Gallowgate Toon

I agree with most of this post...what's with all the omg's tho? I just want to know why so many people think Cacapa is crap? Some of his performances haven't been great but he is clearly good footballer and time to adjust to the Premier League should be factored in. He is definitely not Boumsong or Bramble. Some of his performances have been class aswell, he is imo the most comfortable CB at the club with the ball at his feet. He needs time to adjust but remember he doesn't speak English so communication is a real problem but thats with our whole defence though and he probably can't understand Shay (explains Pompey mistakes), Just recovered from a bad injury, Loss of confidence after Pompey due to the former factors and he needs to settle in like every other footballer. It's not been easy but if you captain a Champions League side you have to be damn good.

More potential then Nani imo, and deserves to be in an equally good side.

I think Beye is more than adequate and should be our captain.

I would spend £15m trying to get Van der Vaart, he won't sign a contract extension and wants desperately away from Hamburg and would like to go abroad.

Milan will never let Gourcuff go for that, he's a massive prospect. Add a couple of m on that then He doesn't get any playing time at all almost. And it seems like they have more belief in Pato who plays as an AM also if im not wrong? Worth a try at least imo.. I agree worth a punt but i doubt they will let him go.

Milan will never let Gourcuff go for that, he's a massive prospect.

Fernandes, Diarra and Arshavin would do me like.

Some of the Arsenal forum members reckon that we'll play better as the players want to prove to the new manager they are the best in their position and give their all. We'll still lose though 2-1.

If he does come, i hope Muntari comes along with him.

We might aswell support him. His track record with money is pretty good, as soon as some was available to him he spent it well and now he has made a good side that plays nice football.

Tbf his Pompey side do play some good footy.

Its a total longshot to get the likes of Diego who is on top form at the mo. But we do have the money, even a cheeky bid shows we have the ambition.

He is a brilliant player, very under-rated. He is just as good as Kaka tbh.

Van der Vaart has just rejected a new contract.

Is this post invisible? i don't think he's south african, and not convinced he's 5 foot 11 either. He is South African actually and his myspace page does say he is '5'11 or something'

He is definitely 17, he is in the same year as my cousin.

He was 17 in October.

Probably because Butt was fucking awful in possession, and most shots... off target doesn't warrant a high rating. I agree Zoggy was useless today, lost the ball alot etc but Duff however i thought looked pretty sharp.

He is poor away from home, as he runs round like a headless chicken and leaves massive gaps in the midfield.

How many times has he played on the right wing? He's played right side of a front 3 but that's hardly the same as a right winger. Its actually pretty similar, your expected to go out wide and put in crosses, but also come inside and shoot too. did you not see the formation? who was going to stick out wide when you had Barton, Smith and Butt playing in the midfield, they are all very central players so Martins and Milner were expected to do the wingers dirty work. However he has played on the right wing proper only a couple of times when Smith and Viduka were upfront together.

Oba has scored 24 goals in 55 starts and 62 appearances overall. With some of these starts being on the right wing. So basically your looking at a goal every 2 games with Oba. He is a good striker his goals to games proves it.

Get help. The only thing Martins has over Smith is goals Oh, so not much then? The point lost on you it seems is goals as infrequent as they come from Martins I might add, are not enough. We need more from Martins than the odd goal. yeah, we could've done without Martins' odd goal last year.. wonder how Smith's creative genius would've fit next to Sibierski.. or from the right wing.. oh wait, we've seen that this season What Martins did last year doesn't matter in regards to this debate. Lets re-sign Andy Cole because of what he did in 93-94... No. i wrote it, because you keep saying that the odd goal is not good enough yeah, surely, if we are Real Madrid, it's not good enough.. but we are a team that lacks flair so much it hurts my eyes watching model pros like Smith playing their pointless side passes.. Martins' goals were good enough to save us from certain relegation last year, playing in a team that created even less chances than this season's.. in my eyes, he has proved here that he is a good striker and a danger for every defense.. sure he has his shortcommings, but who f****** doesn't.. if only Allardyce had some common sense to play him more regularly instead the lost cause of Mickey Owen, maybe his form wouldn't have suffered so much.. He's an average striker and an average goalscorer too, and he's a poor footballer full stop. This sin't opinion, it's based on clear and present evidence. He's poor in almost every department to ever be a top striker/footballer. As for your other comments, he's featured more this season than Owen so what the hell are you talking about? He looked a pretty decent footballer last season and he has this season when played in a 4-4-2 (playing upfront). He has featured more than Owen by a few games but alot of the time has been played way out of position. Whenever he has played in a 4-4-2 this season and been played up top he has scored goals. Thats all the facts you need with a striker, goals.

No point in selling, good striker with alot of potential just keep him here. Would be a huge mistake to get rid.

I think we all know Martins is really a pretty good player. If you watch Newcastle train before a match you can see he has good technical ability, he is a raw player with Raw talent which CAN be coached. Just play him upfront in a 4-4-2 and he is guaranteed to get you goals, as we saw last season (which wasn't 17 in 54 btw it was 17 in 43 with a couple of those being substitute appearances). He is a very good 4-4-2 player, if he was played there consistently he could be an excellent player. Comparing him to Torres is stupid though Torres has had alot more practice as a footballer then Martins. Torres practically played every game for Atletico for 4 seasons, Martins played sparingly for Inter. This could be a reason for the inconsistency and lack of confidence. Oba has all the attributes, he is just misguided nothing which some coaching and an arm round the shoulder can't solve. When on form everybody has seen how well oba can play, and what he can do. Keep him he's a good striker for a top 8/top 6 team.

Act Yeh but he doesn't use it Where is this 'pace' that people keep talking about? Butt put him through in the first half at Chelsea, he had a metre on the defender and was caught with ease. It appears if has two options he'll choose the wrong (the selfish approach) one. Actually i think if you watch that again, you will see he and Alex were level on the half way line, Butt played Martins through Martins gets 3/4 yards ahead of Alex but slows down to take a touch to shoot, it's quite clear. I watched the highlights vs Chelsea on quite a few occasions. Regarding last night, i personally thought he looked quicker on a few occasions than i have ever seen him before. Regarding his general play yesterday, i thought he did some good stuff with the ball, he held it up well went on a decent dribble, and did some nice passes and forced a good save from Hart. His famed 'gash' play is just plain untrue he is a better player then many make him out to be, technically. Martins is just a striker that takes more risks and is more selfish but he's a striker right, so thats his job force the opposition, do the unexpected. He is however inconsistent and while his finishing when on form is explosive and very impressive, when off form its quite poor. However this is as much the managers fault by not giving Martins a proper run and not playing him in the right position, up front in a 4-4-2. Imho he is our best striker in a 4-4-2 and its the only time he should be played. The last word though is to the fans, its just amusing going back 3 months to some threads when Martins was on form, coming off the bench and scoring goals and setting them up too to people on this forum were purely jizzing about Martins saying he was the saviour, better than Owen blah blah just shows how fickle some of our fans are.