Wallace

http://www.timesandstar.co.uk/tavernier-put-saturday-s-horror-show-behind-him-by-time-the-following-wednesday-arrived-1.891843?referrerPath=sport/carlisle-utd Carlisle Utd's Tavernier over 'personal blow' inflicted at Charlton

Santon was pushed off the ball quite easily at times last night but he just needs to get used to the physicality of the English game. With that in mind, I am not sure Stoke is the right game to introduce him as a starter.

I seem to recall the Chronicle saying that Simpson that was on a long list of players that England were monitoring last season. I guess that is where all the England talk originated from.

To be fair to Steve Wraith, whenever he is interviewed, he always makes a point of saying that they are his views only and he is not speaking on behalf of all the fans.

He was renting the house as well!!!

http://www.football365.com/faves/7251201/F365-s-Team-Of-The-Season-So-Far...

What I would like to know is when he is watching the games and hopefully enjoying the football, is he thinking "one or two more decent players and we really will have a good team" or is he calculating how much he will be able to sell player x next Summer.

I am sure I read that Papa Cisse signed a new contract with his club at the beginning of this season - if he did then he will cost more than he would have done in the Summer.

Probably the fact that the club were happy to sell him to Villa last Summer and he was on his way there to speak to them until the deal was called off might have given him a clue that he is not in Pardew's long-term plans espcially as the club do not have the excuse of him being a high wage earner or wanting out.

We've already got more points than anticipated so anything we pick up from those 3 games will be a bonus. It will be interesting to see how we do in the following games when we are once again playing against teams where we would hope to pick up points.

Yes - the old Albert/Robert song. It was being sung when he was applauding the fans after the match on Sunday.

5Live were saying earlier that he has been the best defender in the Premier League this season. Fans from other clubs are now starting to realise he is quality as well.

Most of the NUFC players spent a lot of time doing autographs and photos after the game. Ginola especially was there for ages as were Albert and Pav and Keegan was still signing stuff long after everyone else had gone.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/sammy-ameobi-i-look-up-to-him-so-much-i-want-to-be-the-complete-man-like-he-is-2368163.html Sammy Ameobi: 'I look up to him so much. I want to be the complete man, like he is' The Brian Viner Interview: Sammy Ameobi is following his big brother Shola into Newcastle United's first XI. They explain how family and faith have shaped them Monday, 10 October 2011 It is almost 25 years since a Nigerian academic and devout Christian, his bags packed ready to return to his teaching job in Africa after a year studying at Newcastle University for a PhD in agricultural engineering, decided that God was telling him, his wife and their young children to stay put. There was work to do on Tyneside. Today, John Ameobi is pastor of Newcastle Apostolic Church in the Spital Tongues area of the city, and his oldest son, Shola, is a star at another nearby place of worship, St James' Park. Moreover, Shola's much younger brother, Sammy, is on the fringes of the Newcastle United first team, having made his debut as a substitute in the 2-2 draw at Stamford Bridge last season and helped create a stoppage-time equaliser. It seems as if the Almighty might also have had the fortunes of the Magpies in mind when He prevailed upon John Ameobi to unpack. In his post-match interview after that game against Chelsea five months ago, Newcastle manager Alan Pardew referred to Sammy simply as "Shola's brother". But if Shola is right, there will come a time when the Gallowgate faithful know him principally as Sammy's brother. "If Sammy fulfils his potential he can do anything he wants in the game," says Shola. "I can safely say he's got a lot more ability than I've got. I know he's always wanted to emulate me, but at home he was always nervous around me. He'd confide more in my sisters than me. But it was always obvious that he had this immense talent, which he's harnessed on his own. And now that he's broken into the first team he relates to me more. It's been great to see his progress." Sammy beams. Sitting in a small office at the Newcastle training ground, the brothers couldn't look more Nigerian, and couldn't sound more Geordie. Shola, who turns 30 this week, is tall; Sammy skinnier and even taller. There are more than 10 years between them, as well as a middle brother, Tomi, who was also on the books at Newcastle, then Leeds United, and now plays in the Icelandic league. A sister, Titi, is a talented athlete. They are some family, and it is some story. The Tyneside dimension of it began in a small house just a few streets from St James' Park. "There was just me and my three sisters then," Shola recalls. "And when we first came over my mum was the only one allowed to work, because my dad's visa didn't let him. She had a part-time job and we all had to live on what she earned, which was only £15 a week. But we never felt we were lacking anything." Except, I venture, sunshine. He laughs. "Yeah. It was around this time of year that we first arrived from Nigeria to join my dad. He'd bought us each a duffel coat, and we even used to sleep in them. That first winter we never took them off." His parents were advised by the children's teachers to speak only English at home, and so gradually the young Ameobis lost their command of their first language, Yoruba. But sounding more and more like Geordie kids did not help them look like Geordie kids, at least by the preconceptions of the time. The family had moved further from the city centre to Fenham, where they knew only one other black family. "There were times when I had to make some quick exits," says Shola, recalling the racism with which he was all too frequently confronted as a boy. "From the age of about eight to 13, there were times when I had to run for my life. One time, on Stanhope Street, I turned a corner and seven or eight lads just started chasing me. I must have been running for 20 minutes trying to lose them." For Sammy, life was easier. "It's lightened up a lot since Shola was young," he says. "There was the odd time when I was chased by someone riding a bike, and had to run home and lock the door behind me, but it never really knocked me, or changed me." It is dispiriting yet satisfying at the same time to think that those boys who chased the Ameobis, and subjected them to racial abuse, might now be in the crowd at St James' Park celebrating them. Shola accepts the irony. "But I don't hold a grudge. People back then didn't have the information they have today." I risk the crass observation that it might have been running for his life that made him so quick. "That's my theory, too," he says, with a merry guffaw. "It kept me on my toes." But the main thing he did with his feet was kick. And kick, and kick. "I used to go through a pair of trainers a week. I still remember being at primary school and finding a little pebble outside my house, which I kicked all the way to school, about a mile and a half away. And I played football in the street to the extent that my mum used to threaten to take the ball away. But I never had a pair of boots until I was 12." By then, the Newcastle scout Brian Clark had spotted him, and he joined the club academy. Even then he had no particular aspirations to build a career in football. "I remember the night that changed," he says. "I was sitting in the East Stand Paddock where all the academy boys sat, on the night [in September 1997] that Faustino Asprilla scored his hat-trick against Barcelona. I was 15, and I remember saying to myself, 'This is what I'm going to do'. Seeing the joy that [3-2] game brought to so many people, that was very profound to me." In the meantime, his hard-working, well-educated parents insisted that he take his schoolwork seriously. He duly got 11 GCSEs, and excelled in science. But football had claimed his heart, and Newcastle saw enough ability to keep him on. He was an attacking midfielder, not an out-and-out striker, but Asprilla, Les Ferdinand and Alan Shearer were the men he studied. And then came the chance to rub shoulders with them, or at any rate with Shearer, the other two having moved on. It came out of the blue, delivered by the man he considers to have been a second father, even though he rarely got Shola's name right. "I was 18 years old, preparing for a youth-team match at Durham. The first team were training at Chester-le-Street, and one of the security guys came down and spoke to the coach, who called me over. I thought I was in trouble, but he told me I was needed at Chester-le-Street. It turned out Sir Bobby Robson had been watching me play. He said to me, 'You're going to train with us this morning'. Then he said, 'I'm going to put you on the bench tomorrow.' I thought I was going to explode. I just didn't know what to say to him. I was in shock..." At St James' Park the following day, he came on against Chelsea with 20 minutes to go. And very quickly won the admiration of the home supporters by refusing to be intimidated by nasty little Dennis Wise. "I'd gone up for a challenge against one of their centre-halves, and I was getting off the floor when he came and stood over me, and said something. I just pushed him away." The crowd cheered, among them his impressionable kid brother. If Newcastle v Barcelona in 1997 had made Shola determined to be a professional footballer, for Sammy it was Newcastle v Chelsea three years later. "Football wasn't really my thing until I saw Shola make his debut that day," he says. "I looked up to him so much, and I still do. He's a massive inspiration to me, especially his professionalism. Everything he does is right, on and off the pitch. I want to be the complete man, like he is." It was fitting that Chelsea should again be the opposition when Sammy, shortly after his 19th birthday, made his debut. And what made it even sweeter was that Shola was playing, too. "I thought I was on the bench just to make up the numbers, but when I came on, and Shola was on as well ... I can't really describe in words how I felt. It was a big day for our family. And it was live on TV. My mum and dad rushed home from church to watch it." So far in this unexpectedly high-flying season, Sammy has been restricted to cameo performances. He is currently suffering a hamstring strain, while Shola has a groin problem. It might be a while before they play again together, but then Pardew doesn't have the attacking options he enjoyed before the departure of Andy Carroll. "I've every chance now," says Sammy. "And the more versatile I am, the better chance I've got. I feel I'm going back to the way I used to be, playing more as a winger. I love running at defenders. But if I have to play as a striker then I'll do it." Pardew, he says, has been a source of great encouragement, and when he refers to him as Shola's brother it's not because he's forgotten his name. Which brings us back to the man whose life-size image still adorns, and whose charisma still radiates, the Newcastle manager's office. Shola confirms the truth of the wonderful old story about a reporter asking him if he had a nickname. "No, not really," he replied. "So what does Bobby Robson call you?" the reporter asked. "Carl Cort," he said. He laughs when I mention it. "I came into the team because Carl Cort was injured, but in training he used to shout at me 'Carl! Carl!' Because, you know, we were both tall black guys. But Carl wasn't even there. And I would only respond to my name. So he used to turn to his coaches, and say 'Why is Carl ignoring me?' The coaches are laughing, and he'd carry on, 'Carl, look at me!' And finally I'd realise he meant me, and say, 'It's Shola, gaffer'. He'd go, 'Well, Shola then...' So when that guy asked what he called me, I said Carl Cort." The little office is full of laughter. "I owe everything to Sir Bobby Robson," adds Shola, more soberly. "He really was another father figure, and I was in contact with him even just before he died. He taught me things on and off the pitch, like not getting carried away with all the trappings. And his enthusiasm rubbed off on me. Every day he was the first through the door and the last out, at his age. He had all the money he could ever want, but his hunger for the game shone through. I took all that on board." Sammy nods, taking it on board too, at one remove. He still lives at home, and his stature as a Premier League footballer does not stop his parents waking him up to go to church on a Sunday morning. Both brothers are committed Christians. "It has kept me going," says Shola. "I'm doing what I love, playing football, but it's second to my faith. When I had a career-threatening hip injury five years ago, it was touch and go for a while. It was a terrible time, but I felt God was going to see me through, and He did. It also helped when the club got relegated. That was a terrible time for the city, but in the end it's done us a world of good, bringing us all together. And now that all those big names have moved on, that's really bonded us, too, as a team. We work for each other and that epitomises the city, a city of people who work hard and want to see a team who do the same." If it didn't seem irreverent, I would say amen.

:lol: Did N-O start that nickname off? (I'd like to think so anyway ) Wasn't it Taylor and Besty on Twitter.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/oct/07/nolberto-solano-english-boys-lazy Nolberto Solano: 'Music can lift my soul but football is my passion'The adopted Geordie is helping a new generation at Newcastle as his playing days wind down with Hartlepool Louise Taylor guardian.co.uk, Friday 7 October 2011 Nolberto Solano regularly spends spare afternoons coaching Newcastle United's Under-11 squad. Sometimes he decides a short walk is in order and takes the boys on a tour of the club's adjacent first-team training facilities. "Children need to dream and they see things which give them a lot of dreams," says the former Newcastle, Aston Villa and Peru right-winger, now enjoying cult status down the road at Hartlepool United. "They stare at the nice cars in the car park and say they want to become professionals too but then I explain it's not as easy as it looks. It helps them realise there's a lot of work ahead and a long way to go." Solano has been on quite a journey since his boyhood as the youngest of seven siblings growing up in an unforgiving Lima shanty town. His evenings were devoted to practising playing his prized possession, a trumpet, but any daylight hours not eaten up by school were spent kicking tin cans and cardboard boxes around the local streets. "It helped my first touch," says the 36-year-old, whose arrival at League One Hartlepool has not only boosted season ticket sales but inspired an unlikely promotion push. "The street is where I got all my skills. The problem for English boys is that they've got so many other things to do they can become lazy about football practice." Not that Solano entirely subscribes to the view that modern affluence is the enemy of youthful talent. "I'm sure children are getting cleverer – I think using computers is making them brighter," he argues. "If you talk to my Newcastle boys about tactics their understanding is amazing. I couldn't have grasped the same ideas at their age. Managing so much new technology sharpens their football brains." Fame has a habit of insidiously changing players irrevocably but, despite his long-standing label as Peru's David Beckham, Solano is refreshingly devoid of the precious streak so many peers succumb to. Aware a knee operation means I am unable to drive, he readily agrees to meet at my mother's home in Newcastle, turns up precisely on time and proves politeness personified. It all rather chimes with the insight offered by a friend working at a nearby branch of Asda who reports that Solano ranks as a rare member of their football clientele prepared to pack his own bags at the checkout. "I like to live a normal life," he says with a shrug. "My Mum used to say: 'You're good at football and maybe you'll be a success but that doesn't mean your personality has got to change.' Whether you're an architect or an engineer or a footballer or a teacher we're all the same," he says. "Maybe some players nowadays need to be more sensitive in some ways; as Sir Bobby Robson used to tell us at Newcastle, everyone deserves the same respect." Hiding behind minders, electronic gates and blacked-out car windows would, in any case, have interfered with Solano's musical persona. These days he plays the trumpet in a Salsa band called the Geordie Latinos, which performs regular live gigs across the region, yet even at the height of his Premier League celebrity he felt the need to "socialise normally and play Salsa together with my friends in small bars". Word of his off-field gift spread to exalted circles. Sitting in Newcastle's dressing room following a Champions League fixture against Juventus in Turin, Solano was "shocked" when a familiar figure burst through the door and made a beeline for him. "It was Sting," he recalls. "He said 'Hi Nobby' in Spanish and we chatted. It was a great shock that Sting wanted to talk to me but I'd always loved The Police so it was a very nice experience." Suitably inspired, he dallied briefly with the idea of becoming a professional musician. "It's not easy, though, a full-time trumpet player practises six or seven hours a day," acknowledges Solano. "I enjoy doing a few gigs but playing every night would be hard. I love music and, on bad days, it lifts my soul but I have more passion for football." This abiding fixation explains why a creator once described as "my favourite player" and "the Little Master" by his former Boca Juniors team-mate and good friend Diego Maradona can be found converting classy free-kicks for Hartlepool. "The knees are feeling it more and more but football is my life, I'm enjoying League One and Mick Wadsworth is a great manager," says the man whose crosses conjured countless chances for Alan "he owes me many hundreds of goals" Shearer. Now in charge at Victoria Park, Wadsworth first met the Peruvian during his time as Robson's assistant at Newcastle. "I was with Hull last season but I wasn't playing, I got bored and gained weight," reveals Solano. "I'd decided I wanted to manage eventually and I also hoped to be able to live in Newcastle again so I spoke to Mick. He said: 'Join Hartlepool, I'll help you with your coaching badges and you enjoy yourself playing as much football as you want for us.' At the moment things are going well, it's all looking very good. We're in a very tight division but, while getting promoted will be difficult, it's not impossible." Television viewers can assess Hartlepool's potential when the cameras capture their game at Notts County on Sunday. It is the sort of journey Newcastle would automatically make by air but Solano is sanguine about the impending four-hour each way bus trip. "We go everywhere, even Bournemouth, by coach. We sometimes travel for six, seven or eight hours; when you finally get home it's a big moment," he says. "Because I enjoy playing so much it's no big bother and my team-mates are great boys but it's very different from before. At Newcastle we flew everywhere; if the lads went on a coach for even three hours they'd go mad." Whenever Hartlepool commitments permit, Solano heads to St James' Park on match days. "I've been to watch the lads a few times," he says. "It's different from playing there but being back still feels great. I see Fabricio Coloccini and Jonás Gutiérrez [Newcastle's Argentinian duo] socially and I think the team's got a real chance of doing well. It will be tougher when winter comes but Alan Pardew encourages intelligent football – he's doing a good job." Solano might be talking about his home-town club and, in a sense, he is. An occasionally complicated private life may have ensured that things on Tyneside have not always been straightforward but the good times have easily outweighed the bad. So much so that the boy from Lima is now very much an adopted Geordie. "Newcastle's where I want to be," he says. "It's a beautiful, welcoming city; I feel comfortable here." He smiles at a suggestion that he sounds like a St James' manager in waiting. "It's easy to say but very hard to do," Solano says with a laugh. "I learnt a lot about the difficulties playing for Ruud Gullit at Newcastle. He was a fantastic coach but too young to be a manager; he wasn't experienced enough to handle big dressing-room personalities like John Barnes, Robert Lee, Duncan Ferguson and Alan Shearer. So I want to go slowly at first, be a coach then an assistant. After that, we'll see but, for now, I want my Under-11s to enjoy themselves, express themselves, play intelligent football – and dream."

http://www.thenational.ae/sport/football/the-french-influence-at-newcastle The French influence at Newcastle Ian Hawkey Oct 5, 2011 There are always urgent questions at Newcastle United. It goes with the territory, with the large and loyal band of supporters, with the club's habit of extreme plunges and leaps of fortune from one year to the next. Yet the questions posed at the beginning of this season, Newcastle's second since being promoted back to the Premier League in 2010, seemed pertinent, not least because they were being posed by one the club's most popular players. How, asked Joey Barton in July, were Newcastle going to replace Kevin Nolan, the captain who had been sold to West Ham United? By August, Barton had asked too many awkward questions and was moving on, too, to Queens Park Rangers. How, it was left for others to ponder, would Newcastle fill the gaps left by both Barton and Nolan? Here is a convincing reply: Yohan Cabaye. The 25-year-old Frenchman, recruited from Lille in the summer, has proved an instant success on Tyneside, offering to a more mobile, and currently top-four, Newcastle team much of Barton's admired gumption and bite, as well as Nolan's ambitious eye for goal. "He's a genuine talent," Alan Pardew, the Newcastle manager, said, "and when he's on the ball he's great to watch." Pardew has also praised the midfielder's swift adaptation to the "crazy pace of the Premier League". Cabaye has rapidly made himself at home, he says, because so many like-minds are around him. Newcastle are an increasingly francophone club, what with the French-speaking Demba Ba up front, the France international Hatem Ben Arfa coming back from a long injury and his compatriot Gabriel Obertan offering speed on the flank. And English football is hardly impenetrable territory for a good French anchor midfielder. Many of the Premier League's best teams have been built around them, from Patrick Vieira at Arsenal to Claude Makelele at Chelsea. Cabaye's football is not quite in their style. At 5ft 9ins (1.75m), he does not have the commanding physique or the telescopic reach in the tackle of a Vieira. And he is more forward-thinking than Makelele, as 13 Ligue 1 goals for Lille last season shows. He possesses an unusually powerful shot from distance, which has already scalded the palms of a few goalkeepers in England and skimmed crossbars and posts. But it is his capacity for organising the game from his deep role that gains Cabaye most of his plaudits. He is an excellent first-time passer, and, that, coupled with a combative streak, is propelling him up the hierarchy in his national squad. Cabaye was given his first France cap 14 months ago, on the debut of Laurent Blanc, the new national coach. Now, he is starting to look like Blanc's preferred choice in the centre of midfield: Cabaye can realistically expect to keep the first XI place he had in France's last match against Romania when Blanc's team take on Albania this Friday. Before joining Newcastle, Cabaye had been a one club footballer. He comes from the north of France, and enrolled with Lille in his early teens. His father, Didier, had been a promising footballer when he was young, although a serious injury prevented him developing at Lens. Cabaye was lucky in that he joined a Lille who were progressing. He made his Champions League debut at 19, and when the club appointed Rudi Garcia as their new head coach in 2008, he found his role redefined: he was asked to play the sentry less and the playmaker more, and, with his more attacking outlook, he and Lille thrived. That season, he would reflect, contained several turning points. A red card in the derby against Lens, and subsequent ban, caused him "to think more responsibly". He certainly took a great deal of responsibility for Lille's triumphant 2010/11 campaign. The club celebrated a double of French Cup and their first league championship for more than 40 years. Newcastle acted fast to offer him a five-year contract. He arrived there thrilled with his freshly-minted winners' medals and would later say to French media he had been taken aback that in Tyneside, Lille's successes made little news. "There's no French football shown on TV here," he said. He then realised the north-east of England can seem insular simply because its fans are so focused. "We played friendlies pre-season against Darlington and Leeds and first 6,000 and then 20,000 Newcastle fans travelled," he said, wide-eyed. He approves of that. "If you show you are committed the fans get right behind you. What I like is that they even applaud you for doing the defensive tasks well. I'm convinced it's the best league in the world."

http://www.express.co.uk/football/view/274823/Little-Master-Nobby-Solano-is-still-so-grand LITTLE MASTER NOBBY SOLANO IS STILL SO GRAND Nobby Solano is now playing for Hartlepool Saturday October 1,2011 By Niall Hickman ASIDE from Alan Shearer, there has been no more popular footballer on Tyneside in recent years than Nobby Solano, which is why his brush with bankruptcy triggered shock waves throughout the North-east. In two spells at St James’ Park, Solano became the most revered winger since the Nineties heyday of David Ginola. He was a Peruvian trickster who seemed something of a throwback to when every side had a creative beacon in their ranks. Solano, who is now coaching Newcastle’s Under-11s, ended his playing association with the club in 2007 before spells at West Ham, Larissa in Greece, Leicester and Hull City led him to his current club Hartlepool. It was during his short time in Greece that his marriage ended and the money troubles began, but Solano is hoping the bankruptcy order issued this month will soon be reversed. “It is in the hands of my lawyers and I am hoping something will be done to reverse it because it has obviously been a deeply upsetting and disturbing time for me,” said 36-year-old Solano. “It has been very embarrassing, but hopefully it will all be over and sorted out soon.” I would love to carry on coaching and obviously, if that happened at Newcastle, I would be delighted. Solano is not playing on for the money – far from it. He left Hull for Hartlepool in order to carry on doing the thing he loves best, lacing up his boots every week – a refreshing opposite to Carlos Tevez’s reluctance to get his knees dirty. “I just love playing week-in, week-out,” said Solano, who won 95 caps for Peru. “The knees are feeling it more and more and I am not too keen on pre-season training so this could be my last season. In fact, it probably will be, but when manager Mick Wadsworth rang me and said I would play every week, I said that was all I wanted. “Hartlepool have been really good for me. The people are fantastic and we have done really well this season, well enough to think that we could get into the play-offs. “That would be a real achievement bearing in mind the size of the club. I’ve enjoyed every minute of it.” They know a player when they see one at St James’ Park and, in his prime, Solano was a mercurial talent who lit up the Premier League. Not every player can boast being nicknamed the “Little Master” by Diego Maradona, but Solano can claim that distinction having played alongside the Argentina genius for a year with Boca Juniors, prior to joining Newcastle in 1998. His long-term goal is to settle in the North-east and he hopes the coaching he has been undertaking with Newcastle’s youngsters will lead to a permanent role. “I would love to carry on coaching and obviously, if that happened at Newcastle, I would be delighted. It is the club closest to my heart,” he said. “However, I know what football is like and if a coaching job came up somewhere else, of course I would have to consider it.” Solano certainly had to overcome plenty of adversity growing up in a Peruvian shanty town with his six brothers and sisters. Solano would take a three-hour round trip bus journey in order to get to football training and throughout his career he looked after his family financially. “I had a fantastic time playing for Peru and fortunately all my club managers, especially Bobby Robson, were very happy for me to go back home and play for my country,” he said. “We had a great side under Sir Bobby, which came so close to winning something. It was a shame we never did. “We were a very entertaining team and we could beat anybody on our day. We finished third, fourth and fifth in the league and maybe we should have won a trophy in that period. I’m delighted with the way they are playing now and Alan Pardew has done an incredible job.” It is Sheffield United at home today in front of a Victoria Ground full house, a return to something like the big time for Solano. “I’m just enjoying it for what it is,” he said. “Hartlepool have been very good to me. Everyone has been good to me.”

Yes.

Would love to see Tevez try and tell someone like Souness that he's refusing to come on. For all his bravado, wasn't it leaked that Souness was overawed by the swathes of fearless 20-somethings who wouldn't automatically show him respect and who he couldn't control? Relatedly, (altho not really anything to do with City, but relevant to Souness) I knew someone who was in the dressing room at NUFC and I remember being told that before a trip to Spurs away around New Years Stephen Carr was still recovering from an injury and Souness tried to pick him anyway. Carr refused to play and the medical staff backed him up - they were sick of being made to look inept in public when Souness blamed the massive number of injuries we had on everything that went wrong, and then pulled stunts like this. Carr still refused and Terry Mac then comes over shouting how he played European Cup matches with worse than that and Carr was a disgrace. Souness went public with it and gave the story to Alan Oliver - making Carr look a complete tit: As it turned out, Souness was gone in a month. John Beresford tells a similar story when he refused to play for us under Dalglish: Not hard to imagine Souness taking the hard line with Tevez when justified then, he does it when its totally unjustified. Personally I think the fabled 'Liverpool way' may play some part in Dalglish and Souness's thinking. Theres some ex Liverpool player on the after dinner circuit (I for get who) who for part of his act will ask the room "Who can remember the Liverpool physio's name when we won the cup in 1980 whenever it was?" Answer: "Nobody". I don't know if anyone remembers Phil Boersma? He was a mate of Souness' from Liverpool who ended up doing most of the physio work while someone very highly regarded (Paul Winsper, I think) stood around doing nothing. He got sacked suddenly and quietly at the FA Cup semi final farce because when everyone woke up on the day of the game Boersma was still up drinking from the night before! Possibly its the likes of Souness, Saunders, Boersma and McDermott who may explain the constant crippling injury crisies in the Souness days and not "Lady Luck". Heard alot of other stories of complete incompetence from that era as well. I strongly suspect that Dalglish is a similar sort of dinosaur to Souness and that Liverpool are heading into a mess with him in charge. I also still need to put the TV on mute whenever Souness appears. Nowt to do with City, but there you go. Souness also rushed Steven Taylor back too soon when he did his shoulder and it went again a few minutes into the match at Liverpool. Probably set the lad back a fair bit at a key stage in his development as he was only young at the time and it took him a long to recover from it.

You talk as if Pardew actually had a say in this sale I honestly reckon Pardew actively encouraged the removal of Nolan for somebody more dynamic. I know there's others on here who suspected he was never a fan months earlier. I recall an interview with Pardew towards the end of last season where he said he had given a list of players to be moved on to the board and a second list of players for whom we should consider any offers. I thought then that Nolan and Barton would be on that second list.

Let's hope that most clubs share Alan Brazil's opinion when he said on his show the other day that he doesn't rate him.

They've used those grow lights for a good few years now. I used to think they'd left the floodlights on as they are quite bright. i've just been to the front door with the dog and they're on tonight although my view is now being partly obscured by the new university buildings that are going up as part of the Science City Project. I think we were the first club to use them over here but most other clubs have now followed suit.

Glad this has all been done quietly and without any fuss. It is promising that the player was happy to sign - if he was unsettled, there was no need for him to sign a new deal.

Let's hope Colo is next. Mick Lowes said the other week the club were renegotiating contracts for both Colo and Jonas.