Taylor Swift

Yes, pressure pressure pressure. Fight, for fuck's sake!

Ball from Jonas.

Jonas is picking the ball up too deep. Not sure how to solve that, either make him play right next to the lb, leaving him with little room to run if he gets the ball, or our whole team has to push up so he still has space but is much closer to their goal/byline. But if we do that, Butt and Guthrie will be run ragged by their midfielders breaking from their own half. Butt's already struggling to track back and that's his main fucking job, the useless cunt. We need to lob balls over their defence and let Duff/Charlie/Jonas run onto the ball, otherwise the center of the pitch is too crowded and when we lose the ball, they break too fast for our cms. It might not be pretty, but Allardyce long-ball tactics is our best bet, just launch it into space, not for Owen or Duff to head. Saying all that, I hope we fight. I hope we battle. Win, lose or draw, we're playing the league leaders on our home turf. Let's show some fight.

At the end, after everything, after the Heskey dive, after the ref booked Carroll for diving, after the inevitable Duff miss, after the expected no-show from Owen, after the fat fuck Viduka walking down the tunnel, after the stupid fucking cunt Mike Dean losing any semblance of control over the match, after all of that, I was as close to punching the television as I've ever been in my life. We've played worse, we've had shittier refs taking charge, we've had worse luck and even worse misses (DUFFFF!!!!), but the combination of it all, yesterday, was un-fucking-believable.

I have no idea what Butt is doing on a football pitch. That was one of the worst displays I've ever seen from a Newcastle United player. The diving, the head-down passing, the lack of awareness, the fact that he completed more passes to a Wigan player than to ours.. jesus christ, what a player. What a fucking player.

They are kicking us off the park. What a fucking dirty team. We look rattled and are second to every loose ball. Kinnear's gotta get our players fired up for the second half because this has been very poor.

Again.

Butt passing the ball to no one.

Here we go.

Shit news regarding Enrique. But 4-4-2 it is.

I hope Wilkinson feels like a right dick now.

As a winger, definitely. But as a striker, he keeps the ball well and I'm fine with us playing a little safe away from home against a team with a lot of pace. We need to make sure we keep more possession and tire them out eventually by just passing it around.

I'm happy with that. 1-0 to us.

What a moron Wilkinson is. Stoke down to 10 men.

Team of cunts if there ever was one. They're resorting to dirty, dirty tricks.

Hopefully the FA will review that Rooney elbow and not be as pussy as UEFA was with the stamp on the Aalborg player.

Fat Frank with a clever chip. Everyone I know has him as captain of their fantasy team so that's just shit. He needs to get himself sent off in the second half.

Dempsey with an awesome scissor-kick shot which is well saved by Gomes. Fulham passing the ball around well.

He really was immense for us though. Rare to get a defender who can win a ball so slickly and consistently without having to use sheer strength or aggressive/rough tackling. IMO if he didn't have the injury problems, he'd be up there with the Baresi's and Cannavarro's in terms of being a legendary defender at all levels in the game. At the same time though, if he wasn't injury prone we'd never have signed him in the first place as he'd have gone straight to a CL elite team for silly money ala Rio Ferdinand. We were looking like becoming an elite CL team in a way, it just didn't work out for him or us. I remember genuinely thinking 'if Woodgate and Bellamy can stay fit, if Shearer keeps on scoring... who knows' when Woodgate signed. We were definitely in with a shout and maybe it's a different season but we were top with 12 games to go and Sir Bobby said 'well, if we win 12 games, we're champs, it's as simple as that'. I agree with you though, that Woodgate was a top class defender and imo as good as Ferdinand and better than Terry.

We need draws, draws and more draws.

Portsmouth now up as well. Belhadj with the goal.

Time for a new gamethread! Chelsea 1-0, Drogba. Man Utd level with Stoke so far but Fuller's been a nuisance and has had a couple of half chances already.

Honestly...... he is not half the player he was at his pomp at Newcastle you couldn't even say he has been a success anywhere else in comparison not too dissimilar to Laurent Robert in that respect. He used to be so quick off the mark watching him now he looks to have lost a great deal of that explosive pace due to injuries I wouldn't dispute him however having improved with more intelligent runs but not a chance is he as destructive to defenses with his pace down the side of defenders as he used to be. Regards him returning I would of thought he is far too expensive to be a 3rd or 4th choice behind Owen and Martins here, I think he would be good down at Spurs though if they are looking for a good foil for either Bent or the big Russian. I disagree with the pace remark and I do so having observed him burn Chelsea and Villa's defenders easily in only the past couple of matches. I do, however, think that his ability is now not dependent only on his pace and his dropping back into the space between the midfielders and defenders caused Chelsea a shit load of problems. That's why you don't see him sprinting away time and time again (because he's busy doing other team-beneficial things). With Villa, he was the busiest man on the pitch and picked up the ball right, left and center then drove at them with real determination. Honestly, even though it was a poor game in regards to the football played, Bellamy's class shone through.

He'll provide them with a new dimension. I've watched him over the past few games and he's developed an awareness that was lacking earlier in his career. He's aware of how the defence is set-up and uses the spaces available on the park to a devastating effect teamwise. He makes even more intelligent runs than he used to and looks as direct and pacy as he ever did. Of course, the only question mark regarding him was his fitness and it remains so, but put him in a quality team (like ours?) and he'd be better than he was in his first term here. Not a chance he'd be better than in his first time here. Not a chance. And I'll tell you the main reason why, Alan Shearer. Teamwise? Probably not because of Shearer and others like Robert and Solano. But individually? From watching him play in the past 4-5 games, he's a more developed footballer.

He'll provide them with a new dimension. I've watched him over the past few games and he's developed an awareness that was lacking earlier in his career. He's aware of how the defence is set-up and uses the spaces available on the park to a devastating effect teamwise. He makes even more intelligent runs than he used to and looks as direct and pacy as he ever did. Of course, the only question mark regarding him was his fitness and it remains so, but put him in a quality team (like ours?) and he'd be better than he was in his first term here. what are you talking about? ever since he signed for us bellamy's main talent has been awareness and making intelligent runs. I'm saying he's better than before. Is this too difficult a concept to understand?