merlin

good move for both sides imo. they desperatly needed a quality CB. Agreed - he's a good CB and could be the signing that keeps them up, even though they are payinga fortune in wages.

With a better manager, I would reduce my forecast to 5 mainly because of the new signings. As it is, with Pardew in charge and Reading getting another good point last night, I'm sticking with the original 7 until I see concrete evidence that the players are going to be used properly.

Nice post, I agree about giving him until the end of the season, Some of the subs baffle me but as you say he seems to have the support of the dressing room which is a major plus. Hopefully this could be the result that kicks our season into gear?!? You cannot keep quoting last season's results to defend a manager - Pardew has form with other clubs that indicate he has initial success with a club then it all goes pear-shaped...why does anyone believe it will be different at NUFC ? I know for a fact that the Southampton Chairman warned that this would happen when he joined us.

I'm going to quote that again because it's just hilarious and frighteningly true at the same time. All true - Pardew has Plan A...then he has Plan A.

Dear "Derek", your mate Pards is putting too many square pegs into round holes and has been doing for some time. Cisse on the right wing, Mbiwa in midfield, Ameobi in midfield, Anita at right back Demba Ba stuck out on the left etc etc.... the list goes on and has done for months now. His tactical nous is also highly questionable and he has form for doing well in his first full season at whatever club he is at and struggling after that. Check his stats...... These things are contributing to the fact of why we are getting "knobbed on a regular basis" by supposedly inferior teams. Have a nice day! PS/.. Man United do not replace attackers with defensive midfielders when they are chasing a game unlike a certain somebody does at Newcastle United. You might be on to something here, Wally - I asked last week whether this guy could be a board troll... Nail on head.

He would want another striker, but he would make a brilliant side out of the players we have now.

For a penalty to be awarded 1 or more of these should happen. The ball or player must be travelling/facing towards goal. There is a goal scoring opportunity. A deliberate hand ball. If there is a foul in the box and non of those situations apply then it is an indirect free kick. Rule 1 in Refs handbook - 'the referee's decsion is final'...Pat Partridge confrimed that...

... Gouffran? He doesn't look like Supermac Mk 2 to me...!

In 1972, we lost to Non-league Hereford, then beat Man U at OT the follwing week... That's the Cup. Incidentally, that was the last time we beat Man U at OT......

Utter Utter Utter Garbage We held on after being under the cosh, having gifted them a goal - if Simpson had done what Debuchy did he'd be getting crucified on here, Krul actually made some saves for once. We won away from home, Cabaye and Sissoko were excellent until they tired. We won after a team came back at us, previously a team scores and we fold, this time we didn't. Laugahable !!, when we lose it's Pardew's fault, when we win it's despite Pardew. WE WON A GAME, AWAY FROM HOME, NO LESS !!! If winning 4-0 is your benchmark of acceptability, you may as well pack in and start watching basketball. Confidence is an incremental thing and I'll quite happily take some scraped results whilst it builds. Either you have as much comprehension of tactical changes as Pardew has or you never actually watched the second half. Oh I'm sorry, I didn't realise you were a professional coach, which club do you work for ?? BTW - Yes we were poor second half, but we hung on, Debuchy doesn't have a brainfart and they would have fizzled out. Them scoring early combined with our lack of confidence meant we were on the back foot. Agree with the changes or not - we held on, and we won, ergo the substitutions worked. Do you have a problem with people passing an opinion that doesn't go along with yours ? What makes YOU think you are in a position to use your pathetic attempt at sarcasm by asking another poster if they were a qualified coach ? You lost any credibility when you started quoting Talksh--e - those people are living adverts for the lousy standard of the UK media, and as for the BBC...doesn't that stand for the Biased Broadcasting Corp ? IF you want to judge any situation properly, you try to get as much info about it as possible....you claim that you want to give Pardew time - have you studied his record with his previous clubs ? Has it occurred to you that there may JUST be a pattern there...? If you are a Pardew fan that's fine....just don't expect the rest of us to take the sort of crap you are dishing out in his defence if we disagree - and the percentages of voters who either have lost faith with him or didn't have much in the first place far outweighs those with opinions like yours. You can freely discuss your views about the majority when you meet with those who think like you in a telephone box.....

Debuchy has shown good attacking skills in his games so far, but is unconvincing when a quick forward takes him on for pace in defence. This could well be that he is used to more time on the ball and to be able to support attacks in the French league and that is not available to him in the PL. He is a quality player, but it may take him a while to adjust...look at Colo's first season...

Basically this - we were lucky to win this match, Krul saving our bacon in the second half with at least 3 great saves....all caused by handing the initiative to Villa, who, thanks to Lambert's HT reorganization, really put us under the screw. They went for it with 3, sometimes 4 up front and with Gutierrez having a nightmare second half, our m/f couldn't cope at times. Naturally, we reverted to hoofing the ball forward once Shola came on, and needless to say, he lost it more times than not.This is Pardew's favoured tactic. Pardew had millions of pounds worth of talent in the side and still managed to make us look worse than Villa in the second half...their side cost a fraction of ours. We have some great players but we are never going to see the best of them under this man...some may disagree, but that's my opinion. do you not think sissoko and cabaye had crap second halves ? Yes - but to try to use that as an excuse for Pardew is ridiculous. Sissoko will take a few games to get up to the speed of the PL game and Cabaye is still a bit short of proper fitness - do you not think that they both did enough to win us the game in the 1st half and then the manager did his best to muck it up with the usual subs and hoofing balls up to Ameobi ? And what about Jonas' hopeless contribution in the second half ? No wonder Cabaye and Sissoko were finding it tough.....

It was a clumsy challenge by Debuchy - he didn't even need to try to tackle at that point as the player was going away from goal. He caught him without touching the ball so it was a pen....we probably wouldn't have been awarded it, but that's what happens in away games.

We had a bad run under KK during the promotion season, but the team never lacked confidence and Keegan never let them.... Its up to the manager to take the pressure and sort out the team...whether in their heads or on the training ground.

We almost threw this game away after dominating the first half. The crucial moment for me was N'Zogbia's shot hitting our post when we were 1-0 up - a goal for them then could have changed the whole game. You wouldn't have thought so until you saw the abysmal second half performance, assisted once again by Pardew's subs and his inability to deal with a rival manager's tactical changes. Had Krul not been on top form we could well have lost and that would have been criminal after gaining such a good advantage in the first half.....he made at least 3 top class saves. Sissoko was the stand out of the new signings with his first half display and great pass for Cisse's goal. Another brilliant strike from Cabaye and his all-round committment gave us a solid base to win the match - we then proceeded to attempt to throw it all away. Colo was a rock in the second half and I stick to my view that if we lost this guy before May, we would be a favourite to go down because it will take time for Yanga-Mbiwa to adjust to the PL. Jonas was awful in the second half and he is surely coming to the end of his time with us now....his disappearance meant that our flanks were constantly coming under pressure . Why they shoved Anita up front was a mystery to me but then again, we lack pace up front. Cisse is not slow, but it is his anticipation which is his biggest threat...he is not fast over a distance. As for Shola...no words needed apart from the fact that his presence was our cue to begin hoofing..... Relieved that we got the points but we are not out of the woods yet and NUFC fans could well win the prize for the most bitten finger nails by the time May arrives with Pardew in charge. We have some excellent players but we are never going to see the best of them under this guy.

IF we had some pace up front I could see us getting a result of sorts in this game because we could put some pressure on the weakest area of their team. As it is, I can't see us getting anything although I suspect the m/f battle will now be a lot closer than it would have been before Sissoko was signed. We need a striker with real pace in order to make the best of our m/f...neither Cisse or Ameobi are blessed with it although Cisse's anticipation off the mark is what makes him damgerous.

Sissoko had a decent debut...brilliant pass for the Cisse goal. Looks mobile and strong but faded in second half - will be a big asset once he gets some proper direction....don't know when that will be though..!

Basically this - we were lucky to win this match, Krul saving our bacon in the second half with at least 3 great saves....all caused by handing the initiative to Villa, who, thanks to Lambert's HT reorganization, really put us under the screw. They went for it with 3, sometimes 4 up front and with Gutierrez having a nightmare second half, our m/f couldn't cope at times. Naturally, we reverted to hoofing the ball forward once Shola came on, and needless to say, he lost it more times than not.This is Pardew's favoured tactic. Pardew had millions of pounds worth of talent in the side and still managed to make us look worse than Villa in the second half...their side cost a fraction of ours. We have some great players but we are never going to see the best of them under this man...some may disagree, but that's my opinion.

The problem in Oz is that youngsters are directed towards Oz rules once they get past 10 or 11 but there are loads of kids playing the round ball game and an Academy set up there would have enabled us to grab the best ones and improve them. Once players show talent and potential, they are usually snapped up by overseas clubs as happened with ourselves and Curtis Good...Rojas will also go soon and Dutch/German clubs seem to find it easier to get round Work Permit rules than English ones. England is not producing good players because PL clubs can buy foreigners cheaply but that has not always been the case - before the PL began, it was a regular thing that top clubs bought players from lower league UK clubs ; Kevin Keegan was bought by Liverpool from Scunthorpe and Supermac first started his career as a FB at Fulham before Alec Stock saw his potential and took him to Luton where he became a 30 goal a season striker that cost us a massive(at the time)tranfer fee of 180,000 in 1971. The Charlton Bros, Colin Bell and Howard Kendall were all NE boys who went on to play for England, the former in the side that won the WC and Bell in the team that defended it in Mexico, so we have produced top players....there is a problem with schools not encouraging sport as much now and the French are only producing good players because they set up their main Academy in the early 90s after years of second-rate football - I saw England beat them 5-0 at Wembley in 1969 but whilst they have concentrated on bringing through good technical players, the English FA have made a hash of the whole thing and too many kids now play with computers than with a football...

The calls for Pardew's head began LONG before this match - a bad result here would simply be fuel to the existing flames...

Academies - now THERE is an interesting topic...! Back in 1997, I wanted SJH to set up an Academy in Oz.I spent a lot of time researching this and even had an interview with the Development manager for S.Australia in London to discuss this(the Academy was going to be set up in Adelaide as that was the most central point in the south of the country) Unfortunately, Sir John was suffering from health problems at the time and about to step down as Chairman so the idea never really got going because Shepherd and Fletcher had other -er - ideas about where money should be spent.. Once Freddie Fletcher confirmed that the club were not going ahead with the idea, I told a journalist friend of mine and he asked if I had any objections to him letting Alex Ferguson know ; as we weren't going to use it, I said OK. Ferguson was all in favour of it and Man U would have done this had the Sky takeover of that club gone ahead in 1998(it was over-ruled by the MMC). There were a number of reasons for choosing Oz - plenty of kids with British parents/Grandparents which would have enabled them to get work permits and also immigrants from other European countries. The absence of language problems and the ease that Australians can settle in the UK were other factors...Australia is far more similar to the UK in many ways than is the USA. When you look at what has happened since, we missed out on some good players - Harry Kewell was a young kid then, so was Mark Viduka. They are now starting to produce more good kids - Rogic has just signed for Celtic, Marco Rojas was watched by Liverpool and Juventus at the w/e and there are other emerging kids like Walker at Melbourne Heart who we may have been able to snaffle.. Strangely enough, Fat Fred DID go to Oz in 2002 to try to buy Newcastle United Jets in NSW but the owner, Constantine, did not want to sell at that time. When Ashley took over the club in 2007, I told Chris Mort about the proposal and he asked me to send him the details which I did ; whether Ashley ever saw it or did anything about it, I don't know....I expect Llambias thinks Australians don't play football but it is the fastest growing sport in the country - Melbourne Victory v Sydney FC was a sell out last w/e and Rojas scored twice in front of the Liverpool/Juventus scouts... I suppose that the club haven't even got a decent set-up in the NE, let alone Oz...they failed to qualify for the top league of Academies which even the Mackems managed. NUFC has always lagged behind other clubs in obtaining top NE talent - the last ones we had were Gazza and both young FBs, Steve Watson and Robbie Elliott... I suppose Lee Clarke also fitted the bill but he was never a top PL player as Gazza had been 10 years earler in the First Div. The club seems to think that tbey'll always be the target for youngsters in the NE, but unless you show that you really want to sign them and that their parents are satisfied that the club is going to develop and look after them, they will go elsewhere. The current regime seem happy enough to raid France for cheap quality players but they are still paying out millions for what are basically mercenaries....bringing through youngsters gives you players with at least a degree of loyalty to the club and its an area we have been sadly lacking in recent years.

I've never been impressed by this guy - he just doesn't seem to have the 90 minute determination that marks a top PL midfield player and I doubt that he'll ever make it in the top league.

Yep - totally agree Dave. The squad looks much better now and Ashley has done his bit, even though at least 2 of these signings should have arrived in July. We still need a decent striker and I wouldn't be averse to seeing either Tiote of Santon sold if it meant getting a top forward in now but I'm happy with the signings. Pardew now has no excuse for not putting a decent football team on the park now, esp when everyone is fit - it will take time for the new guys to bed in but a result at Villa is a must.

Thanks for letting us know then. There are actually sound reasons for both Tiote and Santon being possible sales - firstly, the club have spent far more than they intended to do in this window due to the dire league position and failure to strengthen last summer. Ashley will want to bring some money back in if possible and I wouldn't rule out a striker being signed if his club accept a deal towards the end of the deadline. Secondly, we have signed a LB and a RB in this window - Santon is wanted by at least 1 Italian club and if Ashley could get 8m plus, I reckon he would go. Tiote has not been a shadow of the player he could be and we have signed a good replacement in Sissoko ; we know Man U wanted him last summer but wouldn't pay the price...remember Llambias' comment about 'Purple players'....

I've lost whatever little trust I had in Pardew in the past few weeks, but f*** me how the hell would he get away with doing anything like you suggest? The circumstances are completely different to the above scenario. He is also a different person with different experience now! Is it not possible that he has learned something from that fiasco? Granted Pardew wasn't involved in what names we signed, but I'm fairly certain he knows our weaknesses, and will play the new players, moving heaven and earth for them in fact, as he knows they are the only chance we have of staying up. The circumstances are far from completely different - at West Ham, they were fighting against relegation just as we are now and it wasn't until he was pressured into playing Tevez regularly that they escaped....if you remember, Sheff Utd tried to get the Hammers relegated in their place because there was an irregularity with Tevez' registration or something and they said it was his goals that saved W Ham.... I do remember yes. 1) This was a few years ago, and Pardew will have learned from that 2) The Tevez/Mascherano transfers were dodgy, they didn't speak a word of English, and had no compatriots to help them settle in. Our new players will have a much easier time settling in. Do you know whether the new players speak English or not ? There are not just French speaking players in the side.... Also, Pardew's record at Charlton and Southampton suggests he doesn't learn from past mistakes....time will tell about that one....!