Sifu

They actually bid. This actually happened. Woah!

Well Kadar was on the bench for the Brighton game. Could yet see him on the bench again in the coming months?

A massive boost that.

I'm not expecting Cheik to be back anytime soon like, the Ivory Coast should get to the final/win the ACoN.....

Wednesday are on a good run of form. I reckon it'll be an away win in any case.....

I always assumed we signed him after the World Cup, I've since found this to be the wrong assumption. Having googled it, yeah we signed Guivarc'h at the end of the Ligue 1 season in 1998 (he finished as one of the top scorers in Ligue 1 too).

the first half of that season he was a good call for player of the year. That performance against Liverpool was something special (scored all 4 of Arsenal's goals too iirc).

He was indeed good in the PL to begin with. Then for some reason, just went to s***.

Agree with that, though I suspect Cissé may be on the bench. Something tells me we'll see them both on the bench with Ba coming on at half time if things aren't going to plan.

Actually yeah, he wasn't that great during the World Cup. Guess that was a bad example then.

Ba touched the ball about four times. Just goes to show the worth of judging someone based on an international tournament. One of the most inconsistent and unpredictable ways of judging a player. Always baffles me when teams do it. An example: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ITR6NR6DR98/TknQrwz7owI/AAAAAAAAAco/Q2DFGjimS4A/s1600/stephane%2Bguivarc%2527h.jpg

My mate said the exact same thing when we were watching the game. He said that it was a pathetic cut he had there Regarding the possibility of Cabaye getting a retrospective ban, it's more than likely to happen really.

Ha, indeed. Hmmm, apparently Man U and City are also interested......

I have no idea who he is.

Was distinctly meh at best imo.

Update: nobody is.

indeed. Fucking hell.

So I'm assuming you would prefer a Coloccini-Perch partnership instead of the Coloccini-Williamson partnership? Williamson has been, for the most part, defensively solid (apart from the Fulham game). His weaknesses have been highlighted a bit recently, yeah but I'd definitely still stick with him until the end of the season like.

Don't think anythings been on SSN so he won't have a f***ing clue. Has he been banned?

:lol:

This campaign has turned out to be quite a disaster for them.

Huh? Interesting I guess.......

while i think this is way ott i have the same gut feeling, in the same way i felt that hughton had took us as far as he was going around the time he was bagged a better manager could get more out of what we've got imo, but that's a blindingly simplistic way to look at things - for a start how many "better managers" could work under MA and DL? Mojo, TRon is being ridiculous in his comments, way OTT as per. Yes, it is overwhelmingly likely that (at the moment) Pardew is not an 'elite' manager who can guide his team past the 'big boys' on a consistent basis - he also seems to suffer from the team 'underperforming' as a group when the expectations are for them to win the match (it could be said that previous wins from this position have been down to individual brilliance rather than an overall good team performance). However, to say that you're counting the days down until he's sacked [TRon] Pardew fits our club in the current system and where we're at. We've not had a top half finish in the Premiership for 5 years, one of those years spent in the Championship. We've not won a trophy for 19223123years and not contested a major final since the 1970s*. This is not to say that we can't win trophies or challenge for titles, or that we don't deserve to, but it's a bit rich to expect us to be hiring world-class managers and signing world-class players - ask yourself [with your b&w specs off]: why would they want to come? We need to re-establish ourselves as a genuine Premiership team, 3+ seasons of consecutive top 6 finishes and we become a regular European team. This means we not only earn more money through TV + prize money, but we become a more attractive prospect for those players with the quality of Ben Arfa (but without the alleged dodgy temperament/baggage). When we get to this stage, we may well find that Pardew hasn't evolved or adapted and we've surpassed his ceiling. In that case, in the same way Hughton was sent packing when it became clear he wasn't going to kick on, it'll be time to wave goodbye to Pards - but we have to get there first. Pards has shown some interesting ideas and some new ways of working which have seemingly benefitted the club this season (we're over-performing everyone's initial expectations for this season), so there's definitely a lot of good things for him to work with and expand upon over the second half of the season. Now that we've achieved Premiership safety (or at least 4 points from it), there's now a cushion for him to try installing his own way of playing (pass + move, fluid football) in a competitive environment with the players he's been working with for over a year. He can introduce some of the youngsters that have impressed him and try other players in slightly different positions to give them a chance. We've also got the rest of the season to help Cisse bed into the club, with no immediate pressure for him to score. He's not perfect and he has some points which look to have cost us wins this season; however, we have to give managers the chance to evolve and learn from their mistakes before we start praying for their departure. Only if we were dragged into the bottom three, with a team looking bereft of leadership or ideas, would I consider sacking a manager 18months into his tenure. Yesterday's performance and result were both disappointing, a cup run would look to be our best shot of success but it wasn't to be this season as we've underperformed in both cups, despite playing reasonably strong teams in the games that we've been knocked out - similar to last season. If Pardew is genuine with his comments about wanting to go on another cup run (a la WHU) then he needs to work out how to get his players on the same wavelength, because they're playing in the cups like they'd rather be at home . *I don't count two no-shows at the old Wembley in 98 + 99 Bang on the money there Stu (well for me anyway)

Very impressive indeed. All credit to Roeder for that. Shame about the following season though.