afar

Just read the first page of this thread, can't believe the negativety from his own people, you should be damn proud of the lad, to play as well and have the consistency he has had at his age, not to mention in a team with the dross around him, is quite remarkable. He deserves this call up, get behind him ffs, no CB in the world is the finished article at 21 but he's a damn sight better than most and he's ours. Thank god he's not Newcastle mad, probably can't afford one of those expensive computers or has much time on his hands to surf the net, cos if he came across "support" like thiis it may make him want to say "F*** that" I'll go somewhere where I'm appreciated.

How much is Arteta worth, if Everton were ever stupid enough to sell him, can't believe Rangers let him go !!

You forgot to mention Jermain Jenas.

Looks even nicer seeing who's bottom. Bolton look to be making a concerted effort to gann down. http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/b/bolton_wanderers/6944306.stm "Andy is an astute acquisition"

Agree with that, Spurs will only finish top 4 if other teams fail rather than by their own design. I wouldn't be surprised if Jol doesn't make it till the end of the season. I was one of those that thought MON would be perfect for us, got to admit though I'm still waiting to be convinced at the work he's done at Villa. Admittedly they were truely awful when he arrived and getting them mid table was to some degree a success but I expected him to kick on with the backing he's got his signing's have been on the whole poor Petrov: has been woeful for them, Ashley Young: £9m an awful lot to pay for a kid with half a prem season under his belt not exactly showing the money has been wisely spent yet. Carew: Always like this guy thought he was well suited for the prem, still waiting to see if he can cut it though at the highest level. Harewood: 1 season wonder springs to mind, looks Championship material at best, West ham must have been laughing all the way to the bank when Villa handed over a cheque for £4mill. Reo Cocker: Supposidly has tonnes of talent but also brings a lot of attitude, West Ham fans aren't exactly mourning his departure which says a lot I think, £8.5mill wisely invested ?? Of course having said all that, they'll probably turn us over on Saturday with Harewood getting a hattrick

Actually, apart from being thin up front Everton has got depth everywhere else. Moyes' obsession with utility player means that they have Phil Jagielka who could play adeptly as centre back, defensive midfielder and right back, Phil Neville who has played everywhere across the back, and Joleon Lescott who could play left back and centre back. In midfield they have Arteta who could play everywhere, Tim Cahill, Leon Osman (winger at both sides). They are apparently confident of landing Manuel Fernandes, a midfield talent who could play as winger and central mid. Last season they managed fine with Andy Johnson out for a while. True that they have lost James Beattie now but Beattie was invinsible. Now they are bidding for Yakubu. It is unfortunate for them that James Vaughan is injured yet again. They have a small squad, but their players are very versatile. Still not convinced by them, Arteta is key too, a quality player who creates so much for them, they have no cover for him currently and I doubt very much Boro will let Yakubu go, if they do they will go down. Moyes needs to buy if he's going to achieve what he did last year. It's not so much they have gone downhill, more the fact that all around them have improved.

It pains me to say but I think Sunderland will do very well this season, they look extremely solid at the back and capable of nicking the odd goal at the other end, they'll win a lot of 1-0 just like yesterday, think they make top half but not quiet enough quality to get a UEFA spot. Tottenham looked a real mess tbh, they were without a few yesterday but no one should really fear them on their travels, they look totally unbalanced, at WHL it may be different, they probably win enough there to ensure they make Europe again. I can see Man City doing really well, Sven's bought very well and they have some good youngsters, will be pushing strong for Europe. Blackburn have developed a surprisingly strong squad, Mark Hughes has done a fantastic job there. Challenger for Europe. Everton have added to a strong team of last year but it's still not a squad with a huge amount of depth if they loose Johnson for any length of time they'll are going to struggle for goals. They tend to have good season followed by bad season. I don't think they finish as high as last year. Villa don't excite me in the slightest. I've been a little dissapointed in MON since going there, he had a terrific start, but has struggled in both transfer windows. If I were a Villa fan I would be happy with top half, don't think their squad at the moment is any better than that. Before kick off yesterday I thought Pompey may do very well this year, I had them down to finish 6th. Not so sure about them now however Harry likes to dable in the transfer market he may have dabbled a bit too much. At the summit Liverpool will be closer imo but no close enough to win it, Chelsea look a more balanced team than Man Utd who seem to lack a bit at the back and a target man up front. So Chelsea to win it for me. To go down, I'm going for Middlesboro (if Woddy fails to play 20 plus games), Wigan and Derby. Birmingham, Reading and Bolton flirting with trouble. As for us, I hope I not wrong but all the signs are there that we'll do really well, we've always had decent players at the club just our managers have never been able to get the best out of them. Sam has aurgmented them with some great buys. Bring in a quality rightback and a creative midfielder and I really believe we could be heading places. A return to Europe backons next year.

Wouldn't that be a nice bottom 3 to go down ?

Chopra's not as bad as many people on here think, we could very well rue not truely giving him a chance and forcing him to move on to get first team action.

Newcastle United aren't listed on the stock exchange anymore !

Got to say Sven' ad the Thai are doing a terrific job, some excellent signings there, thought they were screwed only a couple of weeks ago but I'll be shocked if they don't finish in a European spot by the end of the season.

Souness is something like 5th favourite at 12-1 for the job according SSN. Unbelievable how he could even be that close to any premeirship job. Houlier looks odds on for it.

Classic case of a lazy journo putting 2 and 2 together and coming up with 5, disgruntled player not getting play time at his club, his former manager in a job with a bit of money to spend, notes quotes just speculation. Slow news day. Dunno why you are all getting so excited, Gudjohnson is no world beater, good player yes and it would be a great addition to our squad, but please if he was so fantastic he would either still be at Chelsea or forced his way into the barca team.

Couldn't agree more best we can hope from Owen is a decent transfer fee, I'd take 9mill, we'll not get near that next year.

No way in hell we'll get 3mill for Luque, Roeder did a such great job in devaluing an already devalued asset, we'll be lucky to get a set of strips and bag of footballs for him. Mind you we did get Juventus to stump up about the same for Boomsong, so I guess you never know. Been pissed off all day about the stupidity of the £9mill release clause for Owen, not that I'm particuarily bothered about him being with us more the point that we would be taking such a big hit. But the more I think about it the more I like it, take the 9 mill invest in a younger replacement such as Bent, Nugent, Ahton or my choice Alves and save a net £50k or so on wages.

We all hate Oliver and rightly so, the bloke is just a terrible journo who is little more the Shepherd's mouth piece. But what you can't argue is that he does have a direct channel to the fat guy. It's only with Shepherd's blessing that he is allowed to write and say stuff, this is my problem with the guy. I wish everyone would stop jumping on the Anal knows nothing band wagon cos that's simply not true, the bloke knows a hell of a lot more about what's going on in FFS mind than anyone on this board. Not sticking up for him cos as I said he's just a plain awful jorno, just saying don't discredit what he says because a blind man could see who's feeding him. If we have no money for the new guy then that is extremely worrying because there is such a big building job to do and I wouldn't blame Alladyce or anyone else for turning it down.

After listening to what he said, his tone and general attitude in his post match interview with radio Newcastle, resignation is not something he is contemplating nor does he think he's in any danger of the chop. Today we were beaten by an offside goal and ity's all the players fault becasue they have no confidence at the moment, he prepared them faultlessly, so he says this could all change though, the next 48 hours could be crucial got a feeling Freddy will ask him to move upstairs, don't think he wants to be seen as sacking another manager.

Why not ? Why are they above criticism to you ? If the Oliver writes something in the chronicle you don't agree with are you telling me not to slate him too ? Like it or not, they are the only independent presence on the net to the vast majority of Newcastle fans who have no idea what one of these forums is all about. Their supporters need to understand that with that responsibilty comes the potential for criticism as well as praise.

Ardiles surely Ardiles didnt get the funds (thanks to McKeag Westwood and the other parasites) that those two prats got. Actually the football under Ardiles could never be described as boring, ineffective and niave but certainly not boring. Agree with Phil, Ossie just didn't get the funds, not suggesting he was a great manager but unlike Souness and Roeder he was never really a hate figure for the crowd.

dot com isn't a money making venture Biffa and Niall started dot com out of passion and saw the internet as a media channel to communicate a non plc view of the club. biggest load of bollocks I read in a while, a count of their "advertsing partners" should be sufficient for even blind man to see them for what they are, which is a commericial site which must be extremely badly managed if they do not turn over a tidy profit. Hiding behind the, they are only fans spouting there opinions like the rest of us so are beyond criticism is nothing new and something invalidated when they took the £££ from the radio stations, betting companies, et al. They just got lucky, the site is just as popular for the domain name they were fortunate to register at the right time as the content they provide. Having said that, this article apart some of their recent stuff has been showing signs of improvement, love the alias of Pravda for the Chronicle.

I think the silence might have something to do with impending season ticket renewal, the thought of being linked with a manager that actually has a clue could encourage those wavering to sign on the dotted line. The only way I can see Shepherd doing the right thing and sacking Roeder once this season is over is a couple of bad defeats in our last games there is absolutely no way he'll pull the trigger and admit he made yet another mistake until Roeder's position becomes untenable, this was clearly evident in the sacking of Souness, which should have happended months before it did.

Could this be a blessing in disguise ?? May get the idiots in charge to drop their asking price for the club.

I noticed this too, what he's basically saying is those criticising him (the fans mainly, press have actually been pretty easy on him considering) know nothing, he doesn't respect them he only respects his fellow managers. So if we liken that to the real world, My customers think I'm doing a really bad job but my mates at work think I'm fine so there's nothing to worry about really. Love to see a national paper pick up on this with the header "Roeder has no respect for the fans"

That is a crap draw, anyone thinking this will be a walk over is deluding themselves, when top of championship meets bottom of premiership at home rarely does the premeirship team win out.

Who cares, asbsolutely of no relevance to us other than we play arsenal next.