Minhosa

Sam shit, different manager

Come on Alan. Come out, come out wherever you are. No fucker else would vote "No - your doing alright in your role" unless they are either blind or......have the surname Shepherd.

Ok

As much as the West Ham punishment is controversial, Whelan and Co can have no complaints about the fact they've bombed this season. They were at least 5 points ahead of the Hammers when the Premier League decision was announced - whose fault is it that they are now below them?

So what would be your strategy to break the mould? How would you go about building solid foundations? First, I would stop signing players that only come here because of our ability/willingness to offer them wages far in excess of market rate. We don't have a wage structure at NUFC. Look at the Owen deal, we got him here because we offered him astronomical wages and because (as is becoming increasingly evident), we put a clause in his contract that actually allowed him to leave FOR LESS than we paid for him. Stop for a second and think about that. We were basically acknowledging two things by doing that: firstly that we weren't an attractive option to Michael Owen as we were giving him an escape route out of the club that no player willing to come here would get in their contract. Secondly, and perhaps more damning, we were acknowledging that we had paid far in excess of his market value to get him to come here. We offered Scott Parker crazy money to get him here, we offered Damien Duff crazy money to get him here, we gave a crocked Kieron Dyer crazy money to get him to stay. Steve Sidwell is arguably better off at Reading than he would be here, but it looks to me like we've turned the lad's head, no doubt by talking about wages a good £15k in excess of his market value. Does this sound like a way of establishing the club of motivated winners that you're looking for? Doesn't sound like it to me. And yet this is what we have established ourselves as. We can't even shift some of the shite in our squad because we're paying them far in excess of what they're worth and they know they're onto a cushy number here. You can talk about huge resources and being starved of success, but it's our misuse of those huge resources by our moron chairman which is making life far too easy for the players at the club. The top and bottom of it is this: Players don't come to Newcastle United to win things. They come to get paid. As much as I don't want to further inflate that ego of yours Gemmill, thats a top post.

I'd love to see West Ham go. 1) It'll mean Tevez is available. We can all dream, eh? 2) Bowyer will be on half wages! 3) Curbs will find his level. 4) The biscuit baron will have to scrape the biscuit barrel to pay his stars - only right after bladdering Pardew so soon after taking over IMO. 5) Some good players become available. The only downside is that Anton Ferdinand might be available on the cheap! That said, I'm not sure he's an Allardyce kind of player anyway.

Against. 1. Panorama 2. I want to watch entertaining football. He's never played that at any of his previous clubs. I remember his Blackpool days. God awful to watch when other teams in that league were playing football the proper way i.e: On the deck. 3. He'll want full control over everything (and rightly so.......) but Shepherd hasn't given anyone that and it'll end in tears when Sams ego is dinted cos Shep wants to sell/buy someone or won't authorise his doubtless legion of backroom staff. 4. He's an arrogant prick with an over-inflated opinion of himself. The club needs re-structuring from top to bottom and starting 3/4 of the way up with the Manager is pointless. Whoever gets the job is destined to fail whilst the club is under the strategic direction, leadership and control of Shepherd. So it's almost irrelevant who gets the job to be honest.

I've been really impressed by George Macartney over the last few months playing left back for West Ham (Puts tin hat on). In terms of improving our squad, we could do worse than him, Volz (even though he had a shocker for Fulham last weekend against the Arse) and Hoyte. Sign that lot and sign one superstar defender and still get change out of £11m I reckon. Substantial improvement on Carr/Baba and Co and those lada are far more likely to actually want to play for us rather than pick their games and they'd be wages of less than £15k per week.

It's all about opinions. I just reckon Martins, with the right coaching/direction, could become a serious talent where Bent's game probably won't change that much over the next few years. If he hasn't already learned from Crespo, Mancini, Vieri & Recoba, he'll never learn.[/crackedrecord] Two very different leagues to be fair. I think we play off the last man much more than they do in Serie A and also, because of the NUFC play, he's expected to win headers from crosses much more than you would expect a second striker to in most sides. I see him more as a Bellamy type player in that he's not the main forward. If we had a full squad this year he would have played as a deeper fwd feeding Owen I would've thought. The amount of people who still get bonk-on's talking about Bellamy when Martins first season has been far more productive than most of Bellamys is weird. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying he's the finished article or that his close control/first touch are good, they're not - but he has the potential to improve. Bent is a steady 15 goal a season man for me. Martins can be more than that. IMO.

It's all about opinions. I just reckon Martins, with the right coaching/direction, could become a serious talent where Bent's game probably won't change that much over the next few years. He's already a good player, but I don't see him becoming an amazing player. Oba has that potential IMO.

Might as well put that in the 'what are you wanking over thread' in general chat for Gejon to spunk his load. He's been doing the big sell on the Aussie for so long I'm starting to think he might be his Agent.

I really don't get the vibe on here about £15m being good business for Martins. It only represents a £5m profit. A good season next year between him and Owen and we could easily be talking about a player worth £20m plus. Granted, there is lots to his game that needs improving but how many young kids have NUFC had lately with his raw talent? Some work on the training ground with Owen and maybe even Shearer (if his Ambassador role will stretch that far) and he could be a top player imo.

Voted for Blyth too for a craic.

Thats gratitude for you.................

Nice to see HTT's warning about stupid posts is being adhered to.

WHY was he shooting from 20 yards out all game? He's NEVER scored from there in 6 bastard years. He can't even pass that far. Fucking pinheaded twat.

Agree - I think he might be here sooner than we think. I can see Glenn getting the boot this week.

Oh, and his teeth are a fucking mess...................... AND he's still a twat.

He didn't exactly say that. I think he said he'd heard that 'Roeder and Newcastle might be parting company' but it's still a surprise he let that much go. Obviously fuelled by FFS to see the Toon Army reaction is my bet. Sorry to be pedantic.

We'll beat these tonight

Bolton gonna struggle next season. Nailed on.

The 3483 people that've read it perhaps?

Probably a stupid question...............I'm gonna ask it anyway though!! What happens to the £5.5m?

Agree - I've never understood the slating Rooney gets from some people on here. Madness. The 13 goals/10 assists are also coming off the back of a heavy world cup campaign and broken foot at the back end of last season which people seem to have forgot.