Taylor Swift

And it would be such a fucking tasty front six

Our front six (assuming we go 4-5-1 or 4-2-3-1) is N'Zogbia away from being all Francophone. Tiote Cabaye N'Zogbia HBA Marveaux Ba

I like that there seems to be a plan in place and we're not just signing random players. All of the players that we've signed so far are ones that we've been linked to/seem to have planned on signing. I'd never heard of Cabaye before but we obviously must have because we knew the clause and we got it done so quickly. Marveaux has been linked with us for a while so this fits in nicely with the plan. If Erdinc signs then he's one that we've been linked with for a long time as well. I don't know, maybe there's some sensible management taking place at the club and we're not just selling players because other clubs make good bids for them.

Never gets old. It was only first uttered a week ago, man

Our defence is good enough for now. When we're able to control the ball and play the game in the opposition's half, our defence looks stable. That will be helped by having more mobile strikers and having midfielders with good technique (Cabaye and Marveaux look like they both fit the bill). Our defence only looks shit on the counter-attack but I'd be ok if we only lost goals to the counter because we'd score far more than we concede if we dominate possession.

I think that leaves us with N'Zogbia or Barnetta to complete our wing signings, leaving us needing two strikers and a midfielder. Have I got that right? Edit: Forgot about us signing Ba. It's been a busy two days. So that leaves us needing one more winger (Zoggy), a central midfielder (Matuidi?) and one more striker (Erdinc) to complete the squad, which I think would make us contenders for the top 8.

it's on the NUFC home page and SSN. Aye, was referring to the out-of-the-blueness of it. Never seen him play like, but more depth can only be a good thing. Still got a lot of wonga to spend on the subject of free transfers etc. usually the player allows his contract to run down in order to get a bigger pay day from his new club as they have no transfer fee to pay. interesting that the player said the liverpool move fell through due to personal terms. anyway, it doesn't go through till july 1st so expect loads of rumours till then that he's changed his mind. There's a picture of him in our kit on the official website. It's done, man. He's ours. it's on the official site, why didn't someone point that out a few posts earlier ? Yeah, I know, you pointed it out So why the hell wouldn't it go through now? Or am I due a big whoosh?

it's on the NUFC home page and SSN. Aye, was referring to the out-of-the-blueness of it. Never seen him play like, but more depth can only be a good thing. Still got a lot of wonga to spend on the subject of free transfers etc. usually the player allows his contract to run down in order to get a bigger pay day from his new club as they have no transfer fee to pay. interesting that the player said the liverpool move fell through due to personal terms. anyway, it doesn't go through till july 1st so expect loads of rumours till then that he's changed his mind. There's a picture of him in our kit on the official website. It's done, man. He's ours.

He looks good on youtube. Left-footed, moderately pacy and decent technique. He also looks like he was played on both the left and the right. What a signing this looks like it's going to be. And from under the fucking scousers' nose, too!

Holy fucking shit Wow.

Badly drained and still coasted to the league title and CL

I think that will be next summer if we're able to get into the top 8. I reckon the club will make a profit this year way in excess of £35m (the Carroll money will be bonus) and we should be profitable again next year if we end up in the top 10 because our wage bill will be lower than this year's + expected increase in attendance if we have a reasonably fun team to watch. And hopefully that profit will be used to invest in young players next summer to increase squad depth and push us on to Spurs/Liverpool/Everton level.

Again, awful avatar, but why do you say this? This guy is probably valued more than £1m but we've taken advantage of the release clause in his contract. If we bought him for £3m or so, I reckon people would expect him to be able to develop into a relatively good LB, given his young age and lack of experience.

Yep. 8 years. Captain. Hasn't caused trouble, agitated for a move or publicly requested one. He's probably someone you wouldn't begrudge leaving in the end. He even signed a contract extension knowing that in doing so, he wouldn't be able to force Arsenal to sell him.

I think we were slightly unlucky last year that we had two players in midfield (Gosling and Ben Arfa) who were injured for the whole season. I think it's a pretty unlikely occurrence and that we'll have better squad depth this year with them returning. If we sign N Taylor then I reckon our defence is sorted. And if we play 4-3-3, this will be the players in our squad: LB: Enrique, Taylor CB: Colo, S Taylor, Williamson, Kadar RB: Simpson, Perch DM: Tiote, Smith (ugh) Passing CM: Cabaye, Guthrie utility CM: Matuidi, Barton, Gosling or ideally rotate Matuidi into the DM position if Tiote's injured/suspended and play Barton/Gosling instead. LW: Barnetta, Ferguson RW: HBA, Jonas ST: Ba, Erdinc, Best, Ameobi We still of course lack squad depth but not in as many positions and the versatility of our players (like Jonas) should mean that we should be able to compete for 6-8th. Guthrie might also be useful if he has Matuidi and Tiote doing all the running for him.

Cant imagine Barnetta will come cheap. Bayer have just qualified for the Champions League. 1 year remaining on his contract.

I hope he's better than our £1m back up RB.

Holy shit the fucking irony.

No reason why he shouldn't come back 100%. The break was clean and it was the leg, not ankle, that was broken.

At least someone has had a word with him.

At least we haven't sold him on the day the window closes.

Pardew is Charlie Sheen's bro? #winning

Come on, look at who Liverpool played last year. They had two kids at RB, a RB at LB, Kyrgiakos playing many matches and Carragher starting. I'd take S Taylor over Carragher at this point. Our defence is comparable to theirs. The difference is up front and on the wing. I've assumed that Enrique stays. If he goes then we need 5 players. And we won't need two new strikers if we're planning to play 4-5-1. Best is all right as a sub striker. Remember that we'll have Gosling and HBA back. Gosling is a decent squad player who seems to have good control and technique, and HBA is easily, and I mean easily, a top six player. We're not far away.