Minhosa

Great name. He's gonna be immense.

Totally agree with this. If we were winning games, everyone (the press included) would be all over it. Very unfair to use this as an excuse to have a dig at him. Bit disappointed in Shearers criticism of the guy tbh. It's been quite stinging and not massively constructive. If you want to dig him out at least do it with some thought. Edit - though, if I'm honest, I'd expected to see him have a bit more of a turn of pace and/or bag of tricks. He's not shown much as yet.

One of his better games yesterday imho.

Yep - this is the absolute key. They need to beat some shit teams asap.

They've had a bad start to the season, but p*ss poor? It really is, totally unbalanced. Fabregas is awful these days and Hazard isn't as good as his reputation suggests, Costa likewise. I don't think they have one world class player and have a good few plodders. Get to fuck man. They were champions 7 games ago. Hazard may not have hit top form yet this season but his acceleration yesterday was unreal. He's a gem of a player. I don't think you write Fabregas off either tbh.

Be great if he can get off the mark soon. Love his presence but we could really do with genuine pace/acceleration either side of him as he does drop bloody deep. If we had some wide men with pace (Aarons?) then opposition fullbacks would be reluctant to push up.

Over the start of this season (6 games) and the full two previous seasons he's played 75 games contributing only 7 goals and 9 assists. This is from someone who many seem to credit as our most attacking threat. He's very much part of the problem imho. I'd (very) happily see him replaced by someone more effective. Mahrez of Leicester has a virtually identical record from only 32 games (coming off the bench in 5 of them). Wes pissing Hoolahan has a goal and five assists for Norwich over the last 6 games alone. Payet has three goals and three assists in first six games from West Ham. Sissoko's record is similar to Larsson's at Sunderland who has has 5 goals and 9 assists over the last few seasons. That's not to mention some of his decision making which is absolutely woeful. The guy is as thick as a prison wall and the sooner Schteve recgonises it and bins him the better.

Hope you're not getting chinned again tonight.

Really impressive debut from the lad. Clearly needs polishing but physicality seems there already. A tank for his age.

One lead to their equaliser and the other could have been their winner. Fucking shit for brains this lad.

Made all the difference today. Ball to stuck to him. Zouma and Cahill will wake up at 3am with images of this crazy fucker backing in to them and chucking them around and not be able to get back to sleep. Really good game and very positive reaction to their nonsense. Well done son.

Ridiculous couple of fouls to give away at the end there Moussa. All brawn, no brain.

You might be surprised. Failure at NUFC and he's done for. We are literally his last chance of salvaging an already comedic reputation. Who else, in the top level, takes him after another failure? Not to mention this frankly fucking ridiculous notion of putting the cunt on the board. Agenda for todays Board meeting 1. Future of head coach LCharnley - The owner isn't happy with his return following spunking £50m this summer. What are your thoughts gents? ACarr's Dad - I rate the head coach SMcL - Me too. Top man BConcur - When's the stadium getting painted though? LCharnley - that's that settled then. I'll propose a contract extension.

Tend to agree with that.

I know it's still very early but, the biggest concern for me, away from our general shiteness, is that nobody looks like they're going to tank. Bournemouth/Norwich/Watford are all picking up decent results and not getting humped. When you add to that the strong starts by the likes of Leicester/West Ham you start to wonder who will make up the bottom 5? Sunderland (who will inevitably change their manager), Us (who won't), maybe West Brom (who will have too much organisation to be anywhere close to 'at risk') and then Villa (who will stay up imho) and then it starts to become a worry. I'm almost hoping that one of the new boys has a proper stuffing and that knocks their confidence because, as things stand, there's literally nobody that looks as bad as us. We're already displaying relegation-esque characteristics and we should be three months way from even discussing who will stay up/go down.

Yip, something different, something new, someone who the players all knew and respected as having done it all in the game. Exactly.

Stature's a good word. He might turn out shite Vieira but he'd certainly have a presence and, dare I say it, a bit of fear factor about him. I think the players would want to work for him tbqh.

One of the reasons I was pro-Vieira was because I think he could have inspired belief and a certain spirit.

The job demands someone with charisma, an understanding of what football means to people in the north east and an ability to lift the place up. He needs to be able to take people with him and take the shackles off the players. The, very obvious, restrictions placed upon him by the owner should not restrict this. Look what Bilic has done already at WHU having spent less money. He's got into their players heads and given them a degree of belief.

That's probably what he thinks he's just done. What we really need is an experienced and empowered director to replace Charnley, and give him the power to run everything properly. David Dein would be the best shout not that it'd ever happen.

Hope the new wonder coaches are applying the lube now so the team are ready for their bumming in plenty of time.

I ask the same question now as I did at the end of last season.............Where were his bollocks with 3 games to go?

Don't disagree with any of that. The last line in particular resonates. I'd love to have seen with Vieira would have done with them. Might be totally misguided but I suspect he might have been the sea-change we've needed. A proper figurehead. I think he would have taken the players with him and been quite happy to bin the bad boys.

I hear all of that HTT but the overriding issue, imho, is that McClaren has been badly hindered by the pre-disposed culture of the club which has taken hold as a result of the last 5 years of MA's reign. The club have very obviously been sold to players as a stepping stone to the big money hence the attraction to many of them. They look at Cabaye and get all excited thinking that it could be them getting the big six figure salary per week at PSG or whoever. It worked for Cabaye/Remy/Ba/Enrique/Carroll and that's been the selling point to the recruits over the last windows. I genuinely think that may have changed this window but you can't turn around a culture overnight. I think his biggest mistake has been keeping the likes of Tiote/Cisse/Sissoko who are all clearly after moves. I'd have cleared out all three and any others who are hankering for moves. Wanting to be here has to be a bare minimum requirement. If these guys don't give a fuck, we might as forget about it until they're replaced. I wasn't 100% sure about the Austin move but, in hindsight, they probably should have paid the money as an interested English focal point might have reinvigorated the attacking shape and bought Mitro some time. I'd also add that alot of the criticism of the new buys has been a bit harsh as they're coming into a squad that's fundamentally flawed. Judging them now might be a bit premature because there is no doubt they must be half decent for the money we've spent on them and they've all shown (albeit very minor) flashes of quality.