AlanSkÃrare

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2532379/Newcastle-hope-beat-Man-United-signing-French-midfielder-Cabella.html Remy Cabella

Just fucking win this.

WTF is this. Horrendous.

Sickening to see Anelka start

Fucking bellend.

Fucking hell

Struggle to see how we'd find an equal replacement for Remy. His movement has transformed our attacking play and we're unlikely to pay money who could couple that aspect of his game with his goalscoring ability. Need to sign him tbh.

The thing is - he won't drop Gouffran and Sissoko has done too well at RM. That equals no space for Hatem unless he drops Cabaye into a sitting role along Anita.

Ben Arfa ahead of Shola tomorrow is the right thing. Still don't trust Pardew to do it.

Very pleased to see this from Pardew afterwards. Hope has returned and he's won back some confidence now. Seems as of he's learning.

Disregarding our (lack of) ambition - imagine if this squad was topped with 2-3 players (a winger and a striker primarily) in January. And we attracted a better manager. That's how close we are to mount a challenge for top 4 in my opinion. Ashley's faith in Carr has paid off and made his way of running the club less harmful. We've assembled some superb players over the past 2-3 years for very moderate sums. It's a shame that ambition and understanding of football (Pardew and the managerial glass ceiling that prevents us from moving forward) has coincided with the faith in Carr. Frustrating as fuck. It used to be backing of managers but shit players being signed.

They played really well against Chelsea as well. This will be tough as we adjust to every team we play and subsequently will revert to their football. If we had developed an idea of how to set the agenda for games ourselves I'd be confident.

Word among Spurs fans is he was intensly disliked behind the scenes as well. Might have prompted it to occur at this stage already.

Fully agreed. Runs the club in a fragmented fashion. They look to names and seem to lack strategic direction.

what separates him from (planA)lan Pardew, in your mind? other than his season in portugal what the f*** has this lad actually done? not seeing it myself mourinho had the balance right, arrogance with always, always defending the players - AVB would sell his f***ing granny, no-one is going to want to play for the prick imho He hasn't deployed a lumbering target man at RW. He hasn't been in charge of a team that hit most long balls of any team in Europe's top 5 leagues. It didn't take him 2.5 years to turn a game around. His team hasn't lost 10/13 games during a period in which barely any changes were made. He hasn't played the majority of his squad out of position. He hasn't been relegated, he hasn't been sacked in both The Championship and League One. AVB's team certainly lacks a leader, character and have no offensive pattern or ideas to rely on. But it's still nowhere near what Pardew served up between October 2012 and November this year. Not totally convinced by AVB at all, I just think his immaturity, both in terms of personality and football, was the main reason for his downfall, not the tactically confused, overly negative and shit scared character that Pardew has built his managerial identity on.

He'll grow as a manager and become very good. Needs to get rid of his arrogance (which serves him negatively) and keep calm. His reluctance to revert from the high line (because of Lloris ability to cut out through balls?) was a big indicator of how stubborn he was with his ideas. Also read that he was unhappy with some of the signings they made in the summer. That's partly down to Levy, they need to find someone who isn't just an up-and-coming name and sought after, but rather someone to unite their squad and buy into the way they run the club (i.e. work under Baldini and be flexible). AVB's reluctance to play to the qualities to some of their signings (Soldado in a Cissé-esque situation) was there for everyone to see.

Watching Southampton this season (and their thoroughly impressive way of incorporating their entire squad into the football they play) really brings clarity to Pardew's most obvious and crtical weakness as a manager; is inability to define his team/squad. Going into his fourth year as our manager, the quite large amount of questionmarks surrounding his preferred style, formation and overall mentality really highlights why I find it hard to regain confidence in him even now that we're doing well. Every team and manager has purple patches from time to time. But we still seem incoherent. Apart from the football we played in March/April 2012, I've not seen us win and play well for an extended period as a result of a clear and purposeful footballing agenda, I've not seen players buy into a footballing philosophy and I've not seen us aqcuiring any sort of identity as a team. It's been about different succesful changes, individuals and tactical maneuvers in different areas in different periods. No strategy behind things and no indication about how we're going to move forward and grow as a squad.

Probably been posted, but his comments on the way he lost his job at Southampton had me laughing. 'I always felt that it wasn't so much a footballing decision". I can think of another decision in that mould.

4-0 win, Hatem to score two. Then 7 defeats in a row.

Is it, though? How exactly can we control what's being reported, outside of a few player interviews? The gossip, opinion, s****, will remain. The press won't suddenly forget about us, because they're not paying. You maybe right, but the way things are have evolved latelyI think there's every reason to suspect they're looking to control more of what's being said and done. Changing the power to the club - i.e. getting the upper hand in the relationship to the press, would go some way to control what's being written. It goes hand in hand with the decision to ban the local media. In this new packaging, papers will most likely get access to a specific amount of features on a number of conditions. Reporting negatively on the club's ambition and finances would probably not be appreciated in that agreement.

It's their way of controlling reporting on the club and subsequently adjust the perception of the way things are being done. That's a concern in my view.

As they make them up, they'll get them for free. Rumours is one thing. Not the interviews (and there has been several). Mark Douglas just said the club "accomodated Tioté and Pardew for exclusives" this summer.

Good question regarding SportsDirectNews. Wonder whether they'll pay for exclusives as well?

It's all part of the attempts to lower expectations. Adjust and fine-tune the PR machinery. It's more and more obvious what they're trying to do here. The only information going out of the club will be carefully orchestrated by the regime in order for us to appear more coherent than we are. On top of that, "Kinnear's" matchday column, Pardew's interviews (and Llambias before he left) are all trying to paint a picture of where we are and what our limited capabilities are. They're doing their outmost to communicate about a situation where we should be thankful for every little success and be vary of the financial constraints we're under. Lowering expectations, in short. This is another step.

Seems reckless to just disregard that other Manchester club completely. I agree about the three title contenders/top sides, though. Of course it is, don't know why I left them out. But there's nothing in their play to suggest they'll catch up with Everton or Liverpool atm. Spurs look more solid but are equally crippled going forward.