Thorpinho

I think you have to understand scepticism about these things though. There are so many people with supposed rumours etc all the time that are rarely true. Also I could have told you Allardyce wants Crouch playing for him ages ago. Doesn't exactly take a genius to put together the pieces of Sam liking big target men and having raved about Crouch as one of England's most effective players.

Well before I get all interested in Emre's supposed move away from the club I am still waiting for Darren Fletcher and Wes Brown to turn up at the club.....oh wait that that didn't happen either did it Dazza

His negative attitude about away games and fear of getting beat must translate to the players so much. If he had an attitude of it being just the same as a home game then this would give the players much more confidence. The mentality for away games at the moment is resulting in us being beaten before we turn up. The only thing keeping the critics off sam's back is the home form.

Considering the fact that Allardyce absolutely loves Crouch I would not be surprised to see it happen eventually.

Well he wont be England manager as the only national team he wants to manage is Portugal, and he wont be back in the EPL managing in the next year or two due to the restrictions on his severance deal from Chelsea. Good manager and despite being a bit of a twat a lot of the time he has a great winning mentality.

Does anyone know who Ramos signed for Sevilla? Was Dani Alves already there? I have never really followed them and was just wondering to what extent Ramos built their team, or if it was largely already there.

Im not that bothered about having a female footy commentator, but only if they are actually good. This woman is rubbish, and if she was a man she would still be rubbish. Its got nothing to do with the fact its a woman. Martin Tyler is the king of commentary and needs to be cloned ASAP.

Van Basten might come across as a prick, but Dutch fans i have spoken to like him for getting rid of all those old wasters from the team.

A good example of an international manager not going on reputation and egos etc is Van Basten at Holland. He came in and told all those arrogant twats like Kluivert to do one, and brought in the players that he felt would work in the system and do what he wanted them to. That took some balls to do, and is exactly what England need.

One of the most frustrating things about watching England is that its really hard to put your finger on exactly what goes wrong/is missing, and also who is actually responsible - is it the players not performing or have all the managers since Euro 96 just been playing the wrong tactics etc? In midfield/attack there really are very few options apart from the ones that already play (and who at club level are world class a lot of the time). Our back 4 is actually one of the best around in international football, and does keep a lot of clean sheets. Paul Robinson is another matter entirely. I would like to ask those people who boo Frank Lampard a question - do you applaud Paul Robinson? If anyone needs dropping its him, and by some distance.

It would be more embarrassing for him to have been such a ridiculous waste of money. Throughout his career he has tried to do the 'financially correct' things but his efforts have backfired spectacularly on the pitch, at both Madrid and Newcastle. He could well go down as England's all time top goalscorer but he will in effect have wasted what...6/7 years of his club career??

If he doesn't play the next 2 games for newcastle then realistically its over for him in terms of any kind of relationship with the club or its supporters. If he wants to put his money where his mouth is then he simply has to stay fit for the next couple of games. Even if he gets a genuine injury I sadly don't think a lot of NUFC fans will ever believe he wants to play for us which is a shame. I think the next 2 games are crucial for Owen's NUFC career.

There is absolutely no way the majority of newcastle fans are going to walk round with 'virgin' in big letters on their shirts.

No one is booing Owen. There have been doubts raised in the media about his committment but no one is actually booing him.

£15 million would be a great deal, because lets be honest he is never going to sign a new contract with us and so to get back most of the fee we paid Madrid for him would be excellent business. Selling him in January or beginning of summer would also avoid all of the Owen paper speculation about his contract which will inevitably start soon, and would annoy the hell out of me!

I think a lot of the 'he only cares about england' stuff comes from the media and the way they ask questions. I saw a post west ham tv interview with big sam, and the reporter asked "how is michael owen"..Big Sam: "hes done his groin having scan etc" then Sam moved onto the team performance for a while. Reporters next question "so will michael owen be having an operation?" or along those lines. My opinion of Owen though is that until he is putting in top drawer performances for 4 or 5 weeks in a row, he should not be automatically starting. Sam has shown with the goalkeepers that it is play well and keep the shirt - he should do the same with strikers and Martins should be keeping Owen out of the team until Owen earns his place.

If people have legitimate criticisms of the game then thats fine. For example a lot of girls i know don't like how obsessed people get by it, which is acceptable because they see people in pubs etc going mental at the tv. What pisses me off is when some idiots start saying "footballers are paid too much" and "the players are all primadonnas" when they know nothing about the finances of the game or anything about who the players are.

He would undoubtedly be successful here, although it would look really bad to sack yet another manager- surely Ashley/Mort would want to show some desire for stability rather than chopping and changing like under Shepherd. I can't work out though what Jose will do now though - never going to be Man U, Liverpool or Arsenal manager...Real Madrid is doubtful but anything can happen with those lunatics, Barcelona I guess is possible if Rijkaard messes things up. There just seem to be no obvious vacancies or managers who are doing badly at big clubs, although that will no doubt change in a few months time.

I have given up on caring whether he is fit or not. If he is then fine he is a quality finisher, if he isn't then play Martins. The whole "is owen fit this week" circus is boring and he is clearly going to continue to be an injury liability for his club side for the remainder of his career.

Is it just me or do we ALWAYS lose these type of games? I think we approached this game with a great deal of complaceny and tactical naivety. We are becoming desperate for Emre and Barton to get fit and perform in the midfield. I hope for Smith's sake he can play upfront because he is atrocious in midfield. Also is anyone surprised to see Owen go off? Im not - does anyone know when England's next game is because about two weeks before that Owen will magically be fit and on form again. Playing Ameobi is a complete waste of time, and to put Martins on the game is just going to be harmful to a player who clearly thrives on confidence and getting games and goals. All in all an absoulute shocker tonight - bad management, bad performances and rubbish football.

Derby didn't play any kind of physical or long ball game. We needed a good midfield player tonight to impose our own tempo on the game, instead we played a couple of destroyers and the most irrelevant midfield player i have ever seen in Smith - does he actually do anything??

Babayaro wins this by a mile. To describe him as incompetent would not do his shiteness justice.

Viduka may just be unfit at the moment, but in the games i have seen him play this season he has looked poor as a 'target man'. Martins actually seems to win more headers than Viduka!

Given is undoubtedly one of the top keepers around, particularly in terms of shot stopping and his lack of really bad errors which seems to be due to some good preparation and concentration ability. One key aspect of a keeper which people can sometimes overlook is distribution, which Given is poor at. I love to see a goalkeeper come to claim a cross then instantly throw it out a long way to a winger to break away. Schmeichel's long throws to the half way line or whatever were awesome.

I cannot understand how someone can berate Milner's crossing ability and then mention N'Zogbia - it really is unbelievable. N'Zogbia isn't very good at all at crossing, and compared to Milner his crossing his utter shite. Yet still people cream themselves over N'Zogbia and can't even acknowledge that Milner is a good player. N'Zogbia is allowed to be "raw, got some ability" but Milner isn't maradona by the age of 20 and is deemed as complete rubbish by a lot of people on here. Its depressing. Even more so is that Milner's fitness, committment and work rate are all arguably the best in our squad and he must be one of the fittest players in the league. After the criticism the likes of Dyer have got over the years for lacking theses attributes and people constantly whining about "when are we going to sign some fit players or some players who work hard", you would think that Milner must get some credit - but no he's completeley and utterly useless isn't he!