KaKa

Okay, guess we'll just have to see how it turns out. Assuming he is even signed. I'll be very surprised if he isn't an improvement on Shola, Best and Loven, because for me he already passes the eye test in this regard. For me he is far more technical and classy than the lot of them. Lets see if it translates to the prem.

Bothroyd is an improvement on everyone of our strikers bar one, and so for now, it's a decent enough move, considering his price and the wages. To insinuate he is no better than Loven, Ranger, Shola and Best is just not true imo.

We're not guaranteed to stay up yet, and there is no player anyone can identify that will definitely keep us up, because that isn't possible. Bearing this in mind who the hell do people expect us to sign? This season is about consolidating prem position. The club was always going to go with safer options this January. At least the squad is being strengthened, and Bothroyd is definitely worth a punt all things considered.

 

We already have 4 very average strikers no point in buying a 5th one.  Bothroyd has shown nothing to most people to show he can do it in this division, and he's just an average championship striker for me.

 

He is average huh? Based on what exactly? In fact forget that. I'll let you have that, even though it has no meaningful basis.

 

Outside of Carroll our strikers are not average, they are terrible. Best is actually okay but far too unproven and inexperienced to rely on consistently if Carroll is out. Shola is awful and is never in decent enough shape to play more than a few games in a row without getting injured. Lovenkrands is a bit headless and Ranger is very very immature. Xisco is awol.

 

No why would you compare Bothroyd to any of those guys exactly? You're just letting your mouth run without thinking.

 

If he's better than average why hasn't any decent team in the premiership looked at him.  Reports from Cardiff fans and Coventry fans alike tell a picture.  He's a championship player and that is what his level is.

Are Newcastle looking at him? Are they not a prem club? How do you know no one else has?

Answer me this Einstein. Is Charlie Adam a prem player? Is DJ Campbell a prem player? Is Chris Brunt a prem player? Is Andy Carroll a prem player? Why didn't anyone snap any of these guys up before this season. Reports from Newcastle fans this time last year would have told you Carroll wasn't good enough for even the Championship. Read them for yourself on this very forum.

If the scouts have identified Bothroyd as someone who they think can come in and improve the strikeforce, which really shouldn't be that difficult, as it is quite poor, then it is what it is. Your opinion has no real basis, other than that he is a championship player. It isn't based on anything you know about any of his attributes.

We're not guaranteed to stay up yet, and there is no player anyone can identify that will definitely keep us up, because that isn't possible. Bearing this in mind who the hell do people expect us to sign? This season is about consolidating prem position. The club was always going to go with safer options this January. At least the squad is being strengthened, and Bothroyd is definitely worth a punt all things considered.

 

We already have 4 very average strikers no point in buying a 5th one.  Bothroyd has shown nothing to most people to show he can do it in this division, and he's just an average championship striker for me.

He is average huh? Based on what exactly? In fact forget that. I'll let you have that, even though it has no meaningful basis.

Outside of Carroll our strikers are not average, they are terrible. Best is actually okay but far too unproven and inexperienced to rely on consistently if Carroll is out. Shola is awful and is never in decent enough shape to play more than a few games in a row without getting injured. Lovenkrands is a bit headless and Ranger is very very immature. Xisco is awol.

No why would you compare Bothroyd to any of those guys exactly? You're just letting your mouth run without thinking.

We're not guaranteed to stay up yet, and there is no player anyone can identify that will definitely keep us up, because that isn't possible. Bearing this in mind who the hell do people expect us to sign? This season is about consolidating prem position. The club was always going to go with safer options this January. At least the squad is being strengthened, and Bothroyd is definitely worth a punt all things considered.

Are neesy and taxfree related? Two disturbingly "unique" individuals.

Seems the strategy for January is a minimal risk one, mostly targetting loans or players out of contract in the immediate summer. Linked with Kris Commons this morning whose contract is also up this summer.

Hope he can maintain his confidence in front of goal if he joins, as he seems to have scored a hell of a lot of goals already this season. Hopefully help towards securing prem position. Review in the summer.

What would Spurs want for Krancjar?

 

 

8 mill?

 

I'm sure KD will come on and announce at least double that though.

They got him for £2.5 million, after taking advantage of Portsmouth's plight last season, but being the despicable swindlers they are they'd likely be after around £8 million I'd imagine, yeah.

full link here not press exactly but still news i guess.

 

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/571302-transfer-window-newcastle-linked-with-villa-midfielder-in-cut-price-deal

 

It sounds like pure speculation. Villa are in trouble and I can't see why they'd want to release him to a rival at this point.

 

He'd be a good acquisition, because we don't have a DM with any kind of engine apart from Tiote. Reo Coker can also play at right back.

Then again Villa are supposedly about to seal a deal for Jean Makoun and/or Sissoko and Reo-Coker's contract is up at the end of this season.

Kranjcar would be great.

Unlike Stoke to go for the tall, rangy, unpredictable forward.

Pulis is a complete neanderthal.

http://cdn.caughtoffside.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/PA-9729113.jpg

 

LFC's Tinie Tempah.

Did anyone here Ian Holloway's interview on Talk Sport last night? Love the guy, his interviews are class and he seems to really be building a club and culture at Blackpool that's on all the right foundations.

Holloway is making a lot of managers look really bad. You're Allardyces, McCleish's and Pulis' who are all so damned cynical and claim it is the only way to survive in the prem without Arab owners. Holloway is playing great football and getting results with a league1 / championship side. It's unreal. Awesome stuff.

Watched the Birmingham v West Ham game on iPlayer last night, Larsson looked for the most part very, very poor.

I watched the game live. My thoughts were that Birmingham were a shockingly poor team, who are incapable of any kind of cohesive build up play that initiates their attacking moves. They were completely incapable of starting off any passing moves that eventually allowed for them to consistently get the ball to either Larsson on the right or Fahey on the left, when they were in the final third of the pitch. Neither of the wingers received the ball in positions where they could look to attack and deliver a final ball of any kind.

It actually shocked me, especially as this was against a poor West Ham side. I too was hoping to see more of Larsson. All he was useful for was his set pieces. I cannot believe Bentley agreed to go there. You really have to wonder how these footballers go about weighing up their options.

http://www.competition.dz/Actualite/-Ziani-:-Wolfsburg-fait-une-concession-d’1M€

 

Update this morning, Wolfsburg have lowered the asking price by €1m (they reckon €5m inc that weird €2m bonus if we get into Europe) which will speeden up any transfer.

Again, some very detailed info. Will be very surprised if we aren't in for him.

where do i say foreign players are flops?

 

just saying i'd rather the club spent money on a player who can actually cross the ball. rather than on a player who is an older version of routledge.

You are such an ass.

"Ashley will only allow players to be bought if they are under 26 years of age, have some resale value and accept a wage limit of £15K a week, which is around £750K/year."

 

tell me where he fits into that policy, please.

 

Actually the idea was that substantial fees will only be paid on these kinds of players in the long run. £3 million is not a large fee. Honestly, use your common sense. Don't be so mechanical and rigid in your thinking. If the opportunity is there to add an experienced player who is decent for a small fee and reasonable wages, obviously you still take the deal.

£3m is a huge fee for someone who has no resale value, no prem experience, most likely doesn't speak english, will ask for high wages, sour history with one of our star players. the list goes on.

Absolute rubbish.

"Ashley will only allow players to be bought if they are under 26 years of age, have some resale value and accept a wage limit of £15K a week, which is around £750K/year."

 

tell me where he fits into that policy, please.

Actually the idea was that substantial fees will only be paid on these kinds of players in the long run. £3 million is not a large fee. Honestly, use your common sense. Don't be so mechanical and rigid in your thinking. If the opportunity is there to add an experienced player who is decent for a small fee and reasonable wages, obviously you still take the deal.

Blackpool's 4-3-3 is fantastic. They really do get forward in that formation, they play it with the right attitude. Awesome to watch. Superb attacking play.

Adam wouldn't be half the player in 4-4-2 I reckon.

 

Yeah, I bet you've seen loads of Blackpool this season.

 

Alongside Tiote he'd piss all over the shop.

I agree. Just needs the right person alongside him. He's about ten times more mobile than Nolan, despite it looks like they both follow the same diet.

Why has Dirk Kuyt become an acceptable right winger?! Yes, he works hard, but so friggin what? The guy doesn't produce any quality from that position at all. PLay him with Torres or bench him for goodness sake.

Hmmmm ... not so sure that's that bad a lineup. He's brought Jovanovic back in which is a good move. He's a lot better than the likes of N'Gog who has been playing every week. Surprised by how little Jovanovic played under Hodgson. The only player I really question in there is Poulsen who has been shocking. However it looks like he will have both Meireles and Lucas in there with him so he should look better.

Will imo it wasn't the wrong decision at the time because while people will say he was bringing an DM the fact was the reason we were 2-0 down was because of our shocking midfield being overran by Stevenage and he wanted to bring Tiote on to remove that problem.  In hindsight it was, but hindsight is a wonderful thing that no-one can use sadly.

 

It had nothing to do with hindsight; Tiote is a defensive midfielder and is as unlikely as Alan Smith is when it comes to turning a 2-0 deficit around.  Replacing 1 man wasn’t going to change a game in which we probably had 7 or 8 players all playing below par.

 

 

Mick, you completely undervalue what Tiote brings to our midfield. He is a defesive midfielder only in name and people say that to simplify things but he is not in the mould of Smith or John Mikel Obi at all. His role is not just to stop play and get tackles in. He is more of the Essien, Xabi Alonso, Xavi (though obviously not at their level) in the sense that he dictates our tempo and how we pass the ball from defence to attack. Against Stevenage, without that link, even Colo decided to hoof the ball up because there was just no outlet. Passing it to a midifielder would have meant just losing the ball. True quite a few of our players underperformed against Stevenage but I would say that was largely because of Tiote's absence...that is how important he is to us. Without him players like Nolan, Barton have to try and do things on their own and let's just say that, that's not their strength at all.

 

Based on that, I can at least understand (though I disagree with the decision) why Pardew tried to gamble putting Tiote on, putting on another below average striker was not gonna change anything, it's not like we had Carroll on the subs bench. Having said that, if it was me I would not have risked putting Tiote on at all, in fact my view is that until we establish ourselves as a mid table club, the FA cup is the least of our concern, I would have just fielded our youngsters along with players like Ranger and Xisco and ask them to have a go at Stevenage.  

 

Your assertions that Hughton would have not done this or done that, like "I do not believe for one minute that we would have seen the display against Stevenage under Hughton" or "I have no doubt at all that we wouldn’t be going into the mackem game without Tiote if Hughton was still here" is unfortunately just that, bollocks assertion. Despite your best believe, nobody can say for sure what Hughton would have done.

 

All this coupled with the fact how you intentionally omitted the part that Pardew had a 10 point deduction when you come out with your super "Pardew had the highest budget in the division and his target was to reach a play-off position and he failed", tells me that you are either unable or unwilling to be objective in your assessment of Pardew. Stevenage aside (which yes I hold him accountable for), he has exceeded my expectations in the other 5 games. I have no doubt at all that we would have only got maximum 4 points under Hughton for those 5 games, two can play the bollocks assertion game.

 

 

Some fantastic points  

This "must crawl over broken glass or f*** off" attitude is cringeworthy.

Agree.

For a top, top player, then yes we might have to go a bit over the top, but this is just Larsson we're talking about; while he's good, he's not now nor will he ever be top class. Him and his agent are acting like he's the best thing since sliced bread.

I say if he doesn't want to come here, then fine, f*** off somewhere else and we should move on.

 

Hmmmmm ... are you sure you agree?!

 

I don't know. I thought he meant Larsson's and his agents attitude, but maybe he meant the attitude on here?