Colos Short and Curlies

Stephen? Martin Offiah on the wing!

Time for one of these bad boys me thinks. You are JFK, in a surprise move Mike has given you £15m plus whatever you can get from sales. Your mission, mid table boredom. £10m Arda Turan - gives us pace and direct running on both wings £0m Stephen Appiah - fitness permitting obviously, a definite upgrade on Butt £10m Ludos Podolski - Need a Viduka replacement (£5m) N'Zogbia - Rather sell Duff but can't see him going Loan John Arne Riise - Purely for cover at the back (Loan) Tim Krul - Ideally to a Cahmpionship club to see if he is up to being our number 2 next year Given Beye Colo Bassong Enrique Turan Appiah Barton Jonas Martins/Owen Podolski Subs Harper Taylor <defender> (Nothing to choose from the rest) Guthrie Duff Viduka Owen/Martins Once safe would love to see Nile etc get some bench time

Thats bollocks Stoke aren't a bad side, yes we need to win but it doesn't mean we'll go down if we don't. Will Spurs go down if they lose their next game? Hopefully

Surely we should be in for him? Also some reports that Ashton's gotta be sold from West Ham, anyone else rate him (bar injuries)? If I were Scolari I would flog Cole before Bridge. If I knew Cheryl I would then be bending her ear to get him to come up here. I'd also have a very large right wrist

...and SBR imo. At that point in time Jenas looked a quality player, he and Dyer complimented eachother superbly. I also think good ol Nikos had too much bad press, not the worlds best defender but not the worst either

If my Aunt had balls would she be my uncle?

Only if you're buying from each other or competing with another PL club for a player. We are much stonger financially than most other European or lower league clubs. Anyway, most other clubs spent their windfall on transfer fees, and on raising their wage bill closer to ours which is why we by not spending it are dropping back into the pack. So effectively we might as well still have the debt. That's fine if Ashley stays, but would the money still have been there if he'd been able to sell up as he wanted or if he sells in the Summer? I'm not as convinced as most his desire to sell up started in September. IF he was trying to sell then putting cash onto the Balance is a bad idea as no investor would want to pay a premium for cash. Also, by taking it upfront Ashley has created a liability to the club in terms of future obligations, if he took out the cash then the value of the club decreases. In short, other than a pretty pointless 'look at the guaranteed income' exercise (I say pretty pointless as I guess that the number of people paying upfront is less than 50% of ticket holders and past performance would suggest crowds well in advance of 26k going forward), having the cash up front does little for the total value Ashley could extract from the club.

Why not? £18m extra TV revenue in 07-08, no interest payments to make, reduced wage bill, money from advance season ticket sales. Where has all the money gone? I don't think there is any doubt that Ashley had the idea to find players at low cost and sell them on. As Johnnypd also said, a few announcements made over a year ago clearly signalled this intent. Which is really no good to a club like us. Its behaving like a 2nd rate club, not the big progressive club which we ought to be. Which leads me on to bobyule's comment about "throwing money at big name players". What do you think the other clubs do, do they or do they not buy "big name players". What is the fixation that some of you people have with this attitude that you don't want the club to buy top footballers, then you say on the other hand that we are one of the biggest clubs in the country. What a small time attitude. I can guarantee you one thing, a few more years of Ashley, and you will be screaming for the club to buy these so called "trophy players", or "big name players" again, just like the other trophy winners do. You have seen where the penny pinching leads. Its already lost the manager who could have put us back whereabouts he did the first time, you still haven't learned. What a load of cliche ridden bollocks. Only a few people opposed the sale of Milner, given the fee, and fair enough they are entitled to their opinion of him as a player and his worth. But any progressive club would have handed the manager the money - at least - and told him to go out and buy someone to strengthen the team elsewhere with it, being that Guittierez had came in and was ready to take Milners place. Good scouting ? Of course it is, but poor reactions. But do you agree that at this point in time the last thing we need is for £20m to be spend on one player leaving nothing left to strengthen the rest of the squad? I would love to see a Robinho here, but not if it means having Babayaro and Carr at full back. All too often we've spent big on one player then scrimped elsewhere - hence the 'Trophey Player' tag. Man U and Chelsea can afford to spend big on individual players as they have built up their squad over a period of time, likewise Liverpool two years ago felt that they had a strong enough first team squad to spend £25m on Torres (give or take a couple of mil). This summer they spent big on Keane, but many dipper fans are crying out for stronger full backs now. We can't, spending £5m on 4 players would improve us short term more than one £20m player (who would get injured anyway knowing our luck!) Of course should we get to a top 6 position I would expect £5m players to become £10m etc, but thats for the future

Why not? £18m extra TV revenue in 07-08, no interest payments to make, reduced wage bill, money from advance season ticket sales. Where has all the money gone? £18m extra TV revenue in 07-08 - all clubs will benefit from an increase no? Therefore the increase in revenue will translate to higher prices being paid No interest payments to make - small fry in the scale of things and probably partly exchanged for dividends to MA Reduced wage bill - Do we really want to see the type of money offered to mid-range players just to make them move North that we have in the past? Agreed that this should free up some money though. Money from advance season ticket sales - Spend it all upfront or 'bank' the cash for transfers in subsequent seasons? Anyone who believes that the advance ticket sales were a ploy to increase the immediate transfer kitty is misguided. It was simply an option given to lock people in and guarantee the funds. I personally would have been disappointed if the advance pot had been spent this summer, reducing any available funds in the future

I also think that if there is one player in the squad who understands Newcastle its Shay Given.

http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8652_4581931,00.html Good Lad (we need a Shay Smiley!)

Over on Toontastic there is a Shearer Compilation (A TwoJ one I think). You'll miss him even more after watching it!

I just can't bellieve that no-one picked up on our past racist bile hurled at Jimmy Floyd, after all 'Just a fat Eddie Murphy' was obviously thrown his way because he is black and so is Eddie Murphy. On a more serious note, regardless of the nature of the chanting it is close to the bone for a lot of people and its no surprise that some quarters have lumped it as being racist, I'd wager that (giving the benefit of doubt to the songs creator) the original target was his likeness to RR, but a number of fans were chanting it thinking that it was aimed at him being an 'arab' (that seems to be the term banded about by borderline racists for anyone not from Britain these days). Unfortunately we can't do anything about these individuals unless you can identify them all indivudally. Until then maybe the song should be shelved for the greater good?

Apart from giving Nicky Butt a new contract

Increasing season ticket prices is a business decision and par for the course really. Abramovic didn't have to apologise for getting rid of a manager either, that too is par for the course. In short those things happen in football and are generally related to the football. Your argument is daft as Nut comparing Gibson and Ashley. Putting aside whether it was a good or bad decision, Ashley putting in his 'system' and backing it over a manager is a business decision and as such would be par for the course.

Or just as likely ping right into the top corner. Which is why we love him!

As for the season ticket money for the 3 years up front. Would people be happy if it was all spent now with nothing left for years 2 and 3? It was simply a way of guaranteeing revenue, not a way to build up a transfer fund for 2008

hmmmm. If you have paid upfront then the VAT became effective at point of payment so no refund I'm afraid. If you have sold the service more than 14 days prior to 1st December then the VAT remains at 17.5% so no refund I'm afraid. Sorry lads. I guess that this will also apply to those who have bought the 3 years in advance, but the guidance issued didn't cover forward purchases this far into the future.

A cheeky £2m bid to bring Bellamy back in January? West Ham are seriously fucked!

Well I just did. I'd say the best player in the world is Messi. I agree, when he's fit. But you cant be injured most of the time and still be the best player in the world. No one comes close to Ronaldo at the moment. Just wait till smudger gets back

Weather forecast in yet?

Says who? Sounds like the usual bollocks. Check your PM's Cant you share with us all ? Basically, 3 hours ago i was holding an offical letter from Mike Ashley requesting my mates dad (who's job is finding buyers/investors in the area) to find a buyer for the club, the price listed by Ashley was 450m pounds, and the letter was signed MA himself, can't say anything more. I'm sure Keith Harris will be chufffed that Ashley is handing out these documents despite being instructed to sell the club

Gone above Wigan and West Ham Spanners got the Mackems tomorrow, Wigan Everton on Monday

Dean Fucking Windass!

We've done what we've needed to do. Chelsea have been stuck in 4th gear all day, we've had a couple of flurries upfield but on the backfoot for the most of it