Mick

I have been angry after so many games but not tonight, I didn't expect any positives before the game and have been able to take some from tonight. Pardew must have seen that the extra body in the middle made a massive difference and that gives me hope. If he doesn't see it after tonight and reverts to type then I will be massively against him, he doesn't have any excuse now. Even people who are pissed off after tonight must see that we were better.

I'm thick, I'll give him a chance and hope that he does, simply because it's better for all of us that way.

If they come to defend we stand a far better chance than we do if they come here and have a go. --- We improved tonight and while it wasn't great there are positives to be taken in to the Wigan game, just need to have a go. I agree and we could turn our season around against Wigan.

Our football has been like an illness and different people have different tolerances to pain. I realised long ago that Pardew might not be up to the job, others are taking longer to come to that conclusion. Once you realise he might not be up to the job it becomes easier to see little positives, even in defeat. It's perfectly understandable that another defeat isn't going down well with some people because it might just be the last straw for some.

I speak as I find, we were unlucky tonight because we did enough to get something from the game. I'm not bothered about what has happened in the past because that's gone. We need points and for the first time in 4 games we looked as if we could get something from a game. I couldn't give a s*** about Pardew, I only care about the club and I'll slate him when it's needed but not for the sake of it. Tonight I'm positive and gutted at the same time.

It's simple, attack them. We've scored goals and sat back too often. We need to get a goal and keep going at them as if it was 0-0 and we will get a reaction from the crowd. Perch being banned might create an opportunity for Marveaux to get a game and I would drop Jonas for Ben Arfa.

Some of the most shameless backpedalling from you of late after the way you've spent the last eighteen months up the man's arse. No backpeddling whatsoever. He's done a good job and I like him and don't want him sacked. Doesn't mean I can't criticise because he's done a dreadful job of late. Thing is, neither of us wanted him appointed and only one of us was truly prepared to get behind him as NUFC manager. Niether stance made the slightest bit of difference.

Do you not think the improvement had anything to do with the formation because I do.

The players need to forget about the result and remember that we played well for 75 to 80 minutes.

If we make chances for the forwards we'll get goals, and we'll have Ben Arfa back to add a spark.

I'm sticking up for him tonight, we needed to see a reaction from the players and we got it, he must go all out to attack Wigan. Get a few goals and it could turn our season around.

This useless c*** is rapidly catching up with Graham Oates and Glenn Keeley as being the worst central defender ever to play for Newcastle.

We did, we wouldn't have lost the three games before tonight if we'd put as much effort in as we have against Stoke, I just hope the players realise that and take something from the game.

Gutted, we didn't deserve to come away with nothing tonight. They hardly created anything until we shot ourselves in the foot. I thought Cisse and Anita played really well and can’t understand why those two were brought off. For the first time in weeks we were competitive in midfield which I think we all expected when we put a 3rd central midfielder in that area of the pitch. Cisse scored from one of the few genuine chances he’s had all season and has shown that he’ll get goals if we create chances.

When we have our flair players on the pitch we hoof it, when we don't have them we pass it about. If only I could get my head around that kind of thought process.

I hope we win for the sake of all of us but I also hope that we win for Pardew so that we can get some pressure off him in the hope that a clear head will work better than the one he currently has. I don't see anything changing apart from our injuries.

You can now understand the mentality of your average Stoke inhabitant. One of them tries to take the piss out of the fact that we didn't average a 40,000 crowd between 1955 and 2001which is true. What he's forgotten to mention is that between 1955 and now they've only once averaged a higher attendance than us and that was during the 1963-1964 season when they averaged 900 more than we did. In the last 58 seasons, a cut-off point decided by a poster on that forum, we’ve averaged better gates than they have 57 times. Some times we’ve had more than twice and often almost three times the crowds they’ve had. Our worst average crowd has been better than 27 average crowds for Stoke. The highest average crowd for Stoke since 1955 was 30,315, we've beaten that average crowd since 1955, 37 times.

I don't want to go on too much about the place because I have a lot of friends who live in around Stoke but it's not somewhere that you would really want to live. Trentham looked OK, Hanley was supposed to be OK but the shock has set in by the time you get to those places. Meir isn't a very nice place and Dresden was probably named it after we'd bombed the German city of the same name during WW2.

They really should read what they type, one mentions somebody having a go at them which is probably me and I wasn't. I was saying what was said when I lived near Stoke, they then go on to admit some want Pulis out which backs up what I said. They then call us deluded because some want Pardew out then claim that he's basically a crap manager.

Bobby?

Things are that bad, I can't detect sarcasm anymore.

Best is still injured isn't he? Anyway, I think we're stronger in goal because Harper and Elliot have proven to be better than expected when called upon. Defence is as was with Good coming in and then being loaned out. Midfield is stronger numerically but weaker on the attacking side and the forwards are weaker, just. That said, we were willing to spend on a central defender and a right back, or we were at least told that we were. What did we do? We tried to penny pinch and it's proven to be a false economy because if we finish the season in our current position we'll have missed out on up to £9 million in prize money and we're not going to be the TV draw that we have been. We could have pushed the boat out and spent a few million more than we were willing to spend. We could have saved shit loads of cash that we’re likely to now lose because of how far we’ve gone backwards.

It wasn't in the summer when people were defending the transfer window.

The lack of incoming signings will be a part of our problem, it's still down to the manager to sort it out and to get the players motivated again. My guess is that players aren't as motivated as they were last season. Last season we brought in Cabaye and Ba in the summer window and they clicked almost instantly. Cabaye came in and had a massive pay rise, he was living in a new country and playing in a new league. Ba had just came from a club who had just been relegated but he'd personally done really well so he wasn't tarnished by relegation. They both came to a club which was attracting massive gates and they were both star players. Add to that Tiote was now playing alongside a class players and they hit it off which raised Tiote's effectiveness. Ben Arfa came back from a serious injury and that also gave everybody from the players on the pitch to the fans in the stands a lift. Cisse was signed and started scoring goals at a rate that was as good as anybody had seen at the club for years. Everybody was getting a lift regularly because of the positives that kept popping up. We were winning games and everybody associated with the club were feeling good about what was happening with the results and league position. We even went into the last game of the season with a possible CL place up for grabs so we had everything to play for. Ba gets pissed off because he’s been moved to the left in an attempt to get him and Cisse playing but his mate steals the limelight and his dummy comes out. The season ends and we qualify for the Europa League for the first time in years. Some of the players go off on holiday while others go off on international duty. Cabaye taps his mate up and thinks he’s coming here to play next season, it doesn’t come off so Cabaye gets a lip on. So he should, he’s been telling his mate that the club really want him and he’s been telling the club that his mate is desperate to come. All that effort and he loses face with his best mate because the club didn’t deliver. Pardew changes the side around to keep Ba happy and our clinical forward who couldn’t miss last season starts to struggle when expected to share his space up front. The midfield is getting bypassed in an attempt to get the ball up to our forwards as quickly as we can. The ball doesn’t stick because the two up front aren’t really target men so the ball keeps coming straight back at us but our midfielders can’t cope because the two of them have three opposition players running at them. The midfielders aren’t stemming the constant tide of attacks which are now getting through and our defence is now getting stretched. Krul is under so much pressure and unable to cope so he starts making the type of mistake you would expect from a kid or a has-been yet only last season was a contender for keeper of the season. Pardew can see what’s going wrong only to dismiss it in the press, even when the problem with 2 central midfielders against 3 costs us easy games. Cisse is banned, Pardew has the perfect opportunity to change things but doesn’t take it. He goes like for like and goes 4-4-2, different personnel, same result. The players are not playing a style of football that they like and the manager will not change. The players aren’t motivated and the manager hasn’t got the tools to change it. Most of that is supposition based on fact, in reality, none of us knows what is wrong with a degree of certainty. What most people do know is that we’re playing shitty football which isn’t getting results, the players seem to be down. The manager doesn’t look as if he’s got a clue about how to turn things around, he resembles a rabbit in a cars headlights and just lets things drift around while point after point is dropped and our league position goes from bad to worse. To be continued……..

He should work on the opposition weaknesses, not 80% of the time though. We don't have time to spend 4 days trying to pick holes in the opposition when we're playing every 3rd or 4th day. Even if we were only playing once a week it's still far too negative.