wormy

Think it should be locked until proper news comes out about him. Depressing everytime this gets bumped

I think madras may be thinking of an incident second half where they both went for it again? Not sure though. The moment we're all talking about here was definitely Shola, though.

the thing is we needed major surgery at the time keegan left but many people just see dalglish coming in and splitting up the team out of spite. A team finishing 2nd twice in a row needed a major revamp, i've heard it all now. I can see where madras is coming from in a way, a few changes were needed. Like mentioned, Ferdinand, at first glance seemed like a smart move. 6 mill for a 30 year old, getting a young starlet like Tomasson. Just a shame Shearer got injured and Ferdinand's a man of his word and wouldn't cancel his move to Spurs after he verbally agreed to sign. Beardsley finally losing steam. But I don't feel to the extent that the team changed. When you consider some of the signings he made, it wasn't as bad as people make out (Didi, Speed, Solano, Given). But I still wouldn't say he needed to splilt the team up as much as he did.

So, I was at work, didn't catch the game. Worth watching it on Sky+?

He could step up a bit, to a Europa League challenging team, but I think in the time we'd get a bid (highly doubt he'll leave after 1 season), we've hopefully built ourselves up to be able to keep him anyway. That's not even factoring in the possibility of Ashley rejecting said overtures ( really could happen guys!), or Cheick even rejecting the move.

Only just saw this post. Jesus Christ on a motherfucking bike Hughton's signings are arguably his best asset so far! Run close by the high morale he's kept in the camp.

These past 2 pages are so depressing! Like someone said, imagine us now if Sir Bobby had accepted to come to us after Keegan. One of the few men who wouldn't see the need to break up a team just to 'stamp his mark'... Souness, easily our worst appointment. Dalglish was a shite regime, but too many factors that imo he had out of his control. He had to rebuild the whole reserves and academy again, remember. So that's why his signings look so shoddy. Still got a lot of good players that we remember fondly to this day. But Souness, everything was his own doing. He still had many good years in Bellamy, and a year or 2 from Robert (from how his career's panned out since). But he had to 'prove a point'. I agree that as a person he seems like a good guy. To be honest, he's probably a football name I wouldn't mind sitting down and having a couple of pints with. If only to see if I could get a more candid explanation of how he felt his time was here, off the record. But out of the hotseat and in the hotseat, you can be complete opposites, and I think that's his biggest problem. Had to play up the hardman image after his playing days ended. And his general bad decision making of course.

KI sums up why I can't see him moving along to another club very quickly. He's fucking immense, more than quality enough for a team in our situation. But if he's going to step up much further, a little improvement is needed. And in that time, hopefully we've built the club back up to a respectable level to keep talent like him. Don't get me wrong, love the guy to bits and hope he stays for the rest of his career at this rate. But he's not top 4 quality. At the same time I think he's the sort of player capable of improving, and he's got the raw attributes. Looking forward to see him in our team for years to come.

Exactly my thoughts. Well, like I said, 2 good games. 2 games where everyone was on song and it just went perfectly for us, no one underperformed. So he's good when every single other player is good, but other than that, seems to be the same below-par striker we've endured for the majority of this decade he's been with us.

Like I say Minhosa, can't be sure. That's just the way it seemed to sound to me from interviews etc. McClaren said he'd suit the English game perfectly and is a fantastic player, but he only ever used him off the bench. Considering they were the Champions, maybe they just didn't need to use a space for a defence-minded player when they controlled games so easily? Complete guess, I know nothing of the Dutch leagues

He wasn't really a starter for them, just came on and shored up the defence late in a game. Don't think he was as suited to the Dutch game to be truly appreciated from the sounds of it.

'Cause we're a scummy big club that tried to bully them around, supposedly.

As far as I recall he ended up having to pay a fair wedge after it going to some sort of ruling?

de Jong? Toure YaYa? Barry to an extent? Exactly, they're pretty thin on the ground.

That's unbelievable! Must be a while since we've had a team worth that little.

That's one hell of a cock slap. Was only the tip of it as well.

Even if he didn't make it in the Prem, he would've been a bargain imo just for tiding us over for the Championship season. The way he's performed this season, can't complain one bit.

Funny that he's finally getting plaudits after the past few years, and there's a player more deserving when they finally do

Are there many clubs looking out for a holding midfielder right now?

Sol was much more deserving.

Is that all?

And they still get a bye? That is pretty stupid. You might as well just contest it between the top 2 tiers if you're going to do that.

FFS, can people stop saying stuff like this about all our decent players. This. Getting so fucking old now. This small-time club mentality is being created by our fans on here more than anything. We sold Given and N'Zogbia because they wanted to go. We sold Milner because £12 million was a ridiculous fee for him. The only problem there was it was a shame it wasn't reinvested. Can anyone tell me any other players we've sold because they were in good form and Ashley thought we'd cash in? Fuck me, I understand we're always kind of on the edge of our seats with Ashley, but it's so annoying that our own fans class us as a selling club with absolutely nothing to prove it.

I think we should give him a start tbh. Not ideal, but we clearly havn't got much better options. Let's see how he does.