.

Whilst it's become apparent that Pardew does like a direct approach from time to time (probably a bit too much these days it has to be said), I honestly don't think this is a tactic he really wants to utilise to a full extent (as in, I don't think that this is his sole gameplan). Now, I am aware that there has been many cases this season where we have resorted to the whole "pass-back-to-Krul-for-him-to-launch-it" trick (and yes, it is very annoying) but there has also been some cases where we have mixed it around effectively (Man U at St. James' being the main example). We have seen glimpses of a "pass-and-play" tactic this season too, now what I'm thinking is that why would Pardew deploy such a tactic in games if his alleged gameplan/entire mentality was just hoofball? I've seen some posts in the past in various threads saying that Pardew was just like Allardyce which is a complete load of bollocks. In the end, I'm pretty confident that Pardew can learn from his mistakes. His unemployment period (post-Southampton) did allow him to reassess his approach imo - considering he went to Germany for a bit and try and learn from the Bundesliga indicates to me that he is a man who is still "learning" as a manager.

Oooo, that's a nice little omen.

Simply put. He's a much better player if he's allowed to push up. So I say, let Tiote do all the defensive work (and Cheik does have the ability to do that all by himself anyway) and let Cabaye do all the attacking from CM. It really is as simple as that.

It's been said before, that French kit is brilliant. Probably the best looking out of the lot.

Plus: http://www.nufc.co.uk/page/News/Gallery/0,,10278~2631084,00.html