John P

I've had it with Simpson, he's just such a poor footballer. I used to think he was a solid but limited full back, but after seeing him live every week this season I've completely changed my mind. Bar the occasional goal line clearance he's a terrible defender, constantly backing off, is poor in the air, weak, no great pace and an abomination with the ball at his feet. The point in the second half when Ben Arfa laid the ball to him to put in first time and he took a touch, drifted in an aimless floaty cross and then berated Ben Arfa for the pass had me fuming. If he had any ability he would have been able to put that ball in first time. Every time he gets the ball I expect us to give it away, usually with one of his clipped aerial balls forward that make it almost impossible for our strikers to get down because it's in the air for so long, and just allows defenders to either get a run on the ball and win the header or get really tight to our striker and force them backwards. If he's rejected the contract then good, get rid, stick Santon at right back and put Ferguson / Raylor / new left back in.

Pardew pretty much said in his press conference that Cisse and Ba are unlikely to start the game together. If that's the case, how about: Krul Simpson Willo Colo Santon Perch Guthrie Obertan HBA Jonas Ba Essentially the system we used at Fulham and Brighton, but with Jonas moving over to replace Best, Ben Arfa coming in behind Ba and Obertan playing on the right. Also means Pardew can use Obertan to double up on Bale when we defend if he doesn't trust Ben Arfa to do it.

If Super Hans was a Newcastle fan, I imagine he actually would write just like this.

What a moron you are.

What did we pay for him? £2m? I'd rather keep him but wouldn't be aggrieved if we got our money back on him this summer. IMO Best is the best we can hope for from 3rd/4th-choice striker right now. Ideally buy someone young on summer and keep Best and Shola as back-up, as everybody knows Shola isn't going anywhere. Agree with this, we aren't going to be able to get anyone who is willing to be 3rd choice striker and who is much better than Best. Best always puts a good shift in, has the ability to score most types of goal and realistically isn't going to be able to play for a bigger club than us, so he's ideal for 3rd choice (as long as he doesn't mind accepting that's what he is).

When you're paying £20/30 to see someone not put 100% effort in; i can forgive the odd bit of jeering. I can't say i've noticed any real booing anyway, though i could be wrong. Don't want to keep banging that drum though. He deserves plenty of credit for last night's cameo and apparent change in attitude. I don't think he lacks effort, as I remeber him tracking back into our half and putting tackles in a fair few times this season. I think that his confidence is very fragile and sometimes he just looks unsure of what he's doing, which people see as a lack of effort when really he's just scared of making a mistake.

Would he not have played with McCarthy for Ireland at some point in the 80s? If so he's probably big pals with him, because there's certainly no other explanation. Wolves in 8th with 36 points from 23 games for Christs sake!

Assou-Ekotto not facing any charge for his studs over the ball, shin high tackle on Di Santo last night because the ref saw it and took no action. I'm hoping this is some sort of sick joke? The rules have got to be changed for these incidents.

6'1 tall, looks fast and calm under pressure (utubetastic) priced around £1.3m Like the look of him... Reminds me of Enrique in a funny way... Seemed to enjoy the battle with Hazard and Sow... Stoketastic throw on him also... I was also reminded of Enrique in some ways from his Youtube videos (which admittedly aren't a great indication of a player) - looks quite aggressive in the tackle, barged the opposition winger off the ball a couple of times in 50/50s and got good pace by the looks of it. Also looked quite decent on the ball and naturally left footed, which would be nice.

Quite a few people on here saying they hope he can do it against the better teams and defences in the Premiership - the Bundesliga isn't some crappy league full of nobodies, it's one of the top 3 or 4 leagues in Europe. And outside of the top 3 or 4 teams in England, the Premiership isn't exactly full of top class defences.

Seems like he would be the ideal signing at the minute, ie someone cheap to cover in case of injuries to Colo or Williamson. Some quick Dennis Wise scouting suggests he's more of a Colo style defender - doesn't look particularly tall or strong, looks more like a defender who reads the game well, fairly quick and looks decent bringing the ball out of defence and even playing some nice long balls (as in a long ball that is aimed at picking someone out in space, rather than a lumping it forward long ball). Would be brilliant if we could get him in and the Cisse deal finalised in the next couple of days, then hang a 'Do not disturb' sign on all club offices and training ground doors for the rest of the month.

If clint hill is playing left back for them and pardew plays ryan taylor instead of ben arfa, he is clinically insane. Ben arfa would tear hill to shreds and we wouldn't need to worry about his fucking work rate as hill would be shit scared of moving out of his own half.

That mean owt in German? What - Demba Ba, Obasi?! Obasi played for Hoffenheim at the same time as Ba.

Should maybe go in the new songs thread, but we should sing this song by a German band, replacing Obasi with Ben Arfa. Listen at the start and then again at 2:30:

Agree with all of that.

The defensive work of Best consists of putting pressure on the opposition centre backs, he pretty much never drops off to pressurise the deep playmaker or holding midifelder. So it could be argued that Ben Arfa would do more defensively than Best, as he would sit a bit deeper and pressurise the playmaker (and from what iv seen, he does put pressure on players to defend, it's just that his style makes people think he isn't doing anything). Pressuring the playmaker is probably more beneficial than pressuring a centre back too as they are more likely to do something creative with the ball.

I don't have a problem with Gosling, just would hate him to start at the expense of Ben Arfa.

Can just imagine the team news coming through now - 'Leon Best does not start tonight for Newcastle' 'So Dan Gosling comes into the midfield'

This is brilliant. 'Striker search called off'

Would hate for us to play a high line with Bellamy up top. Remember the west brom game?

well, this is the crux isn't it, the real bone of contention? Which positions would you say we desperately need to fill in the squad? I'm sure most of us on here would come up with the same two first. it depends what our objectives are, that's the point i'm making..... Ah, I see. The point I was sort of making though was that surely every team looks to progress to the next level, whatever that is for each club. For us, I would say we are a comfortable mid-table / upper mid-table team, with the next step being top 6. Unfortunately progress usually means some sort of investment, which I don't think we will be getting. If we aren't looking to progress, what's the point in turning up?

well, this is the crux isn't it, the real bone of contention? Which positions would you say we desperately need to fill in the squad? I'm sure most of us on here would come up with the same two first.

funny, this came in just as i was about to post the following: why can't people get their heads around the fact that we'll never get the right balance with any board? we never did with hall/shepherd (there was always a position that needed strengthening), ashley is just unpalatable and under much more scrutiny than they were back then imo 'cause he's clearly an utter c***, and southern no-one else outside the current top six or whatever is spending shitloads of money and we have no right to either tbh, except for a couple of big sales that raked in some cash...in spite of those sales we're having our best season for ages if we sign a striker we expect a CB, and vice versa, if we get both we start asking where the RB is and then the RW we need...and so on...it's a natural fan thing, everything is a game of FM to some biggest criticism i have at the moment with any of this is loven, shola, smith etc. are still on the books...extended contract for shola no less...that's where it the s*** is clogging up the fan for me For me the balance would be spending the money on positions we need and no more, which by no means is too much to ask. If we had a striker and centre back and we'd actually shown ambition by filling the gaping holes in our squad then I would be over the bloody moon, I wouldn't care about right wing and right back because we have acceptable players to play in those positions. I know that we can't fill every position in one transfer window, but we need to fill the ones that are obvious to everyone. It's been obvious even before the Carroll sale that we needed a striker - this still hasn't been addressed. We've needed a centre back since the start of last summer - that wasn't addressed and left us with Perch and Simpson as cover. Unlike other teams we are apparently in a sound financial position, surely it's not asking too much to spend £6m or £7m on someone?

Jesus christ, just seen this news. It's becoming more and more apparent that we will get absolutely nowhere with this board in charge (if it wasn't blatantly obvious before). They will always be happy with comfortably staying in this division whilst breaking even or making a small profit. As others have said, we have the spine of an excellent team, but this board will never ever spend the money required to push us on to the next level. The frustrating thing is that we're not even talking massive amounts of money, but it seems that spending £6m on a striker AND a defender is too much for us. It's also obvious from Pardew's recent comments that as soon as a decent bid comes in for one of our players he'll be gone, leading to more wheeling and dealing to replace him and a constant cycle that results in us going nowhere. Do they really want us to believe that we've had 18months to identify strikers, and all they came up with was Maiga or no-one? So during the African Nations we'll be left with Best, Shola or Lovenkrands up top? Fuck me. Oh well, better to wait until the summer then when we'll no doubt be fed other excuses. It also makes me wonder about Maiga failing his medical. The reason - I have numerous reasons to distrust the board, and no reason whatsoever to believe a single fucking word they tell us.

His pathetic pirouette and the subsequent touch of a rapist in injury time were the highlights of the match for me