Andy

Shola could have scored it with ease.

Those comments about Ben Arfa currently being a cameo player are very discouraging.

Bet he was fucking delighted that he was gifted the chance to pass it out of play instead of wasting his energy crossing it out of play.

Worrying if he fell down as a result of his knee giving way. Mildly amusing if he just tripped over.

The game passed him by. MotD showed his 2 shots and made it look like he was outstanding whereas i thought he looked lost and put Tiote under massive pressure. Seemed more like Tiote put him under pressure by failing to turn up, giving the ball away continuously and generally having an absolute shitter.

By the sounds of it he carried on his pre-season form tonight.. encouraging. Going to be a very good player, I think.

Fuck. Bad enough having to follow the match on here without it being as fucking topsy-turvy as this.

I felt we'd gone too many posts without the parade being pissed on.

We won't sign a striker.

I actually agree with you in general - at least based on his first half display anyway (in the second half he was no more or less anonymous than any of our other attackers). In the first period he looked the most likely player to create something for our attackers, as, frankly, Jonas was fucking shocking yesterday (something which I think has been overlooked somewhat). I don't think it's so much a case of him being a scapegoat though; I think it's more a case of people being frustrated because there's a more talented footballer on the bench, who (while certainly not his best position) could probably do a far more effective job cutting in from the right than Obertan is currently doing in what is supposedly his natural position.

Aye, in fairness I can't remember too many people being thrilled at his sacking, which as others have pointed out, was not result-related anyway IMO.

He did nothing in the second half that I can remember. You're absolutely right, but that doesn't really change what I said.

Thought it was one of his better performances for us, and I also thought he was better than Jonas today, but neither of those things are saying much.

So, remind me, why did he choose Ameobi?... Exactly. It's not like Shola is the destroyer of worlds when it comes to aerial threat.

...

Seems very peculiar that he's failed a medical given the ones we've signed recently, and I seriously doubt it's a case of "learning from mistakes" as only Marveaux has arguably been a mistake in that regard so far. I'd hazard a guess that we've changed our priorities from a striker to a defender, that money is only realistically available for one or the other, and that the failed medical is an easy way to cancel the transfer without the club pissing too many people off. Might be cynical but hey ho...

Swan Hunters I found the contrast in visible effort there hilarious.

Fucking hell

Perch? Obertan? Gosling? Campbell/Ireland/Kuqi? Kuqi was a stop gap. Gosling and Campbell were free transfers and Ireland was only a loan signing. Admittedly Perch and Obertan have been poor, I supposed it depends on the market. I don't know which scout is looking at Tomkins, probably not Carr so may not be great. What do you mean by that? I meant I don't know how good our other staff are? Who's watching Tomkins play this season? Is it from Pardew's 'sources'? Obviously if we had Carr watching him regular then I'd be more inclined to back it despite having the perception he's shit as Carr has scouted almost perfectly. However it seems he's probably just scouring the foreign market so my initial reaction of 'If we like the look of him I won't judge till he's played' may be wide of the mark #AlanOliver. See I just don't buy this. Are we to believe all our good signings came because of Carr and all the not so good ones didn't? He's our chief scout, I can't see why he wouldn't be involved in any of our signings. Pretty sure I've read or heard somewhere that Carr is involved primarily in international scouting. I don't think he attends matches in this country for us - could be wrong though.

Nowhere near as bad a player as people in here are making out. As you'd expect from a young defender, he had a bad time last season when West Ham's defence were almost constantly under pressure without any semblance of organisation or leadership, but he's looked much more steady and confident when I've seen him this year (I watch West Ham quite regularly since my father in law is a fan of theirs). He'll do well alongside Coloccini and is a better option than Williamson if you ask me.

Very much doubt it. Aye, it's not like he has a track record of upsetting managers.

Getting frustrated with the fact that this lad is our starting right winger. I've played with and against probably hundreds of players at Sunday League level who have a better footballing brain than him. Literally the only thing that prevents him being a lower league player is the fact that he can run really fucking fast and has tricky feet, so when he spends the entire game walking around and failing to beat his man when he has the ball, he's basically rendered completely useless. Needs to seriously pull his finger out and start playing to his strengths.

Starting to think there's a problem between Pardew and Ben Arfa like. I can understand him not starting today, but the fact that he was left on the bench for the whole game is a bit concerning.

You'll find out in a month.

Absolutely. He needs to drop the stubbornness regarding Obertan, Ben Arfa and the likes or he's going to end up undoing his fantastic work pretty quickly.