themanupstairs

Shocking news!

Relax lads, Shola's got this. We're in the final already

When the draw was made, the board invasion from the Benfica fans went from cute, to adorable, to just about adopting them as our own. The closer we got to the game, the more the twattishness began to come out. Still not sure how serious the banter is, but it's pretty obvious both sets of fans are bricking it at this point. They have the better recent history and play some excellent football, which worries us. We have the better individuals in certain key positions and a certain mystery to our side which worries them. No calling this tie until the whistle goes at St James' IMO. HTL!

What in the actual fuq? http://www.flickr.com/photos/40191515@N05/8617270688/in/photostream/

The question remains though, can Benfica do it on a cold Monday night in Stoke?

The truth! AMEN! http://www.gifsforum.com/images/gif/lol/grand/17141865-lol-reaction.gif

Pacy or hold-up player? A Bellamy or a Fellaini?

Much rather hone in on and nab PE Aubameyang than go back in for Remy personally.

Re: Is Paolo our most stylish gaffer? Quote: Originally Posted by GingerNick I am growing my sidies already I am too. Not sure a Ginger one will look as good mind, slightly paedophilic ;P http://www.readytogo.net/smb/showthread.php?t=771386&page=2

Lucky bastards who are going, have a great time and sing your lungs out. Show them Lisbians what Geordies on the terraces are made of

Magmatics

Who or what is Swindon? Never heard of it.

Apparently he has been on holiday in Hawaii iihc.

If that happens we'll defo need to reinvest quite heavily again in the summer. The Amalfitano signing along with Gosling have turned out to be hopeless punts at picking players on a free and then get some value into them and sell them on. Yeah but it happens. Gosling has done close to fuck all, and Amalfitano has done precisely fuck all. Maybe we really meant to move for Morgan but fucked it up somehow?

But you can't criticise them for that! It's journalism, not politics. What do their views and actions have to do with anything? If you express your opinion on their behaviour you're basically oppressing them, stop it. How is journalism and politics not directly linked? The profession was created and continues to be used to influence public opinion! SAFC is a privately owned company and they can ban whoever they like from their press conferences. Once again, I don't deny that the club has brought this s*** storm on itself. Whether they intended to do that or not, they're now scrambling to try and deal with it. As long as they do that without breaking any laws, then so what? Football influences public opinion! It probably influences public opinion more than every leaflet put through every bloody door in the country! The very fact that this debate is going on is evidence that it's not 'so what', people have a pretty non-controversial opinion that they don't want a fascist manager in the premier league and people are trying to imply they can't hold that opinion because it somehow infringes on the rights of others for reasons I can't quite pin down. Paolo Di Canio has the right to be a fascist, other people have the right to believe he's a f***ing c*** for holding those views and they will continue to say so. Not going to disagree with that at all. However, PL or L2, it shouldn't matter imo. He'll be in as much of a role model position to kids growing up in Sunderland as he was for kids growing up in Swindon. But there's a lot of kids that follow the premier league and know the name and personality of every manager in it. How many could name Swindon's current manager, and know what kind of person he is to be allowed to hold that position? And this is what I completely disagree with. If this was a true campaign to protect the values of a democratic nation, it wouldn't matter how high profile the club he's taken charge of was. It's like saying a few civilian casualties in war torn country are less important than a celebrity that's been killed by a drunk driver. It's just not right imo.

I genuinely don't even understand why this question has to be asked. There'd be more outrage if Nick Griffin became a member of cabinet then if he became MP. There'd be more outrage on here if a jihadi sympathiser was the CEO of Amazon than if he was the boss of a haulage firm in Kent. There'd be more outrage on here if someone with extreme views took over North Tyneside council than if they took over somewhere in London or France. Proximity and the high-profile or otherwise nature of the position, it's no real mystery. We've had a thread on the mackems sicne the board was opened, go have a look in the Swindon thread to see if it was discussed there. as so it's not the principle then, it's the heightened level of publicity that's bothering people and the fact it's sunderland just wanted to know Spot on.

But you can't criticise them for that! It's journalism, not politics. What do their views and actions have to do with anything? If you express your opinion on their behaviour you're basically oppressing them, stop it. How is journalism and politics not directly linked? The profession was created and continues to be used to influence public opinion! SAFC is a privately owned company and they can ban whoever they like from their press conferences. Once again, I don't deny that the club has brought this s*** storm on itself. Whether they intended to do that or not, they're now scrambling to try and deal with it. As long as they do that without breaking any laws, then so what? Football influences public opinion! It probably influences public opinion more than every leaflet put through every bloody door in the country! The very fact that this debate is going on is evidence that it's not 'so what', people have a pretty non-controversial opinion that they don't want a fascist manager in the premier league and people are trying to imply they can't hold that opinion because it somehow infringes on the rights of others for reasons I can't quite pin down. Paolo Di Canio has the right to be a fascist, other people have the right to believe he's a f***ing c*** for holding those views and they will continue to say so. Not going to disagree with that at all. However, PL or L2, it shouldn't matter imo. He'll be in as much of a role model position to kids growing up in Sunderland as he was for kids growing up in Swindon.

Definitely. As much as I'd love for them to disappear into oblivion, they're not going anywhere for now. Might as well keep the pressure on a team below us. Wins for QPR, Stoke, Chelsea and NUFC and I'll be delighted.

But you can't criticise them for that! It's journalism, not politics. What do their views and actions have to do with anything? If you express your opinion on their behaviour you're basically oppressing them, stop it. How is journalism and politics not directly linked? The profession was created and continues to be used to influence public opinion! SAFC is a privately owned company and they can ban whoever they like from their press conferences. Once again, I don't deny that the club has brought this shit storm on itself. Whether they intended to do that or not, they're now scrambling to try and deal with it. As long as they do that without breaking any laws, then so what?

So we're concerned about the free-speech loving tabloid journalists now? These shit stirring twats are a massive problem, and very very few of them are a credit to their profession.

Yup. Immense finishing talent is being totally wasted. Do feel very sorry for him at the moment. When the scoresheet reads "Nil" to your team, as a striker you feel the burden of it.

Not a single poster has said that. I'll admit I haven't read every single post since the appointment, but out all the posts I have seen, no one has seriously said that.

Ok, they are mackems, unwashed and we hate them. But it's not the fans' decision that brought Di Canio to their club. It was the decision of one, or possibly a small group of people at the top to interview then hire him. The Sunderland fans are desperate for something to cheer about, and even more desperate to stay up. Those who are acting like bellends condoning his views etc. are doing it out of a mix of ignorance and desperation. I don't think it says too much about their values as a collective sporting club when it was most probably the decision of their American owner.

can you expand on that? I already have earlier in the thread. Football clubs represent people and places. They inevitably take on the political identity of those places. Just because the game is a global money making machine does not change that. Barca-Real isn't the biggest game in world football because they're two very good teams. This is utter nonsense - NUFC is in what is generally accepted as a Labour voting area, but many of the fans share a love of the club whilst having totally different views about politics - and politics should NOT enter sport, OR be linked to it. Hitler tried that in the 30s but the England Team(and Jesse Owens in the Olympics)rammed that down his throat....similarly, the Soviets and Chinese have both tried to use sport to boost Communism and ironically, the Chinese have only started to show at the top of Olympic medal tables since they moved away from Maoism and to what is basically a Capitalist economy. Ask the likes of Olga Korbut and various Iron Curtain gymnasts what they thought of sport being used to foster a political agenda... As for Barca and Real, the only way they represent a political viewpoint is because the Catalans want autonomy from Spain and they identify Barca's successes with that aim, just as Real fans use Madrid as an emblem of Spanish would-be supremacy. There is NO similar situation in the UK unless you use the former rivalry between Celtic and Rangers and that is based on religion rather than politics - another thing which should be kept separate from sport. If you are trying to identify NUFC and most other Northern sides with the left wing of politics, it is hardly worth it if you subscribe to that view because apart from the 2 Manchester clubs, one of whom has many southerners in its fan-base, the northern clubs are not as successful whereas clubs in London(viewed by many Northerners as a den of Toryism)like Spurs and Arsenal have been more successful...... Politics has NO place in football whatsoever - either to boost the Right OR the Left and every effort should be made to keep the 2 separate. I agree with Felipao's views about the whole thing and about Di Canio... As I said before, I am far more concerned about his possible impact on the Mackems - and hence, on our chances of relegation - than any madcap political stance/demonstration he might make. If he replicates his successes at Swindon, any Socialists in the Sunderland fan-base won't give 2 stuffs about his views.... As Felipao said, we should be far more concerned about appointing a Lge 1 manager with a dodgy managerial record behind him........ Word