Frazzle

Think he's an attacking midfielder apparently, so doubt it.

I'd play Colo RB instead of Simpson and stick Shola in at CB.

You can't just say the players are out of form as an excuse for Pardew though, its his job to have every player playing at the best of their ability. I'm fairly sure Jonas, Cabaye, Tiote's etc. form will improve when Ben Arfa gets a run in the team.

I think we'll win by 3-4 clear goals.

It was 1-0 to Man U before he won the penalty it was 0-0 against Bolton before he scored his goal, your point is? Was also 0-0 against Wigan and 1-2 against Spurs before he came on.

What I don't get with Pardew is why isn't he even trying to improve our standard of play? We seem to have gone backwards since the start of the season. I don't think anyone expects Barcelona style one touch football but we can certainly improve from what we're doing (Cabaye, Tiote, Vuckic, Ben Arfa, Ba, Santon are easily good enough to play football on the deck). He's got a chance to build something because he'll get given time due to being Ashley's mate/man whatever (why else would we hire an out of work League 1 manager?). I'd be happy to finish midtable for a few seasons if I knew (and saw) that we were trying to change our style of play completely but I wouldn't if the long term prospects were just to plod along each year. The way Pardew's acting at the moment is as if his job is on the line with how fearful and conservative he's being, Pardew seems scared to drop a few points in the short term (which I don't even think will happen ) even if it means we could get our most talented player up to speed.

Can't believe he's still got a job, he's a woeful 'pundit'.

i reckon the fact he isn't in the team is relevant It is. 1) It could be because he isn't putting the effort in in training. 2) It could be because we don't feel he has full match fitness yet. 3) It could be that he isn't one of Pardew's favourites. 4) It could be because when he has come on Pardew doesn't feel he as been as influential as he is supposed to be. ... so that's not all there is to it, that was my point Fair enough. Coloccini has an equal amount of technical ability to Ben Arfa - people just disregard it more because he isn't the goal-scorer he's the goal saver. Tackling is a technical ability as well which people sometimes forget. I think technique is generally understand to mean ability with the ball at your feet though and Ben Arfa is better then Colo in that respect. Otherwise, last season you could have said Carroll was the most technically gifted player in the league based on his heading ability. Tackling requires technique, as does heading. Therefore the best 'technical footballer' has the best ability across most of the areas. As I said though, I don't think people generally interpret in that way. Ask anyone who's got the best technique in the league and 99% of people will say Silva, ignoring all defenders and keepers. You're right. I used to play CB so I may be biased like...but goal-scorers are very widely regarded more worthwhile or more important than goal-savers. They're sold for more and grab more headlines and really it's a load of bollocks. It is a good point, you rarely see defenders or keepers winning the Ballon D'Or. Still think Ben Arfa is our best technical player regardless.

i reckon the fact he isn't in the team is relevant It is. 1) It could be because he isn't putting the effort in in training. 2) It could be because we don't feel he has full match fitness yet. 3) It could be that he isn't one of Pardew's favourites. 4) It could be because when he has come on Pardew doesn't feel he as been as influential as he is supposed to be. ... so that's not all there is to it, that was my point Fair enough. Coloccini has an equal amount of technical ability to Ben Arfa - people just disregard it more because he isn't the goal-scorer he's the goal saver. Tackling is a technical ability as well which people sometimes forget. I think technique is generally understand to mean ability with the ball at your feet though and Ben Arfa is better then Colo in that respect. Otherwise, last season you could have said Carroll was the most technically gifted player in the league based on his heading ability. Tackling requires technique, as does heading. Therefore the best 'technical footballer' has the best ability across most of the areas. As I said though, I don't think people generally interpret in that way. Ask anyone who's got the best technique in the league and 99% of people will say Silva, ignoring all defenders and keepers.

i reckon the fact he isn't in the team is relevant It is. 1) It could be because he isn't putting the effort in in training. 2) It could be because we don't feel he has full match fitness yet. 3) It could be that he isn't one of Pardew's favourites. 4) It could be because when he has come on Pardew doesn't feel he as been as influential as he is supposed to be. ... so that's not all there is to it, that was my point Fair enough. Coloccini has an equal amount of technical ability to Ben Arfa - people just disregard it more because he isn't the goal-scorer he's the goal saver. Tackling is a technical ability as well which people sometimes forget. I think technique is generally understand to mean ability with the ball at your feet though and Ben Arfa is better then Colo in that respect. Otherwise, last season you could have said Carroll was the most technically gifted player in the league based on his heading ability.

In my opinion, Ben Arfa is only the 6th best player at the club in terms of ability, and probably only 8th best when you consider factors such as work ethic and consistency. 6th best in terms of ability? Looking at ability alone he's number one. He has the best technique at the club. Nethertheless, the Shearer-Ginola anecdote applies. He has the best ability and technique, its irrelevant whether the ability is utilised.

In my opinion, Ben Arfa is only the 6th best player at the club in terms of ability, and probably only 8th best when you consider factors such as work ethic and consistency. 6th best in terms of ability? Looking at ability alone he's number one.

If Suarez was nipping him and that at the same time he was calling him a negro its pretty obvious its wasn't used in a friendly way, why would you be trying to wind him up and calm him down at the same time...

Not clear answers is harsh on Suarez, must be hard to articulate anything with those teeth in the way.

I've slagged Dalglish off before on here and had people moaning about it ffs the bloke's a knob

I hated Suarez before all this, hate him more now. Hope this ban gets upheld even if Liverpool campaign for a New Years honour for him.

I dunno how we'd set up against Chelsea, other than having Obertan and Jonas roll out a red carpet at the tunnel before we form a guard of honour

Can't believe they wrote 'Stevie G'

How did you play today brummie, just hitting them on the break or going toe to toe?

He's a year or two away from Championship football?

Gets on my tits this Pardew=bad, Carr=good thing. They sign players as a team, they've always maintained this. I'm guessing Obertan and Ba were Pardew's signings and Santon, Cabaye, Marveaux (does any one else forget we have him by the way?) were Carr 'signings'. Just purely as I think Pardew prefers players with Premiership experience whilst Carr seems to always be scouting in Europe. I think what either want is irrelevent, Pardew and Carr can identify who they like, its about how Fatty and Dekka see a deal, if they think its value for money then it gets the go ahead, if not nothing happens. is that not as it should be ? Well sometimes they should have a bit of faith in the manager/scouting team. Surely Fat Mike isn't the best judge of footballing ability/potential. So, no, its probably not how it should be but it is how it most likely is. and the manager/scouting team will have to think it's value for money. i'm pretty sure ashley/lambias wouldn't have heard of most of our signings and wouldn't have been personally to watch them but they, as you say, had faith in their manager/scouting team. You responded to bimpy who said it will be up to Ashley and Llmabias to decide whether a player is value for money and said 'is that not how it should be', so I'm not sure what your response to my comment is, there'll probably be loads of examples where they've dismissed Pardew's and Carr's advice. Since Colo what's our record signing? 5 or 6m? I'm sure the incumbent manager/scouting have recommended players costing more than that. and that always happens at every club (bar citeh) ,the manager will not get every player he wants. I can see other owners being slightly more flexible though. only within what they consider to be their financial constraints (and thats a whole other debate) or do you think ashley/lambias had a good look at tiote,cabaye,obertan,santon,jonas ? I doubt they scouted them no. Put it this way though, I'm sure if we were asked to pay much more for Tiote they would've said no, regardless of advice of the scouting team, even though he would still be worth it. That's an example of where stubbornness can be harmful. All conjecture of course but I wouldn't be surprised. using tiote as the example, he's only worth it if he produces when he gets here, it's not like he was playing so well in the netherlands that we all knew he'd be an instant hit. we paid what they wanted. What's that got to do with the hypothetical situation I proposed though? We're obviously looking back in hindsight and know that Tiote would still be worth it if he cost double that or more, even though its likely that Ashley would've pulled the plug. as you said thats conjecture, why would any owner of a football club pay up more than the opposition wanted ? i notice it's went from conjecture to "likely" Me saying its conjecture but that I think its likely isn't contradictory and we wouldn't pay more than they wanted, where have I said that. I was using the Tiote situation and creating a hypothetical situation, of course I wouldn't want us to pay over 3.5m if that's what they asked. it happens all the time doesn't it, club a and club b being unable to agree on a price, tiote was actually a very bad example for you to use. Tiote was the example I used because we can use hindsight and realise he was worth much more than 3.5m, the rest was just hypothetical to illustrate a point. his team at the time didn't seem to think so. it was a bad example because we actually agreed a deal at what his club thought he was worth and we have no idea if we'd have paid an extra million or not. In a parallel universe though, where they asked for another million, would Ashley have sanctioned it? If Carr said he was worth double that would Ashley have paid any more? That's just the general point I was getting that. The point is better illustrated with youngsters to be honest where you don't always pay for current ability but for potential as well.

Once he got more confident he started creating a bit more space for himself with some clever turns and touches. Once he's fully confident and got more experience his pace won't be such a big issue, as Nixon and madras have pointed out as well.

Gets on my tits this Pardew=bad, Carr=good thing. They sign players as a team, they've always maintained this. I'm guessing Obertan and Ba were Pardew's signings and Santon, Cabaye, Marveaux (does any one else forget we have him by the way?) were Carr 'signings'. Just purely as I think Pardew prefers players with Premiership experience whilst Carr seems to always be scouting in Europe. I think what either want is irrelevent, Pardew and Carr can identify who they like, its about how Fatty and Dekka see a deal, if they think its value for money then it gets the go ahead, if not nothing happens. is that not as it should be ? Well sometimes they should have a bit of faith in the manager/scouting team. Surely Fat Mike isn't the best judge of footballing ability/potential. So, no, its probably not how it should be but it is how it most likely is. and the manager/scouting team will have to think it's value for money. i'm pretty sure ashley/lambias wouldn't have heard of most of our signings and wouldn't have been personally to watch them but they, as you say, had faith in their manager/scouting team. You responded to bimpy who said it will be up to Ashley and Llmabias to decide whether a player is value for money and said 'is that not how it should be', so I'm not sure what your response to my comment is, there'll probably be loads of examples where they've dismissed Pardew's and Carr's advice. Since Colo what's our record signing? 5 or 6m? I'm sure the incumbent manager/scouting have recommended players costing more than that. and that always happens at every club (bar citeh) ,the manager will not get every player he wants. I can see other owners being slightly more flexible though. only within what they consider to be their financial constraints (and thats a whole other debate) or do you think ashley/lambias had a good look at tiote,cabaye,obertan,santon,jonas ? I doubt they scouted them no. Put it this way though, I'm sure if we were asked to pay much more for Tiote they would've said no, regardless of advice of the scouting team, even though he would still be worth it. That's an example of where stubbornness can be harmful. All conjecture of course but I wouldn't be surprised. using tiote as the example, he's only worth it if he produces when he gets here, it's not like he was playing so well in the netherlands that we all knew he'd be an instant hit. we paid what they wanted. What's that got to do with the hypothetical situation I proposed though? We're obviously looking back in hindsight and know that Tiote would still be worth it if he cost double that or more, even though its likely that Ashley would've pulled the plug. as you said thats conjecture, why would any owner of a football club pay up more than the opposition wanted ? i notice it's went from conjecture to "likely" Me saying its conjecture but that I think its likely isn't contradictory and we wouldn't pay more than they wanted, where have I said that. I was using the Tiote situation and creating a hypothetical situation, of course I wouldn't want us to pay over 3.5m if that's what they asked. it happens all the time doesn't it, club a and club b being unable to agree on a price, tiote was actually a very bad example for you to use. Tiote was the example I used because we can use hindsight and realise he was worth much more than 3.5m, the rest was just hypothetical to illustrate a point.

His injury was a 4 month recovery and Pardew (I know) said earlier this week in The Journal that he was due back in March. Serious injury, will need around 4 months to get up to match fitness.