Hughesy

Meh - I still think he isn't that bad to be honest. Even though he's doing terribly now, I still stand by my posts.

He better play a full strength team for this game.

Would be a completely different player if there was actual movement around. It's the same as it was with HBA - our players (Perez apart) just watch him and expect to do it all himself.

Really hope he punched Pardew. He'd only be doing what right thinking people want to do.

Was pretty good today when he came on - linked up well with Perez. Hard though with no movement around him.

Always find the development, or lack thereof, of these players so fascinating. Wasn't Zamblera capped by quite a few Italian representative sides? And I seem to remember Tozer costing a million or something? And they just turn out to be utter crap.

Some people do seem pretty oblivious to the increasing importance of analytics in football.

Hasn't MYM been injured as well?

I think the hardest thing about being a manager would organising constructive training sessions each day with a view to improving players. I assume as you do coaching courses you must get ideas, but I'd probably get them playing two touch matches (of varying team sizes) on small pitches and that'd be about it. Maybe some set piece work as well...

Put on the other page an article about the Brentford manager who left a career as a broker to get into football, but he had played non-league stuff before I think.

There's absolutely no reason a nobody who plays football manager couldn't make a career out of it if he studied the game enough IMO. It's the same with anything really, if you work hard enough at it and learn the craft you can do it. But fact of the matter is you'll never get a chance based on that alone. I personally never understand the mindset that "he's played football so he knows his stuff and you didn't so you know f*** all ". Sky and BBC prove on a weekly basis that isn't the case if anything in some cases it's the complete opposite. That Secret Footballer guy/Dave Kitson is obsessed with telling people that only people who have played the game can truly understand the tactical nuances etc and that fans generally don't know anything. Which is quite frankly a load of crap, but his view nonetheless.

There's that guy at Brentford - but I think even he played football at some level - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/25734351

Sounds like the title of a terrible book - 'God, Ronaldo and his favourites'.

Paddy Barclay's written another Pardew article for the Bleacher Report (http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2292969-alan-pardew-successfully-tackles-premier-league-big-guns-to-rejuvenate-newcastle?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=programming-UK). I want to respond to him, but I know it'll get me nowhere..

Aren't fatties more buoyant? Knowing our luck he'd float.

I wish journalists and 'itks' could be specific about what HBA actually does wrong. Real facts though - not made up bullshit. Because the work rate thing is a myth, the lack of end product is a myth etc etc. If challenging Pardew is enough to get him ostracised, that says a lot more about Pardew than it does about HBA. No one ever has specific details.

That kind of proves the point that although he probably could have done more with his talent, his output is pretty good compared to two of the best wingers we've ever had who were playing under far superior managers in a far superior team...

Totally agree - his end product was actually pretty impressive, especially when you consider his fairly sporadic runs in the team. And the stuff about his workrate was always overexaggerated - I'd be interested how many goals where people could directly point to HBA as being the main reason why the goal was conceded.

He's got 1 goal and 2 assists in 606 mins of football this season (the equivalent of about 6.5 to 7 games). That's the same number of assists as, among others, Silva, Cazorla, Nasri and Ramsay. All of whom, I think, have played more minutes than him. So - not exactly stellar, but not quite an attacker who doesn't score or create.

He's a 22 year old who has only played 38 Premier League games and I assume a lot of those might have been as a sub. It isn't that strange to point out that he might improve with more games and coaching (although probably not here) nor does his current level of ability indicate that he'll never make it. Players develop at different rates and, given his limited game time, Sammy might be one of those players who develops later than others. From what I've seen of him, he's pretty raw but he's certainly got talent. He doesn't look out of place in the Premier League now so I am not sure why he wouldn't be worth persisting with.

A 22-year-old with the potential to improve. Brave assertion there, like. Cheers mate. Not impossible to work out what I was saying without being an arse.

I am really surprised how underrated he is on here. He always looks dangerous to me and looks like he has the potential to improve.

So much wrong in one post.

How would Redknapp at Spurs work? Or is he a bad example given that Spurs have arguably got worse since he left?

I don't really get how the fact that HBA hasn't done that well at Hull is somehow relevant to his time here or whether it was the right decision to get rid of him. We know how good he was and the direct effect he had in terms of goals and assists, how useful he would be to have in the squad now and how exaggerated his lack of work rate actually was.