Mick

I had to look twice.

Other than two keepers I'm struggling to name any, Hislop and Hooper are the only two I can remember.

I'd be over the moon if you won.

Am I missing something? They were our players, nowt to do with Allardyce.

You do know they were our players, don't you?

I''ll bet you every penny I have that Allardyce doesn't finish his time here with a better transfer record than Keegan.

I don't know where the Allardyce list comes from or what they actually were, ie trials. You can hardly class some of Sir Bobby's as his signings, Des Hamilton coming back from trial is hardly his fault, some of those are also kids who have returned from loan, Gary Caldwell is on four times.

Can't you gather, from the fact that he's forced to sign trialists from the likes of Bishop Auckland, Communicaciones, Tivoli Gardens and Village United, that he had a pretty s**** transfer budget and was merely trying these players out? Have you EVER heard of these players other than the fact that they're on the signings list? With us, atleast before Big Sam, we signed Albert Luques and Hugo Vianas for £8/9/10m, on £50k+a-week wage packets, who stayed on the agenda for three years and more! Sir Bobby's signings list would be an interesting read for you, tbh, if this is your criteria for how well a manager does in the transfer market. You haven't a clue what you're on about, mate. I think you need to get a grip to be honest. Why shouldn't he question the transfer activity of the person now conducting ours? All he's done is point out that Allardyce has been less than perfect, he's not branding him as anything other than being fallible.

mackems.gif Trust you to put two and two together and come up with something other than 4. Going by your powers of perception I must be seething about Ashley because he's got loads more money then Shepherd yet that doesn't appear to be the case. I guess you must be wrong yet again, something’s never change. NE5, officially defender of Shepherd's faith.

If my firm was going to pay me off then I'd take every penny I could get, I don't claim to be a fan of my employer. Shepherd has made something in the region of £50 million through his association with the football club yet he haggled for what? 1% of the offer price, he's made a fortune from the club and has now raided the transfer kitty while you've lost money from your purchase of shares. He must really be a true fan acting like that and doing so for the good of the club. Fan first, chairman second my arse. Give your head a shake and think about it.

Ask him how many Newcastle shirts we'd sell if we bought somebody like Tevez and had him on a 5 year contract.

Which one is it then? I didn't mention "greedy" or "astute." Do you think it's OK for him to take money out of the transfer budget?

Agreed, I think we have plenty of good things to look forward to, I just hope too many people are not getting too carried away. Things are looking good but we've got to see a lot of hard work being done yet. If we get it right then we can make major gains on teams who finished above us last season, I can't wait to see a ball being kicked, I think Carlisle and Hartlepool should get good boosts to funds soon.

That extra 1p was a childish act of a man who wanted to get one over on the Hall's, he's a petty man who took an extra £300k which will eventually come out of the transfer budget because that's probably the only cost which isn't fixed other than future wages.

I'm sure he gets the money either way, the only difference would be that the longer he stays the longer it takes to trigger the two year pay-off.

My worry is that he's identified players for Bolton and is working on that list while at Newcastle, the Barton signing doesn't really prove anything either way as Anelka was on his list for Bolton when he had the money. I just wonder if we're shopping at Aldi when we should be shopping at M&S or Sainsbury's. I don't know the answer and look forward to see how things pan out over the summer, I hope we have a special player or two to come in, not just the bargain basement type of players usually associated with Allardyce. I suppose that will depend on the transfer budget as much as the manager, we'll know a bit more in 10 weeks or so.

Agreed, I think far too many people are going way over the top about what Allardyce can do, I hope they aren't setting themselves up for a lot of disappointment.

It was his point, I think. I just went a bit further than he did.

I'm sure they still are.

The agreement probably isn't as binding as you seem to think. Here's some quotes from the Independent: "There's a feeling that it's a case now of 'who breaks ranks first?' The agreement not to sell is not binding in a meaningful sense. It could, theoretically, lead to one director suing another, but breaking the agreement would not contravene any stock market rules or be illegal in any way. It was more a statement of intent than anything else. And everyone is aware that things might change very quickly."

Why we sold them a crock for about £14 million. Are you on about the Owen deal? Everyone I knew was happy with that deal at the time, as for the other two, aye your reet. Real Madrid made a £7 million loss on Woodgate, we'll lose more than that if Owen cost the alleged £17 million and goes for the alleged £9 million clause. A lot of people on here were less than impressed when we signed Owen for £17 million when we felt that the money could have been spent more wisely than a single injury prone player.

He'll be really popular with the chairmen of Real Madrid, Deportivo and Rangers.

So far Emre has proven nothing, I think it's make or break time for him and it could go either way. He needs an end product which he hasn't shown too often while playing for us. Too often he'll run into a dead end but at least he had an excuse for that last season when he had nothing much to aim at.

We may sign Joey Barton to do that. Barton seems to be more interested in having a go at goal then creating for others, I could be wrong.

I guess it's more to do with a transition than a vote of confidence.