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Nothing really jumps off the page at you. That's worse than i thought. That's a shocking transfer record!

Only reason he pulled out of Bowyer deal was because Bowyer made it clear he wasn't interested. All the Pool fans i know both at the time and now would say they wanted to keep anelka Agreed, Smicer played well in the final, still think overall he wasn't exactly a top signing though. As we won't be in any CL finals any time soon i'd suggest we are better off looking for players who perform a tad more consistently I take your point on Cisse, he did look like he would be awesome Pongolle is NOT awesome, not by any stretch. Failed at Liverpool, failed at Blackburn Cheyrou was let go for free... £4.5m loss 3 good signings, one of which they stole off us... Not really the best record for about 5 years in charge?!

With all the work he put in helping develop Clairefontaine I think Houllier would be perfect for the criteria the club have set. I can see him running the club and Shearer taking charge on the training ground everyday, that's if they work together that is. But what about the style of play?! Did you guys not watch Houllier's Liverpool team?! Houllier's Lyon looked brilliant though. So Houillers Liverpool won the Champions league, Benitez inherited that? Err no... Lyon won the league for 3 or 4 seasons prior to Houllier's arrival, by some stretch. He inherited a title winning team. Benitez did not inherit a team that had previously won the champions league! no. Le Guen's Lyon looked brilliant and Houllier inherited that.

Houllier's transfer record is absolutely abysmal in English football - compare it to Mark Hughes (who i'm not overly excited about either and it's ludicrous). Cheyrou Salif Diao Sinima Pongolle (and that other lad who came with him) Smicer Cisse Traore He wasted so much on those players as well, they weren't cheap buys. He made allardyce look like a genius! Can someone please prove me wrong with a list of all the decent players he brought to Liverpool (under 35, so Litmanen and McCallister don't count!) and kept there (failing to secure anelka when they had him on loan, another error). I'm genuinely asking here, as i'd like to have my mind changed if it's likely he'll come in

With all the work he put in helping develop Clairefontaine I think Houllier would be perfect for the criteria the club have set. I can see him running the club and Shearer taking charge on the training ground everyday, that's if they work together that is. But what about the style of play?! Did you guys not watch Houllier's Liverpool team?! Houllier's Lyon looked brilliant though. no. Le Guen's Lyon looked brilliant and Houllier inherited that.

With all the work he put in helping develop Clairefontaine I think Houllier would be perfect for the criteria the club have set. I can see him running the club and Shearer taking charge on the training ground everyday, that's if they work together that is. But what about the style of play?! Did you guys not watch Houllier's Liverpool team?!

why? because he is sh**e. look what he has done with all that cash and backing at liverpool, never even close to the titlerace. at valencia, even i could have lead that team to glory. would be much worse than the keegan/shearer combo imo. dont really know about houllier tbh. got a real laugh at his time in liverpool, bringing in all sorts of bad signings, but he is way better than someone like hughes, arry and pearce. if we do bring in houllier, i dont think we can pair him with shearer though. keegan/shearer just might have the ability to attract som great players, and we will be guarateed entertaining football. perhaps theyre also smart enough to bench smith, who knows? Seems a bit weird you totally slate benitez then give Houllier credit. In my view Houllier is a very poor man's benitez.

In context, and in English football, yes. Agreed. Really hoping this Shearer / Houllier link up that is being touted around is just media rumour mongering. If people think KK / Shearer would be bad, this would be a whole lot worse. One suspects they would agree on nothing and it would end in a lot of tears.

I would put that more down to Benitez producing an amazing (and often v lucky, although i certainly wouldn't mind us having some luck) cup run with those players, rather than them being good signings. Benitez won the champs league for Liverpool despite those players, not because of them.

He plays feckin awful football and if his scouting network was so good how the hell did he sign Cisse, Cheyrou, Traore et al?! I would rather have Hughes than Houllier.

I think we could have got Hiddink had Russia not qualified for Euro 08 but there is no way he'll walk out on them prior to the Euro Championships and i don't really want Pearson in charge for the rest of the season, so i don't really see how it would work?

Where's all this shortlist info coming from? Something in the papers i've missed?! As for the British thing, SSN all of a sudden dropped it from their list of requirements then tried to peddle out some bollocks about how we had changed our criteria since Redknapp turned us down / went public...

First season with Man City he took them up with a record breaking points total and scored 125 (125!) goals in the process. The next season he took them to 9th in the Premiership. If someone did that now who wasn't Kevin Keegan, the media would be jizzing all over him. I must of missed the Steve Coppell wankfest then as he broke Keegan's record points total and took Reading to 8th in his first season in the Premiership with them. There kind of was actually, was he not heavily touted for / receive manager of the year? The problem with Coppell was that he couldn't handle the pressure when he got a big job like Man Ci... oh...

Of course. Everyone apart from most of the posters on this thread think he was our MOTM on Saturday and that he is one of the very best prem keepers but hey, what do they know. We must have the very best fans in the world for knocking confidence out of players and eventually driving them out of the club into another team where they are supported and hence perform better (Parker and Jenas the latest examples). Given pulled off an awesome save from Ronaldo in the first half. Tell me about the other wonderful things he did on Saturday. Once again i'll repeat, i really rate given as a keeper, i just don't understand how people can be so blinkered.

I now realise why we play in black and white… it’s the only way half our fans are capable of thinking if this thread is anything to go by…

I've established that you are a miserable man and/or your sole purpose on this forum is to bring everyone down to the level you are on with your negativity. People must get really bored of you. The fact people complain about Given astonishes me. He was our best or second best player against Man Utd. He has been with us for what 10 years? He's rejected advances from other clubs to remain loyal to us. We always expect players to be proud of the shirt they are playing in and to pay us back with what we put into our club. Given does this. Enrique and Taylor were, in my view, without doubt the best two players for us on Saturday. Given had a mare. I sometimes think that we don't deserve the loyalty Given has shown us. Dude, i'm saying he had a bad game... Just because he's been loyal makes him completely immune to any criticism whatsoever?! You'll see earlier in the thread i'm not advocating selling him, i just don't think he's had the best of seasons - by his own high standards especially. I would also question the whole 'amazingly loyal servant' label served up, after all as soon as he was out the team he spat the dummy and handed in a transfer request, not exactly loyalty personified. But again, my position is thus - harper had the jersey due to injury to given earlier in the season, harper did absolutely nothing to deserve to have it taken away, in fact he was in nets for some of our best performances this season. As given came back, our form has gradually declined (starting with Man City away), i'm certainly not saying it's all (or even mainly) his fault, i just think if you look back over the season there are a few instances where he has to be held culpable for goals conceded. All the rest of the defence take an absolute hiding on here (beye fairly excluded thus far) so i think it's only fair a modicum of blame falls with Shay if his performances aren't up to it. I'm not questioning his place at the club, just his place in the team for parts of this season (the same as I would with Owen).

Not self-depreciation, just realism i'm afraid. We have a goalkeeper who makes Paul Robinson look competent, a comical defence, a midfield that can't string two passes together and a striker who scores every solar eclipse. But you beat Derby... something we couldn't achieve!

I'm bringing my dad up for the match this weekend, he hasn't been to a game for a few years, he's just had the worst year of his life, lost both his parents and split with his missus and i'm taking him to this... I think this match might actually be more painful...

I've established that you are a miserable man and/or your sole purpose on this forum is to bring everyone down to the level you are on with your negativity. People must get really bored of you. The fact people complain about Given astonishes me. He was our best or second best player against Man Utd. He has been with us for what 10 years? He's rejected advances from other clubs to remain loyal to us. We always expect players to be proud of the shirt they are playing in and to pay us back with what we put into our club. Given does this. Enrique and Taylor were, in my view, without doubt the best two players for us on Saturday. Given had a mare.

Aren’t those quotes they keep using saying he’s happy just recycled from last week when everyone thought Redknapp was going to get the job? He has been far less keen to state he wants to stay since that fell through, as far as I’m aware.

Would be up there as one of my top choices but seems to get strangely ignored... Plays the type of football we'd want to see and the Valencia board did what our board did to Robson, sacking him after just a few games of a new season. Isn't working at the moment as well. Can't see it happening though.

Not at all. The thread is about whether or not clubs should sign African players in the knowledge that they will lose them to the ACN every other January. The thread can continue but I'm of the opinion that no matter how much one twists and whinges, the ACN in January are here to stay so they should be accepted and embraced. Nothing more. Hmmm.... i'd completely forgot what the first post said, apologies!

So you believe this thread should be closed and this convo shouldn't take place then?

Excellent article. You think if the second tier managers achieved great success they wouldn't move to a top, top club? Wouldn't mind if he pissed off to Manure because that would mean we were successful. I'm an idealist, i hope our success will include us no longer being classed as second tier

You're getting far too upset over this. This is the way Africa have organised their football calender. No matter how much you twist and whine, they won't change it. Do you hear African football fans complain because the winter Premiership fixtures interfere with the build-up to the ACN? Thought not. Hehe, i'm not getting upset about the ACN schedule, i honestly don't care, i'm sat around on the sofa at home and thought it was a vaguely interesting convo, what irritated me was you preaching to me about the matter, re-iterating things i already know and trying to make out that i'm proposing sweeping reforms of the African game! I just expressed a couple of ideas! Grief, are you on all the other threads telling people their opinions are irrelevant as they're not actually going to make a difference at the end of the day "however much they twist and whine" or have you just chosen to on this one because you mistakenly believe your soap box stance makes you seem more politically conscious?! Aye, that's it... So, go on, why then? Because you appear to think you should be able to change the entire football calender of an entire continent so it doesn't have any adverse affect on NUFC. Or, if I'm mistaken, why are you against the ACN being held right now? Ok, this is what i've said (to answer your question, i've no objection to it taking place, i was just interested to see if another time would be more suitable for all parties): All my other comments are either repeating what i've already said or badly attempting to be funny. C'mon, it's not like i'm really having a go, i'm just voicing (very mildly i might add!) a view that it might be an idea to change something, whether that be the prem / europe / africa