Jayson

Has Ba done anything useful yet ?

Cabaye sounding class on set pieces

YESSSSSSS !

Whos taking corners for us? Barton/Cabaye ?

Cmon Cabaye, get involved lad

Need Ba to get going, been to quiet pre season.

5th game into pre season & we still havent even played together just 3 of Tiote, Barton, Cabaye, Marv. Silly stuff.

Snodgrass sounds like hes constantly on it

So we do have a midfield out there somewhere ?

There goes any chance he had

Goal leeds, foster error ?

Sorry not directly pointed at you, but the fact that we're not spending vast sums of money keeps coming up. I still find it strange that in every walk of life you look to spend the least amount of money to bring the greatest benefit, except for football. Of course I would love another striker brought in and a decent replacement/backup for Enrique as a minimum, but for some people it appears that would rather we had spent £15m on a striker of Ba's ability and another £15m on a player of Cabaye's ability, and then spent another £10m on a winger like Marveaux. I like the fact that we are looking outside of the UK for signings as they give much better value for money, and the fact we are exploiting clauses like are we is to me, a good thing. Everyone is happy we're looking for Bargains. People are not happy that we sold our best asset & then used the money to balance our finances. Which is what happened. So a company that has recently been losing money and has a bit of debt uses a windfall to plug some of the gaps? Whilst still recruiting new players in the summer window, exploiting contract loopholes/expirations to reduce these costs. And that's a bad thing? Two types of owners. One sells your best asset, then finds bargains he could have found anyway and uses the money to cover their wages to stop any future loss. The other owner doesnt cover wages using that money, he accepts the potential for a little loss because of them. He reinvests the money back into the transfer fees for other players, with the potential to bring more success to the club & increase the clubs turnover because of that. Along with the bargains hes found, he gives himself a very good chance of achieving this. The 2nd one risks that because he loves football and he loves the club. That is why he bought into it. The first owner is Mike Ashley.

Sorry not directly pointed at you, but the fact that we're not spending vast sums of money keeps coming up. I still find it strange that in every walk of life you look to spend the least amount of money to bring the greatest benefit, except for football. Of course I would love another striker brought in and a decent replacement/backup for Enrique as a minimum, but for some people it appears that would rather we had spent £15m on a striker of Ba's ability and another £15m on a player of Cabaye's ability, and then spent another £10m on a winger like Marveaux. I like the fact that we are looking outside of the UK for signings as they give much better value for money, and the fact we are exploiting clauses like are we is to me, a good thing. Everyone is happy we're looking for Bargains. People are not happy that we sold our best asset & then used the money to balance our finances. Which is what happened.

Wheres marv ?

Keegan proved their nature, the values behind the way they behave. There is no reason to believe that has changed. Some will still give them the benefit of the doubt & try and rationalize their own ideas of how it may really have gone down. Theres no reason to do so apart from falling into some made up notion that it means you're holding a more "balanced" argument.

Decent player Prob do well for us.

Id take beckford.

Yeah just reading. 62: GOAL! Albion are back on level terms thanks to a trademark Kazenga LuaLua goal. The winger cut in off the left and unleashed a fierce strike which beat Friedel at his near post Pretty good Tottenham side also, hopefully he's getting closer to first team level.

Ba shouldve done better with his chance, Marveaux looks direct and pacey. Lovely from Vuckic. Jonas speaks decent English, hadnt heard him before.

Carroll dominates when the ball is hung up high in the air and there are players like Nolan who are canny at picking up the scraps. Unless Liverpool are going to drastically change the way they play, it's not nailed on he'll be as effective as he was for us. It's not as simplistic as you are making it out to be either. How much he suits liverpool isnt that relevant, the basis for this discussion is his value whilst he was here in comparison to Ba. Though i reckon Gerrard/adams/downing etc shouldnt have to much problem finding his head.

The reason for the Carroll deal was that the amount of money was too good to turn down. That's it. Only if you're prepared to spend it. Which is the crux of the matter and the reason for the discontent atm. What I mean is, when you get an offer for an asset that is that crazy you pretty much have to sell. If the club was financially healthy and/or Ashley was prepared to continue to pump money in, we could have said no. But neither of those things is true. So you're suggesting we had to say 'yes' to keep the club going? He probably didn't literally "have" to say yes, we obviously wouldn't have gone bust without the Carroll sale (but you know that). What I'm saying is that if you have a club that is making regular losses, the owner is subsidising it with big loans, and there is a chance to bring in massive money for an overvalued asset, then you might well think it's a good idea. I'm not saying anyone "had" to sell Carroll, I'm saying I understand why it was too good a deal to turn down. Regular loses before we brought down the wages & got back into the prem following that. Tottenham dont look eager to accept 35m for Modric, thats a very good offer for their asset. Yet they seem aware that potentially theyll have a hard time replacing someone of his ability for a team of their current standing. If we do not improve as a side then our future turnover doesnt improve either. Its not to good a deal to turn down in that case, its shortsighted.

Yup. Genuinely thought we'd spend the money and feel well and truly strung along. Worth it more than some new nets and a greener pitch. So you'd both rather have kept Nolan and Carroll rather than signing Cabaye, Marveaux, Ba, Mehdi and possibly Erdinc? You can argue that we could have bought those players in anyway but it was never going to happen. Not all perhaps, one or two of them maybe. Ashley had already shown he'd invest if the potential to make it back was there with Ben Arfa/Tiote, you think we'd have ignored any interesting opportunitys again like that this window if we hadnt sold Carroll? Doubt it. Selling Carroll just gave Ashley a reason not to have to risk spending more of his own money in the hope he'd make it back with clever investments. We've yet to see if the way hes switched it around will be more beneficial to having just kept Carroll & given him one decent partner.

only done it once though. losing nolan and carrolls goals and replacing them with Ba and Erdinc. not saying they cant replace them, but neither have as good strikerates as those 2, and even with Carroll and Nolan we needed further striking options. The loss of oNolan is looking worse every day Erdincs strike rate for his last 4 seasons in the top flight is much better than Nolans. Carroll will be hard to replace, but we're probably replacing him with two good strikers in Ba and Erdinc if we get him also. Nolan is being covered by Cabaye really & Ben Arfa if people will stop tryna cripple the poor fella.

Pardew is clearly putting out misleading messages man. Claiming we've offered Enrique a massive contract offer for this club. Enrique saying that they basically havent offered to increase his salary atall. You realise this means that Pardew is trying to present the idea to us fans that Enrique is lucky they didnt offer him a reduced salary, following being one of the best players for our club in the last couple of years. And you cannot see the BS ? What I read from the quote is that Pardew claims the club offered the best deal available to anyone (which probably means the same as Coloccini) while Enrique claims it is "not just about money". "They offered me money which I already have" could be interpret as "I got money but my ambition isn't fulfilled". Not blaming Enrique, just I think it is ridiculous that the club offered "reduced" wages to him. Can't be true. A guy responded to one of his tweets with "But Pardew himself have said that you have a "fantastic deal on the table" - that doesn't sound like they want you to go" He responded "eso es mentira (that is a lie) The give the money I Have already. They lie all the time" So for him to say it in that context suggests it is that theyve just offered the same basic wage. Which is a dodgy tactic for keeping someone whos turned out to be one of your best players in general, let alone then selling it to everyone else as some kind of amazing offer thats been put foward. I think then he goes on to try to say its not about that though its because theyre not investing in the team. Has to say that though really, it'll be both.