AyeDubbleYoo

There's a difference between being up for a scrap and being certain we're doomed though. Obviously I want the players to be fighting for our lives, but I don't want their heads down.

I hope they are thinking like the fans, and i especially hope the management are. Sleepwalking into relegation is about where its at at the moment. And it may have done us good to have spent some time in the bottom 3 before now to galvanise the minds in the same way as its produced 'shock' results for the smogs and Blackburn. I'm still an 8.25 but another of those shock results this weekend for us will go down very nicely. I know what you mean, but thinking "we're doomed" does nobody any good. I hope that they are being positive and determined to get out of it, I don't hope they think they're 80% certain to go down.

Luckily all the other teams have the same amount of games...

The amount of people on 8, 9 and 10 in this poll is scary... let's hope the players aren't thinking like the fans!

The Geremi/Smith/Butt thing is criminal, there's not a less mobile midfield in the country.

They know a good player when they see one?

It probably does, aye. He's a coach anyway, we've established now he's not yet a manager - certainly not at a club of our size.

I hope that Kinnear will choose to retire for the sake of his health at the end of the season anyway. He is obviously putting himself under too much stress being in full time manager.

Do you think Harper decided himself to punt the ball upfield at every opportunity against Bolton and Hull or did Hughton have some influence?? The team selection, tactics and confidence of the manager has a huge influence on the way the players set about the opposition. I don't think it's any coincidence that we played very well for half an hour against the Mancs when very little was expected of the players and Hughton stumbled across a formation that suited the players we had available for that game. He obviously told the players to go out and hit the Mancs with pace on the break. It's also obvious that Hughton wasn't able to look Michael Owen and Nicky Butt in the eye and tell them that he wasn't going to start with them against Hull. Yeah, all fair points, I'm not a big fan of Hughton either. He wouldn't be the only manager unable to drop a big-name pro though.

The players have to take their share of blame for not being up for the smaller games too. If they could put in Man Utd work every week we would already be safe.

Still no, it's not about those specific players, they're just one symptom of being a poor manager.

Same here, the only thing I can accept is the fact that JFK is a yes man and is just happy to have a job, therefore Ashley has nobody to talk back to him. JFk knows that if he says anything out of like Ashley will just chop him. It's an easy appointment for Ashley to make, he & Lambias are just pupped masters as long as JFK stays. Yep, I know what you mean. I don't think that Ashley really wants to be in control of the squad/team via a 'yes man' though, I suppose it's only when it comes to transfers he doesn't want a repeat of the Keegan situation. He needs to accept that managers want a large say on transfers though, and he either needs to let them have it or get in a manager that is used to a DOF system.

We usually do well at home against Arsenal, just hope we do have a few players back, something with legs in CM is vital.

Sorry, I haven't read the whole thread, but the question is ludicrous. In what world could that happen, and for God's sake why?

Do you really want to drink another 3 or 4 pints at the match anyway? People are already complaining it's too expensive.

Can't stand it at the Rugby and Cricket when people are getting up and down every 10 minutes to go to the bar, and carrying 4 pints back to their mates, spilling bits of them over everyone in the row. Don't see a problem with the current setup, once the game starts I'm concentrating on that anyway, it's not a pub.

I can't get my head around the Kinnear situation. I can understand that he was brought in as a short term option when Ashley was planning to sell the club ASAP. But now he is here for the longer term I can't see any argument for keeping JK on. It will obviously be difficult to oust him now when he's ill, so by all means bring someone in for the rest of the season and then get rid of them both in the summer. For some reason I can't accept that Ashley actually thinks JK is a top class manager, and is good enough for NUFC. It just can't be true!

About a 6 for me... if we played the rest of the season 10 times I reckon we'd go down in just over half of them. What gives me some hope is watching the other rubbish teams around us, all of them are struggling to get results. I'm past predicting to be honest, I'm just praying it doesn't happen.

agreed, I want to buy that asap...anyone have anymore info? It's already available, there's a link somewhere up in this thread. It's not our new kit though.

Exactly, not sure if sponsors would be prepared to pay a fortune knowing that everyone will still call it SJP. It might actually make people more hostile to the company, spoiling the name of the ground etc. As others have said, works better with a new ground than renaming an existing one. Just hope it never happens.

Isn't Allardyce the only manager that Ashley has sacked?

This is pretty much what it comes down to. What Ashley is trying to do with the club's finances is completely sensible and, beyond that, may become the only way to run a football club in the next few years. However, it obviously depends on staying up as relegation would destroy our future prospects.

Maybe gold, like the gold of the badge?

That's really nice, would prefer the adidas stripes in black if I changed anything. Would love to see us have a kit as nice as that... unlikely though.

I had a Liverpool annual when I was really little, can't remember 'supporting' them but it freaked me out when I found it at my Gran's house! I actually came to football quite late, not until secondary school. My Dad took me to a toon game when I was younger than that, but I'm told I fell asleep at SJP.