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More important I think is worrying about the players desire to play for us rather than their costv (which should still be kept within reason obviously). For example If Berbatov says he is desperate to join us this summer and he insists he must be allowed to do so and Tottenham are forced to put a fair valuation on him, let's say £18 million, then yeah we ought to consider it. However, if Berbatov is happy to stay at Tottenham and we feel we must get him at all costs; and so we offer Tottenham £40 million and then give Berbatov £150,000 a week just to make it happen, then that would be awful!

It would be very dissapointing if we started carrying on the way West Ham have been this summer but fortunately for us our history of doing this should work in our favour, as we've been there done that to some extent. I was ecstatic to hear Sam talk about bringing in players who really had a desire to play for Newcastle and to play for him. I am confident he will stick to this. It is the only way to do things. We can still get very good players who are on the rise without having to go for the likes of Nani and Anderson, whose values are stupidly high. Sam targets so far have been spot on and I do not believe he will be changin them at this point.

Wow ... it looks like we are going to have a legitimate squad of players for once! So here is the inevitable question, does this mean that we will have the likes of Charlie, Milner and maybe Taylor on the bench and bring them along slower? I have always thought that these three were being thrown into things too quickly as they are only 20 years old. I think they are our future and not our present. They should play a good amount if games, but should not be guaranteed first teamers. I don't think they are quite ready and therefore they will always lack consistency. It will be better if we brought in some more experienced players of the age of 27/28 who the likes of Milner. N'zogbia and Taylor could learn from and eventually take over from. This would be a lot healthier and would really allow us to challenge the big boys. Thoughts?

Your grandma is ITK?

runs out today for Hearts! Parky, pray tell ... what is the latest on the situation? I imagine he will end up with someone in the premiership. Is it still likely to be us though? Bearing in mind we have just signed Barton?

mackems.gif Come on children ... let's not get too excited by that. There were no appendages involved, I repeat none whatsoever!

I heard from someone with French connections a while ago that Sam was in fact looking at their left back Jeremy Mathieu who apparently is highly rated in France. However I blew the guy off! I think it is more likely that Jeremy Mathieu is indeed the player Sam is considering.

Calm down people ... the £70,000 a week offer was West Ham's desperate last ditch effort to sign Barton, who turned them down and took what appears to be £50,000 a week from us. Great start by Barton, he did talk about the importance of being in a winning situation, rather than having more money and a flash car and house, in his interview on Sky Sports. Apparently West Ham weren't listening. Anyone else think Big Sam is up to something here and never in fact intended to let Parker leave? Or do you think Parker just doesn't want to go to West Ham and is instead looking at Tottenham or something? West Hams desperation to land Barton might indicate that the parker move has fallen through.

Hmmm ... no news of Parker signing at West Ham though. Do you thinking they were stalling and trying to sign Barton first before us because they wanted both and thought we needed the Parker money first? Would be hilarious if we got Barton and then sold Parker to Tottenham instead and West Ham were left with nought but a bitter Reo-Coker. Eggy is so shady.

I disagree too. In order to be great he has to step up and lead England to greatness by getting them to a world cup final and even better winning it. He has to be the instrumental player in the national team if and when this success is achieved. So far he has been pretty average internationally. The same could be said for Henry. Although they reached the world cup finals, it was Zidane who carried them, whcih is why he is considered a great. Gerrard has to do it on that stage in my opinion.

The first radical, thought provoking and intelligent post in this thread. blueyes.gif Suggesting 4-2-2 is radical, but neither thought-provoking nor intelligent. 4-4-2 is what I meant.

Get rid of both and get in Viduka and Anelka. Play the 4-3-3 alternating between Anelka and Viduka as our lone striker, and sometimes play both together in a 4-4-2. Maybe buy one more youngish striker with pace and height as an alternative to Anelka should he be injured, while using Ameobi as an alternative to Viduka.

The beauty about all fo this is that I feel comfortable that Sam will have other targets as he does have such a good knowledge of players from all over the world. So I don't think it will be a huge problem if we don't get him. Can anyone think of any other players from the continent we might go after as an alternative to Parker and Barton? Any players who have that drive and determination in midfield, who are legitimate box-to-box players. I'm not sure there are too many players like this outside of England. I can only think of Appiah and maybe Yaya Toure at the moment, but these players would cost more than what we sell Parker for, so it wouldn't be a good business move. Any ideas of top box-to-box midfielders for around £7 million?

Or on the other hand, he's committing the cardinal sin of management - playing people out of position. I'm an Allardyce fan, very much looking forward to the future under him, but bloody hell, don't go on like he's superhuman. Look ... I'm sure Sam didn't just make this decision on a whim, but due to some analysis he has done on Kieron Dyer. Therefore, I see no harm in him trying this, especially if Dyer is enthusiastic about it. There is no way anyone can be certain it won't work. Sam has all of pre-season and some friendlies to give it a test run anyway. You talk about Dyer being played out of position, the thing is though, he has no position! So how can you be played out of what you aren't in? You dig?

Lack of aggression? Hmmm ... hard to say, but he definitely didn't look like he lacked pace in Saturday's game! Definitely looked very elegant and fluid too. He's a good athlete thats for sure. He also did play some nice passes forward from the back.

The miracle worker. I see you've been reading my posts. For sure.

O ye of little faith ... how dare thee doubt the Allah'dyce. Leave him be. This is the kind of thing I have been looking forward to. A manager who might actually have ideas that are even more far reaching than the fans ideas. How anyone can whing about this without waiting to see how it works, should it even happen is beyond me. I know you are all just dying for Glenn's ingenious pick the most senior players irregardless of anything, tactical nous. Yikes.

From tomorrow's Times ... £12 million on Bellamy ... Wow. Words fail me.

Tell you what Sam has some gynormous ones ... first Barton and then Dyer at right-back?! You have to at least admire the guy for doing it his way, and that is exctly what he is doing. I'm intrigued by this because I am sure that the idea of Dyer at right-back has come about due to something they have noticed by tracking him or analysing his game through one of his special methods. Sounds like Dyer is up for it too and if he has indeed been sold on it then it must have been a prettu impressive argument put forth for this change. This is all very different for us as it's been a while since we had someone thinking out of the box, but it's what we have been demanding and I must say it is really going to make next season interesting at the very least.

I sense a 3-5-2 from Big Sam with Dyer as a right wing back and Taylor as one of a back three.

Ujpest Doza is our first official ITK! Take a bow son ... someone give that man a badge. He also said Taylor had been promised a first team place so that must be true too.

No worries city you'll get Deschamp or even Houllier. There are a lot of decent managers available, and as long as the takeover goes through you'll be fine. If not though ... I suspect you'll be after propa players and wide playing non-wingers and you'll definitely be needing a whole lot of lady luck's favour.

I watched him against Wales and although he wasn't tested a lot he did look very athletic and he had pace too, which was nice too see especially as he is pretty tall. He got caught one on one with Bellamy out wide at one point, but did an excellent job of facing up to him and bending his knees and getting nice and low, and he was able to stay in front of him and Bellars had to settle for wacking it off his legs for a corner. He certainly looks like he has the physical tools which is good. I know someone will say Boumsong looked like he did too, but he looked faster and more athletic than Jean-Alain.

Hell of a difference though in the abilities of Roy Keane and Joey Barton. That sooooooooooo wasn't/isn't the point dude ... So what your essentially saying is that it is alright to have a horrific character as long as your as good as Keane was?

I've always though Barton was most similar to Roy Keane in temperament than any of the other idiots he has been compared to like Bowyer. Keane is seen as some kind of legend though ... go figure. Not surprised to here that Sunderland was one of the other teams most interested in getting him. No doubt Keane sees a bit of himself in the lad.