stozo

Bad draw. With Stoke at home on the weekend we will have to put out the development squad again and hope for the best.

Harper S.Taylor Williamson Coloccini Enrique Ben Arfa Barton Tiote Jonas Nolan Carroll I think Routledge is a massive liability down the right. He was great in the Championship but in the 2 games so far this season he has been giving the ball away too much and not providing enough cover for the RB.

Sounds like he would be a decent signing to play in the position that Smith played last season. Fingers crossed this gets done.

Hatem Ben Arfa is the Dirk Kuyt of 2010.

Harper Perch - Williamson - Coloccini - Enrique Routledge - Guthrie - Nolan - Jonas Carroll - Lovenkrands (Amoebi) Hopefully we can get at least a point.

Can't believe nobody has singled out Routledge yet. He had an absolute shocker. He was at fault for both the 2nd and 3rd goals and gave Evra a free run all night while providing little or no defensive cover for Perch. Apart from that it was as expected really. At least we kept the score down.

Pretty poor. Jonas to blame for the first goal for giving the ball away and Routledge to blame for the second for not marking Evra. Barton needs to pass the ball better and the team, in general, need to think before clearing their lines because it is just coming straight back at us. Need cooler heads who are going to take their time and find a Newcastle man.

Hoping we put in a good performance. Would be brilliant if we managed to get a result.

Many thanks to Tim Howard...

3-0 to Blackpool!

That's a bit silly. The home crowd will probably be on his back, and he won't be that motivated either. Looking at their team I think they have a few injuries so it might be a case of having to play him. They only have one other first team CM on the bench in Reo-Coker.

Stuck £5 on Everton @ 2.5

This is illogical. If it is a loan it will not happen. Others are willing to pay money. This is not the optimal strategy to acquire the player. In fact, it is a defeatist admission that we will not complete the transfer. I think it is very sensible to try for a loan. It looks as if he could end up costing £7/8m which is, realistically, going to be a decent chunk of our transfer budget this summer. Obviously we don't now what the budget is but IMO the number one priority should be signing a good striker and if I had to choose between a good striker and Ben Arfa I'd choose the striker. The move needs to be right for the club and while it is good to go after a target such as Ben Arfa when they become available, it should not comprimise out overall transfer strategy for the summer. This may mean the player goes to a different club because we can't afford the fee but that is reality. Personnally, I also have reservations about his role. He plays the majority of the time as a left winger and that position is already filled by a very capable player. Now, if the plan is to have him play the majority of the time in central midfield then I am even more in favour of a loan as we don't want to get him here and find out he is more of a left winger after we have paid £7m.

Former football agent on Twitter who is usually spot on with his transfer gossip says that Ben Arfa move will only be a loan if it happens.

Thought I'd put on a small bet for the opening weekend. Put £5 on Reading and Charlton @ 2.54.

How many times does Hughton need to say "We are not interested" before people start believing him.

Anyone know his injury status? When is he likely to be playing again?

Gosling for free would be brilliant.

Exactly.

but there wasn't. i think we can be quite sure if he hadn't handled it would have went in. I think he is talking about a hypothetical situation which he is correct about. You'd need to be 100% certain it is going in to award a goal, which would be very difficult without the benefit of video replay.

I think their are several reasons more players do not go abroad, some stated in the above article. In general, far more European's have better language skills that they have picked up from primary school onwards and I think it a tough decision for a English player to move to a country where he cannot speak the language and knows nobody. This is combined with the fact wages tend to be tighter on the continent in recent years. Most players would need a pay rise for them to see going abroad as worthwhile and often that is just not available so they stay with what they know.

For £45 the home shirt would have to be amazing for me to buy it. This year's is far short of amazing so I will be keeping my wallet in my pocket.

They sent a crazy number of their kids out on loan last season so I presume they will be doing the same again meaning they don't want to compete in a Reserve League.

The fact he's ringing Bolton, shows how low we've stooped Get over yourself. We are not the club we were 5 years ago. If we finish 17th this year it will have been a good season. Bolton finished 14th last season. At the end of the day we do not want to be playing kids like Kadar out of position against Arsenal, Chelsea or Man U. In my eyes it is only a good thing that we are looking at cheap cover for a position where we already have a definite first choice.