Taylor Swift

What we need in midfield. How many games have you seen him? Let me guess.. three games?

Come on City, Blackburn and Chelsea.

thats what I thought too. Laursen(?) had Viduka's number in the air but we still persisted in hoofing it up in the hope that he'd get lucky. When it was played in to his feet, twice I think, he turned and played someone in each time creating a chance. I know we haven't got a fit creative midfielder yet so i'm not too concerned with our lack of invention there yet. Taylor got caught in possession a couple of times in the second half while waiting for someone ahead of him to 'show' themselves, we can't allow ourselves to become too static................never mind its just like watching Brazil, its a copy of Bolton. I know he's the next to get replaced but I thought Carr didn't do too badly yesterday. Carr was caught out of position way too often. They rarely attacked our left hand side because Zoggy showed he could handle it. Carr couldn't handle Young and that's why most of their attacks came down our right hand side. I think we have to take into account the conditions as well. Villa are obviously hard to break down (as teams found out last season and will find out this season) but with the wet conditions, it made it harder for the players to control the ball and/or develop some slick and quick passes. It'll get better man. Relax. I don't understand why most of the fans seem to be demanding us to be title challengers instantly considering how the past couple of seasons have gone for us.

Milner's actually one of our most creative players. His crosses have improved unbelievably and his control of the ball is quite supreme now. His development as a player over the past couple of seasons is unparalleled with anyone else in the squad. I don't think he lost the ball easily once. Even when he was being marked by two players late in the game, he always made sure he got something out of it, even if it was just a throw-in. If you're going to whinge, at least make sure you know what you're whinging about. The forum's gone berserk in one day just because we drew to a solid team which was organised by someone reknowned for being one of the most solid managers in the game. It's two games into the season. We have 4 points, which is 2 more than Manyoo have, 1 more than Spurs have and 3 more than Villa have. RELAX! Our transfer spending isn't over, our new signings are still adapting and our defence kept a clean sheet yesterday. We're also missing our vice-captain who's also our most consistent performer, our 'best' striker is not near match-fit and we're playing our best left-winger at left-back. The best is yet to come, the world's not ending, it's not going to go downhill for here, just be patient and lower your expectations.

It was a game that was needed. The hype needs to stop or at least calm down a whole lot. This is still a team far from being complete. We're only two competitive matches into the season and people are expecting nice attacking football? Has anyone noticed that this is a formation which NONE of our players are used to? I'm not making excuses for the inept attacking display but I fully empathize with BS and realize that we have to calm down. Has anyone noticed how the other teams in the league have started? Spurs lost 2 in a row before recovering today. Manyoo are only on 2 points after two matches. Chelsea were very good for only 10 minutes and then went back into the sloppiness which plagued them the whole game against Reading. No team has started on fire, and we should be analyzing the team's performance in relative to how the other teams, especially our direct competitors (Spurs, Everton and Villa etc.), have done. Regarding today's performance, I thought Zoggy and Milner were our best players. Milner was trying his darn hardest to create something. Viduka was disappointing and should have come off a lot earlier because at least Ameobi competed for balls in the air. I thought Laursen and Mellberg were brilliant. When Enrique's fit, I expect Sam to give Zoggy a go in the middle in games like these, especially at home. We're lacking that drive in the middle of the park; Geremi's always looking to pass, Butt needs to stop with his playmaking bs and Smith's creative abilities is limited. We're lacking the drive that we lacked when Emre and Parker was in the middle. There needs to be a balance, something which will be hard to find if Smith and Butt are paired together in a game in which the onus to attack is on us. I'm not sure if Barton will be a better fit but we need a playmaker or at least give Zoggy/Emre a real go. Overall though, we shouldn't be displeased; 4 points from the first couple of games was something most of us would have been happy with and we should be looking at that. Our next few games aren't the hardest as well so we should at least be picking up more points, especially if we continue to be solid at the back, something which most people have overlooked in criticizing the attack today.

Interesting note, last year the first game home that their new owner, Randy Lerner, watched, was the game they beat us 2-0. This year it'll be Mort's first official game at home and might well be Ashley's first time at St. James' for a match. Interesting that we're playing Villa today. Wouldn't mind a 2-0

And if he wasn't such a headstrong big shot prick, he'd have had the decision to go taken out of his hands. Are you saying Newcastle could have held Owen out of the WC? Bullshit. When Chelsea forced Makelele to stay and miss a single friendly match, Makelele was threatened with a suspension. Every player who's called up has to go. If he doesn't, he gets a domestic suspension ie. the FA wouldn't have let him play for us.

voted for both, couldn't resist it.

I reckon Zoggy, Taylor and Martins would be able to fetch quite a lot of money. Clubs love buying potential and all three have got more than just a bit of potential.

Parky, just because you quote yourself it does not mean your point is more valid! It has to be Tevez. He's the man until Alves signs (boy are we crying out for a rightback like him). There's quite alot of hype regarding Elano at the moment but people have to be aware that we're only two games into the season and he's played against an out of sorts West Ham team and the prime candidate for relegation, Derby County.

When Smith was signed, Sam said he wanted 4 more players because Smith was signed as a replacement for Dyer. Now that Dyer's finally gone, does Sam still want 4 more players? If Enrique counts as one, this leaves 3 more. It leaves him presumably wanting a right-back, a left-footed defender and an attacking midfielder - the playmaker that Parky's obsessed with. 2 more weeks to go!

Cheers. This means it's even more important that we sign another left-footed player. Preferably someone who can also play CB as it'll sort out that need for a backup as well. What the fuck happened to that Dragon fella?!! So a CB/LB and a RB and our defence will be sorted!

I thought Casapa was left-footed, isn't he?

To be fair I wasn't sure of his worth to the squad, but you have swung it for me. Couldn't agree more. Top post.

Goalkeepers Shay Given Steve Harper Tim Krul Fraser Forster Now that Krul is on loan and given not being able to keep himself fit for a significant amount of time stretching back ever since he got injured at West Ham away last season, we need one extra body here. Given's injury doesn't look too serious and Harper's a solid enough backup but one body's still needed. Rightbacks Stephen Carr Geremi Nobby Solano Steven Taylor This a position in need of real strengthening. Carr isn't good enough to be a starter, Geremi's been excellent so far in the middle of the park and we would lose more than gain if we shifted him back, and lastly, Solano seems to be leaving which means this is our weakest position. Leftbacks Jose Enrique Charles N'Zogbia Cacapa Celestine Babayaro Enrique is, from all accounts, a promising talent. The LB position can be looked at in different ways. One, we still need to strengthen because Zoggy and Cacapa are not natural LBs, and of course Baba's hardly ever fit. On the other hand, we've just spent £6m on Enrique and can make do with makeshift LBs. We're not Chelsea, we're hardly going to be challenging on all fronts therefore we can use the versatility of the squad to our advantage. Centerbacks Steven Taylor David Rozehnal Cacapa Peter Ramage Paul Huntington David Edgar Feels like I've forgotten someone but even so, this is a position that should be strengthened. If Rozehnal can keep this up then our first-choice pairing is good enough but if one of the two suffers an injury, we'll have to throw one of the kids in or let the untried Cacapa play. I'm not sure if we'd be better off by signing an experienced back-up ala Andy O'Brien () but my gut says this position isn't as strong as possible. Sam still has some work to do but just looking at the list above compared to the list from last year's and it's clear that we've improved significantly. Edit - Wasn't sure if I should have written this as an article for the front page

Of course he'd have some caps by now if he was playing for two teams who's defense is rock solid. He's not. He's playing for a team with a reputation for not being able to defend well, which is why he hasn't been selected yet even though he's probably been the best of a bad bunch. Still young though, and he'll learn and grow. I do see him eventually becoming an England regular.

Ashley has already put around £200 million of his own money into the club, which is around £200 million more than Shepherd ever did. Do you interpret this as a representing a desire for the club NOT to succeed? You can't really classify the £200m he spent as being money 'put into the club'. How much was the buy-out? £140m? The club hasn't seen a penny of that. Where does the other £60m come from? Our net spending is approximately £15m, and that's what he's put into the club so far, excluding other unknown expenditure like developing the training ground, hiring in new staff etc. Well, even if he only put £1.50 into the club that would be £1.50 more than Shepherd ever put in. As for the difference between £140 million and £200 million, you have perhaps missed the stories about the extent of the debt which has been left behind by Shepherd. £60 million is probably an underestimate most have pegged it at around £80 million. By taking on that debt, Ashley is actually paying for our recent player purchases under Shepherd. That is a good point about the debt, wasn't thinking about it. Anyhow, the point still stands that he hasn't actually put that much money 'into' the club, and it's pretty obvious that in the long-run, he'll be taking money out of the club. That's what billionaire businessmen do to stay as billionaires.

I wonder if we'll revert to 4-4-2 when Owen starts playing. Quite ironic that Souness was planning on playing a 4-3-3 until Shepherd decided to spunk £16m on Owen, which meant we had to change to a 4-4-2 instead, and now we're basically at the same juncture with Big Sam. Will he revert to a 4-4-2 if Owen is on the pitch?

Win the home games, draw the away games. If we can consistently keep this 'form', we'll be top-6 at the end of the season. The key though, as ever, is winning the home games. Hypothetically speaking, if we win all our home games and draw all our away games, we'll end up with 76 points, which is top-4 material. That should be our aim. It will be a tough ask but honestly don't we all expect to win our home games, except the ones against the top 4?? The answer has to be a yes, which means this feat isn't as hard as it seems. If we end up losing the 4 home games to the top-4, we end up with a total of 64 points, which is top-6 material. This can be done!! And that's assuming we get only 19 points in total from 19 away games, something which I would expect Sam's team to better. During SBR's tenure, in one season, we got 32 points from 19 away games. Even Glenn Fucking Roeder and Graeme Souness managed to get us 20 points in their shared season. This can be done! We used to have a fortress at St. James' during SBR's reign. I remember once winning something like 12 or 13 league games in a row at home. We need to rekindle that kind of home form and hopefully with Sam's detailed preparation, we'll be able to win a few games away from home as well. Here's hoping. 8 points from the next 4 games would do.

Ashley has already put around £200 million of his own money into the club, which is around £200 million more than Shepherd ever did. Do you interpret this as a representing a desire for the club NOT to succeed? You can't really classify the £200m he spent as being money 'put into the club'. How much was the buy-out? £140m? The club hasn't seen a penny of that. Where does the other £60m come from? Our net spending is approximately £15m, and that's what he's put into the club so far, excluding other unknown expenditure like developing the training ground, hiring in new staff etc.

Is there a possibility all 'fantasy' talk can be limited to the fantasy thread?

Micah Richards captain! Knew it was a risk worth taking.

Tbf, I can understand why some players would rather prioritize their family's (wife, kids etc.) happiness over football, especially if money is pretty even.

What they're saying about Jenas..

I've just about managed to put together a team without forfeiting a load of points to transfers, but Essien getting injured is simply unacceptable. He needs to stop being such a big girl about his poorly knee and tell Mourinho he's fit to play on Wednesday. Or else. How many points did you waste getting a team out? Did you think about using the wild card? Parky, save your wildcard until gameweek 20+. Not worth using it at the start of the season because you can never figure out which players will come out of nowhere (year before was Gamst Ped, last year was Barry etc.).