Sifu

Booooo.

Nervous times tbh.

16 goal attempts to 3 (Mackems:Blackburn)

Probably been asked before, what is up with O'Neill having 31 on his top?

Well in ref.

Great save.

Indeed - the contract extension was a value maximiser. I guess so.....

Still clinging onto hope that we'll have Tiote starting for us next season. Just thinking that we did give him a 6 year contract so could yet stay? I'm possibly clutching at straws here considering Ashley's history.

;D Welcome to Sunderland Martin.

I expect that move to be Anelka's final payday tbh. Much like Butt and his move to Hong Kong.

Anyone know much about Coulibaly?

Fantastic.

Just got in from having lunch in town. How's the mackem game going?

Same as you. Rodge Johnson got 0. p*ssed off because I thought Caulker was still injured. I'm 141st in the N-O league but think I'll continue persisting. Just need one great weekend and I'll be up and running again.

Have made this point in the Pards thread, but who would you have brought him on for at 3-2 down? Pardew has already made the 'Ben Arfa will only play as a number 10' comment - so I think it's very hard to find a place for him on the pitch when we've only got 10 men. If he'd been brought on for Gosling after the 3rd goal, with Cabaye dropping off to anchor the midfield, that would have been a smart move IMO. I would have brought Ben Arfa on for Obertan. I've seen your point in the Pardew thread about a half of football not being enough for Pardew to suddenly change his mind about Ben Arfa and his playability on the wing. A point which I agree with but I just thought that if Ben Arfa had come on for Obertan, he could have played behind the strikers with Cabaye and Jonas covering the defensive positions on the right and left wings respectively when Norwich were attacking. Wow, that's a helluva tactical change - what formation would we have been playing at that point? (and how many times do you think the players would have walked through that scenario in training?) It would have been a 4-2-1-2 at that point. Could have had Shola helping out the midfield too. Desperate times called for desperate measures and we were chasing the game so I would have gone with that.

38 points today with 5 to play. Hoping for a good day tomorrow and Monday.

Wasn't always that way. It used to be a fairly decent round up with a few shitty tabloids chucked in. No I know. It used to be spot on and save you a fair bit of time checking the papers, just stick with Guardian one now. BBC dumbing down FTW as per. Some of the coverage on the BBC football site is shameful IMO. e.g. the complete lack of coverage of the Copa America / the large quantities of s**** blogs. f***ing embarrassing how they started covering s*** nothing websites like that one.

Have made this point in the Pards thread, but who would you have brought him on for at 3-2 down? Pardew has already made the 'Ben Arfa will only play as a number 10' comment - so I think it's very hard to find a place for him on the pitch when we've only got 10 men. If he'd been brought on for Gosling after the 3rd goal, with Cabaye dropping off to anchor the midfield, that would have been a smart move IMO. I would have brought Ben Arfa on for Obertan. I've seen your point in the Pardew thread about a half of football not being enough for Pardew to suddenly change his mind about Ben Arfa and his playability on the wing. A point which I agree with but I just thought that if Ben Arfa had come on for Obertan, he could have played behind the strikers with Cabaye and Jonas covering the defensive positions on the right and left wings respectively when Norwich were attacking.

Nor the summer imo.

Benarfanufc10 brings the "Ben Arfa fanboyness" to the next level tbh.

I thought Shola was better than usual. He seemed to be up for it, arguing with the ref a couple of times, and turned into a bit of a playmaker when we were down to 10. As others have probably said, how come when he got clattered clearing the ball it was yellow for whatsisname but the "experts" agree Gosling's was a straight red? Actually, even the Sky commentator said Gosling's yellow was a cheap one to keep the baying crowd happy, so two wrongs making a big wrong there. I'm always glass-half-full (and if it's not I'll refill it) so I'll posit that we have the makings of a decent team here if we keep them. I can only hope I imagined a long-haired Alan Smith wandering onto the pitch at the death, but if I didn't then at least he managed not to make his usual impression by getting booked or sent off with his first contribution. And while my glass is overflowing, that Cabaye impressed me yet again. He put me in mind of an NFL quarterback in that he can take one glance, see where everyone is, where they're going, and where the ball needs to go. I'd like to keep him but I increasingly feel that we are in constant selling mode. S**t, my glass just fell off the table. S**t. Actually tbf to Shola, that was a great through ball to Ba for our second goal.

Pardew's decisions today were poor really. He should have given Kadar a chance imo, after all he was our only fit CB. Having said that in terms of his starting CBs today, Pardew started with the next best choice in Simpson and Perch. (Should have been Kadar and Perch really). Pardew should have also put on Ben Arfa at some point, certainly when the game was still 3-2. The lad would have been useful when we were chasing the game. Don't think there's a problem between Pardew and Ben Arfa as such, I think Pardew just wanted to change his tactics accordingly to compensate for the lack of natural CBs and starting Shola was one of his options to do this. Hopefully we'll have Coloccini, Williamson and Tiote back next week and that could mean a return to the tactics we played for the 11 games or so. Really hope he now starts Santon at LB too.

Not sure about him yet. He was at fault for that through ball which led to Norwich's goal. Silly tackle for his red card, should have been a yellow at most but he would have ended up being sent off anyway. Won't write him off yet like.

He's shown some glimpses of good football when he has played and I hope after this injury, his injury problems will be behind him. Probably wishful thinking but we'll see.

What a fucking pass that was to Ba