durhamunigeordie

Yes Hatem lad.

Get in

Williamson setting out his stall early

I hope so. But he does big up Shola a lot.

Sometimes Pardew bigs up our fringe players in public to boost their confidence. I don't mind him doing that, however, I believe that he genuinely thinks Shola is 'outstanding'. That alone is enough for me to lose faith in his ability. When Shola started at Fulham, Brighton and Blackburn he was abysmal. If Pardew cannot see that then he shouldn't be a football manager.

Please, please be out.

Will more than likely just be that it is too late to start posting out tickets.

Seems to be standard amongst footballers now to regard any fan that criticises them as a disloyal one.

Yea I went to that Reserve game. He started off brightly enough, but didn't seem particularly keen to impress. That is particularly odd given that he was clearly being given a trial in that off the striker position before the Arsenal game, although he did end up starting there at the Emirates so Pardew must have seen enough in him. It may be just his style, but he comes across as so lazy, which is what frustrates me most about him. Did he really put in such half arsed performances for taggart?!

I used to think we made a lot of noise up in Level 7, however, having moved to the corner this year I would imagine we didn't sound that impressive to the rest of the ground. I can honestly say I barely heard anything come from either set of fans in level 7 on Sunday and haven't really all season.

Taylor's still out isn't he? And Obertan wasn't even in the squad at the weekend. But yeah, I expect Ben Arfa to be dropped tbh. I never found out the reason for this. Was there one or was he just 'left out'? i'd guess his 'performance' v arsenal apart from the ball to ben arfa before his goal he was atrocious He must have had a niggle. I am no Obertan fan, but would rather have him as an option on the bench than Donaldson.

Whilst I wouldn't want to see Ben Arfa doing that all the time, ultimately what he did was absolutely fine. Pardew clearly shouted at Hatem, when it was in fact Williamson who messed up. I get that Pardew doesn't want Hatem to be doing that regularly, but if anyone needed balling out at that point it was Williamson. Not that it really matters as I doubt he could even be heard on the other side of the pitch.

Don't get me wrong, I do NOT want to lose Tiote. He is a good player, seems to like the club/area and I'd be happy to see him playing for us for many years to come. However in a real world of salary budgets etc, it is reported he earns £67K per week and if his agent starts turning his head at Chelsea's offer, I would not go any higher than that, thereby taking budget away from another position. As you rightly say there is no guarantee that you pick up a player as good, but a fee in the region of £15-20M and a salary budget of £3.35M p.a. would certainly help you to find someone decent. Agree with all of that. It was suggestions like we could pick up £20 million for Tiote and then replace him for £3-5 million that I was disagreeing with.

A lot will depend on the terms of his contract. If he is found guilty then we could try and sack him. He would then no doubt bring a claim for unfair dismissal. There are two ways for this to be done really. Firstly, procedural e.g. the club hasn't followed protocol by giving him the right number of written warnings, verbal warnings etc. The second is substantive. It is a bit more complicated than this in reality, but it comes down to a range of reasonable responses test. In other words was the club acting reasonably in dismissing him. This is usually quite difficult for a claimant to prove as it simply has to be a reason that any other reasonable employer in the world could potentially use to sack someone, however, this may be complicated by the fact that we have not sacked others (Barton) for similar offences.

Totally agree. As much as I trust Graham Carr, there is certainly no guarantee if we sell him that we will be able to pick up another player of equal ability and who has an instant impact like a few seem to be suggesting.

Muppet.

I agree with the sentiment, but that is an idealist approach. If people are paying good money on a regular basis to watch the likes of Simpson make the same mistakes over and over then they are bound to get wound up. If you did your job as badly as Simpson has over an extended period of time, you wouldn't be employed anymore. I don't get off on abusing our own players particularly myself, but at the same time I am not going to get worked up if other people chose to do the same. Often they are saying exactly what I am thinking, it is just I am more passive about these things than they might be.

I agree completely with this! One thing I don't like is when him and Willo get abuse on match day, one way to make a player even worse...abuse him...Great! There is abuse when any player makes a mistake in a game. For example just before Cabaye played that long ball for Cisse to try and lob the Norwich keeper, Colo gave the ball straight to a Norwich player and there was a loud groan. No player is immune from it. Williamson deserved any abuse he got for pissing about on the edge of the box, it could easily have cost us a goal.

Not a single person is suggesting that winning isn't better than entertaining, some of us thinks we can play better without negatively affecting our results. Exactly. Krul time wasting was embarrassing yesterday. We looked quite good for about the first half hour, but then just tried to shut up shop and win the game 1-0. Against teams who we are at least the equals of footballing wise, we should be trying to go on and kill the game.

Think we will only have 5 home league games that are saturday 3 o'clock's this season!

Not worried by his mini drought. Pretty certain as soon as he bags one he will go on and pick up a few in quick succession.

That is debatable. Really hope Tiote comes back for this one. Perch was excellent today, but we set up to play very defensively against a side with one top and were at home. Away match at a side who will attack us is a very different proposition mind. Santon and Tiote in for Guthrie and Perch for me (tough on Perch I know, would keep him in one of the full back positions myself, but that will never happen). I take it you are not happy with the way you are playing. Is Ba still playing well or has he gone off the boil, was great earlier in the season, kept you in the game? We've had a cracking season don't get me wrong, but I wouldn't say we have been the prettiest to watch on many occasions. Oddly enough one of our standout halves football wise came in the 5-2 defeat away at Fulham. We were 1-0 at half-time and everyone most assumed we would go on and win comfortably. 20 minutes later we were all looking at each other in a state of shock! Demba has been excellent. Started off slowly during ramadan, but got a hat-trick against Blackburn and has never looked back. Hasn't scored for 5 games now, however, this isn't particularly worrying. He is a real grafter and the type of striker who is able to fashion out chances for himself out of nothing. Think once he gets one he will go on a nice little run and hopefully finish the season with 20+ to his name. Was impressed by Long and Odemwingie when you played up at our place. Electric pace on the break. Am I right in thinking they haven't both been permanent features for various reasons since new year?

That is debatable. Really hope Tiote comes back for this one. Perch was excellent today, but we set up to play very defensively against a side with one top and were at home. Away match at a side who will attack us is a very different proposition mind. Santon and Tiote in for Guthrie and Perch for me (tough on Perch I know, would keep him in one of the full back positions myself, but that will never happen).

More than happy for him to keep getting 20 mins off the bench on a regular basis.

That is just the way it is though. He, as a professional footballer, has to be able to cope with that. If he can't then he shouldn't be playing at this level, it's that simple. Of course in an ideal world 50,000 people would shout 'come on Mike, you can do it!' in unison, but the reality is that people have paid money to be there/have had a few drinks etc. and are going to get frustrated when someone does what he was doing today.