Lotus

Yet another person missing my point. They've shown yesterday that they CAN perform, and against a team bang in form. I don't see why we should be chopping and changing it every week. Stick with them and let them develop an understanding. If Bassong had a mare at LB then would you want him out of the team again? Ad infinitum. We ought to pick our best back four - with everyone in their natural positions - and stick with it IMO. I agree 100% that the back four should be the same week in week out, I just don't think Enrique at LB and Beye at RB in particular give us great attacking options which for my money is the best way to defend, i.e. from the front. The Chelsea match saw 10-11 men behind the ball whenever they were on it so not surprisingly the defence did well - all that cover and protection would help any under fire defence. We shouldn't use that one match in any way to justify the current back-four though as they were s**** against Wigan, especially at RB and LB. Hence my choice of Taylor at RB and Bassong at LB who hase the athleticism and pace to get forward from there while also being a competent defender. Enrique rarely passes the half-way line and that doesn't helpe neither the defence or the attack. On the other flank I think Beye is an excellent defender but going forward isn't the best. He isn't aggressive enough whereas Taylor is. Furthermore from yesterday's evidence a lot of Beye's best work came in the centre of defence covering for Colo or Bassong, he's a cool head in there and reads play well. I'd play him there alongside Colo. So you'd play 3 players out of position, basically? Fantastic. The players in question have played in the positions I'd personally like to see them operating from numerous times enough to be competent at least in those positions so I'd be more than willing to shift them around. Either way its give or take with whoever plays where anyway. Play Enrique at LB and you get a natural LB but you lose out in the final 3rd. Play Bassong at LB and you don't get a natural LB but as he's shown you do get some mobility down there and some pace too. Swings and roundabouts really with the personnel we have at our disposal. None of them fully convince me in their own "natural" positions except for Colo. I'd play Taylor and Bassong at full-back because they are better attacking options in those positions than Enrique and Beye in my view. I want my full-backs to attack and to support the wide men, to overlap and to give the front runners options as it pushes the opposition back and in doing so keeps them as far away from our own defence as possible which in theory anyway limits the risk of conceding. Taylor and Bassong are better suited and more inclined to play like that. Beye is suited to the centre alongside Colo who likes to vacate his position a lot. Bassong doesn't have the reading capabilities nor experience to cover for him in that way just yet and nor does Taylor, well he does try but makes a balls up of it, Beye reads the game well and has a wealth of experience. Against Chelsea when Colo went on walkabouts vacating his position, Beye filled in a number of times doing the job Bassong should have been doing. That's not a dig at the Frenchman by the way, he's young and learning still. Problem with FB's getting high up the pitch a lot is that when the oppostion counters it's a ball into the space vacated by the FB, CB comes across to cover and we have to rely on Nippy Nicky Butt to get back, fill the space and mark the on running midfielder who's about to have a free shot at goal. Can you see where this plan falls down?

That's the problem with the "squad" generally today, we have 1 decent first choice player for a position, but very little backup. Allardyce addressed those "problems in the squad" the following season spending substantially more than £5m (I assume you mean the defence) and we subsequently went on to concede twice as many goals - in no small part due to the midfield being weak. I don't think you and I are gonna disagree much on this tbh, but regards the defence. Allardyce bought a CB for <3m and one for free, and that's exactly what they looked like. I'd say he got his money's worth for those 2. Beye is a good buy and i think Ricky is a decent and promising defender. I think BSA thought he was addressing the MidF with Barton and Smith, Barton i could understand (BSA was unlucky with him tbf), Smith was a mystery in my eyes. BSA wasn't unlucky with barton. he knew exactly what he was buyong and if he bought him purely because of his on-field stuff ignoring the players wider life then BSA was a bigger fool than i thought. Barton broke a bone in preseason which i think affected his form. That's unlucky. I didn't know Barton was gonna spark off at some McDonalds and neither did BSA. I actually thought he'd have the brains to stay out of it. I was wrong there. no problem with him on the pitch. if it was that alone he is defintly a player to have based on his citeh form when we signed him. however you are in a small minority if you thought him kicking off again was unlikely. As i said, i was wrong. you can't do that on here. you have to twist and squirm and defend your view blindly no matter what,dodge questions,change the subject,derail the argument on to minutiae of the tiniest detail. That is not the road to emancipation my brother....

That's the problem with the "squad" generally today, we have 1 decent first choice player for a position, but very little backup. Allardyce addressed those "problems in the squad" the following season spending substantially more than £5m (I assume you mean the defence) and we subsequently went on to concede twice as many goals - in no small part due to the midfield being weak. I don't think you and I are gonna disagree much on this tbh, but regards the defence. Allardyce bought a CB for <3m and one for free, and that's exactly what they looked like. I'd say he got his money's worth for those 2. Beye is a good buy and i think Ricky is a decent and promising defender. I think BSA thought he was addressing the MidF with Barton and Smith, Barton i could understand (BSA was unlucky with him tbf), Smith was a mystery in my eyes. I mostly agree, but I didn't want to take this into a discussion about Allardyce, my point was that 1) it's not at all easy to improve a defence weak in all departments by spending £5m on it and 2) sometimes you can do more to improve your defence by improving your midfielders/attackers than you can by improving your defenders (I'd argue it's only really worth having quality defenders after you've got the other parts of the team sorted, but that's even further OT for this thread). That last point is interesting. I've heard a couple of posters say something similar and yet 'conventional wisdom' always seems to be that you build from the back. Not saying Alan Hansen is an authority but he says 'If you haven't got a defence you haven't got much.' You always hear pundits trotting out a similar line. Just cause they're on TV doesn't make them right but i genuinely want to know if you think differently and why cause i'm genuinely interested.

That's the problem with the "squad" generally today, we have 1 decent first choice player for a position, but very little backup. Allardyce addressed those "problems in the squad" the following season spending substantially more than £5m (I assume you mean the defence) and we subsequently went on to concede twice as many goals - in no small part due to the midfield being weak. I don't think you and I are gonna disagree much on this tbh, but regards the defence. Allardyce bought a CB for <3m and one for free, and that's exactly what they looked like. I'd say he got his money's worth for those 2. Beye is a good buy and i think Ricky is a decent and promising defender. I think BSA thought he was addressing the MidF with Barton and Smith, Barton i could understand (BSA was unlucky with him tbf), Smith was a mystery in my eyes. BSA wasn't unlucky with barton. he knew exactly what he was buyong and if he bought him purely because of his on-field stuff ignoring the players wider life then BSA was a bigger fool than i thought. Barton broke a bone in preseason which i think affected his form. That's unlucky. I didn't know Barton was gonna spark off at some McDonalds and neither did BSA. I actually thought he'd have the brains to stay out of it. I was wrong there. no problem with him on the pitch. if it was that alone he is defintly a player to have based on his citeh form when we signed him. however you are in a small minority if you thought him kicking off again was unlikely. As i said, i was wrong.

That's the problem with the "squad" generally today, we have 1 decent first choice player for a position, but very little backup. Allardyce addressed those "problems in the squad" the following season spending substantially more than £5m (I assume you mean the defence) and we subsequently went on to concede twice as many goals - in no small part due to the midfield being weak. I don't think you and I are gonna disagree much on this tbh, but regards the defence. Allardyce bought a CB for <3m and one for free, and that's exactly what they looked like. I'd say he got his money's worth for those 2. Beye is a good buy and i think Ricky is a decent and promising defender. I think BSA thought he was addressing the MidF with Barton and Smith, Barton i could understand (BSA was unlucky with him tbf), Smith was a mystery in my eyes. BSA wasn't unlucky with barton. he knew exactly what he was buyong and if he bought him purely because of his on-field stuff ignoring the players wider life then BSA was a bigger fool than i thought. Barton broke a bone in preseason which i think affected his form. That's unlucky. I didn't know Barton was gonna spark off at some McDonalds and neither did BSA. I actually thought he'd have the brains to stay out of it. I was wrong there.

I'd change Duff for Zog and Shola for Martins. Duff and Shola offer too little/nothing. They can come on if we need to make a sub.

That's the problem with the "squad" generally today, we have 1 decent first choice player for a position, but very little backup. Allardyce addressed those "problems in the squad" the following season spending substantially more than £5m (I assume you mean the defence) and we subsequently went on to concede twice as many goals - in no small part due to the midfield being weak. I don't think you and I are gonna disagree much on this tbh, but regards the defence. Allardyce bought a CB for <3m and one for free, and that's exactly what they looked like. I'd say he got his money's worth for those 2. Beye is a good buy and i think Ricky is a decent and promising defender. I think BSA thought he was addressing the MidF with Barton and Smith, Barton i could understand (BSA was unlucky with him tbf), Smith was a mystery in my eyes.

It's ok, we will get decent transfer fees for our young foreigners, Enrique and N'Zogbia who are obviously much worse than those two fossils. We should rename the ground to Jurassic Park. Christ, when you think of it like that, Riise and Duff. F**K me....... I know Zog and Ricky are young and will make mistakes but at least i'm confident they'll get better over time. The other 2.......... Hopefully this is all rumour that will amount to f**k all!

Not disagreeing with the majority of your post but the purchase of Duff was unecessary. We had a decent player in that position and more important areas to spend a third of the transfer budget. That's not hindsight, he was not in his prime, he was sold 'cheap' for a good reason. It's not a bad idea to take a gamble sometimes but we had other problems in the squad, LW was ok.

Don't think Riise is a better defender than Enrique in any way.

Would rather have someone who'd actually done it before, like.

If you can find a player who's good enough in midfield to defend and attack, great at both like Gerrard or Essien then you buy him. If you can't find or afford such a player you get someone who's good at some of it, either attacking or defending. There's plenty of players out there who can do either, pick 2 who the management believe will blend well and are affordable and buy them. Bob's your uncle.

How? Explain. Because he wouldn't have been able to waste so much money on bad players. So you're assuming that a DoF, simply because of their job title, wont waste money on bad players? I'm assuming he wouldn't have allowed Souness to waste money on bad players...otherwise what is the point? I'm guessing his point is, if you're a Chairman/Owner why would you trust a DoF to sign players if you don't think you can trust your manager too? If you can't trust your own judgement by giving the Manager the money to spend how can you trust your own judgement in recruiting a DoF to buy the players instead?

Manager should be in charge of the 1st team's training, selection, buying and selling. The club should have a scouting network in place which, whoever is Manager at the time, can use. Remeber Roeder saying the club had 1 scout, absolutely disgraceful for this club to have 1 scout. It's actually ridiculous. They should be like the Civil Service, availabe for whoever is in charge at the time Said scouts should befree for reserve/youth team signings with autonomy, i can't see that they need to be accountable to the 1st team manager regarding this. Club should have someone who can deal with contract and negotiations. If the Manager wants a player he shouldn't be burdened with arguing with the players agent over wages. Key point imo, the Board should have a member who knows something about football, someone to say, don't hire Graeme Souness, or SBR's getting on - replace him at the end of the season to limit disruption, or only let Roeder do the Caretaker role then find some body proper, or let Keegan get on with his job and don't undermine him with no-mark appointments - support him properly if you're going to employ in the first place. This bloke shouldn't be in charge of Managerial appointments, he should be a respected and trusted figure who will stay out of the Managers way (and the media limelight) and give his opinion. I'd appoint SBR if he wasn't so unwell. It should be the resonsibility of the Board to appoint and sack a manager, such important decisions shouldn't be down to DOF or Chief Exec or whatever job title alone, should be a collective responsibilty.

I have a nagging feeling Shearer's management style might be more Sounes than Keegan. He was never vocal, encouraging captain and i wonder if he would be as a Manager, especially when the results aren't going our way. I think the club should look for someone who's already proved they know what they're doing.

Not saying i'd want him but i'll bet Hughes will be out of a job by Summer 09 at least.

If there was a genuine intention to replace Milner with either of those players then why was the sale of Milner rushed through (so that he could play for one of our supposed rivals while we were short on numbers) before we were sure they would sign? Milner's replacement is and was always intended to be a 26 year old loanee who noone had heard of because he's only ever played 5 games in Europe. I'm willing to bet none of our brilliant new recruitment team had even seen him play. But hey, it was a great deal Just out of interest which of the games we've lost would we have won if Milner had been playing in your opinion? In which game do you think Milner would've been the difference between winning and losing?

Thought the thing with the debt was that by Ashley taking it over we reduced the interest payments. We all know he'll want that money back.

Why not start him? He's been our best CM this season by miles (not that it's saying much). Flimsy reason really, neither him nor Geremi can last 90 mins but i would reckon Guthrie would be better coming on and running around for 30 mins like a maniac protecting our (optimistic) lead.

Admit it, you didn't even read the report did you? If you mean the Telegraph article, yes i did. Not a whiz with figures by any means but the article says the club is on healthier footing, especially going forward into the future, debts down or consolidated, etc. If so, i would want to know why we seemed to have such a tight transfer budget, unless the plan was to sell the club soon. What am i missing? Genuine question btw.

.................Given................. Taylor....Colo...Bass....Enrique ............Geri.......Butt............ Duff............Owen.............Zog .................Xisco.................... Guthrie to come on for last 30 mins for either Butt or Geremi, probs Geremi.

If the club was that healthy financially then i'm astonished we didn't spend more on transfers this summer. It increasingly appears that that was never the plan.....

I think it's imperative to have someone on the Board who knows football though. I had appreciation for the old board (as stated previously) but at times their decisions regarding the managers was just stupifyingly ignorant. Sacking SBR after 4 games and replacing him with Souness!!!!! A man that everyone could see, and i mean everyone accept whoever appointed him, was going to clash with Bellamy (our best player imo) and ruin the team. I can't for the life of me imagine, Peter Kenyon, David Dein making that kind of decision. And then they compounded that by replacing him with Roeder. The result was utterly predictable. What you learn from that is, whoever on the old Board made these decisions, they weren't well informed. To help with that, you employ someone to advise on these matters. Someone who knows football. You don't have to give them the power to make the appointment but you should listen to what they have to say. Once the managers in place then you can make appointments with his approval for scouting, negotiating, etc. The youth team needn't be in the 1st team managers remit and so the appointments for those posts can be made independantly of the manager. As has been said, the players we've bought in this summer all look good value for money, we got good prices for who we sold too, no one can argue with that. I'm sure KK was happy with Guti, Colo and Guthrie. Xisco looks ok for the money but i can't say much after 1 game. Same for Bassong. But the very idea that KK had to report to Wise is a f**king joke (if true) wtf has Wise done to deserve that kind of power?

Why the f**k would Wise be invloved in selling the club?

Well, i'm sick to my stomach. Gutted. Wanted us to succeed with KK, i won't say we won't succeed at all but you've got to wonder how.