Jack Flash

It's never been Cisse's fault that this season he has been found in offside positions, Sissoko now has the vision to the run much earlier than anyone else in the squad, everyone had been making the pass to Cisse far too late. http://i49.tinypic.com/2m7xhq9.jpg

Very impressed that he didn't use the word "banter" once there. There's hope for him yet.

So we might finally get him to start half the league games?!

Honestly, man. How do these chancers get paid for this stuff?

How much would you estimate it would have cost for a family of 4 from Newcastle (or similar) to come down to see 3 or 4 events with trains (inc tube tickets), event tickets, accommodation, food etc? That's on top of probably needing at least a few days off work/school. Same goes for England playing their home games on a Friday night but that's by the by. Trains would have been cheap as chips if they'd got in early, ticket prices were reasonable (particularly for the Paralympics, which is what I went to). Not sure why you're going on about accommodation and taking lots of time off work, my brother's a teacher and he brought about 10 kids down to see some Paralympics events and they just did it like a day trip. What did you want them to do, host it all over the country?* People are just having a go for the sake of it. * Oh hang on, they did that. f***ing bollocks, you can only pre-book for so long before the event, the whole period of the Olympics and Paralympics was over inflated right from the start as every hotel operator, B&B owner, coach and train providers cashed in on the event. A few low key football games, aye thats fair. You book trains between Newcastle and London for relative pennies 3 months before the event, I know because I've done it for 5 years. The train companies didn't change that system for the Olympics. I'm not going to get dragged into an argument about the ticketing process, which did have its problems but they were dealing with unprecedented demand. As it happens, the smart thing to do (and it seemed obvious when we got to that point, but not sure how obvious it was!) would have been to have booked train tickets for during the Paralympics and you'd have been able to get tickets for any day you wanted. It was really, really easy to get Paralympics tickets. I was going to add at the bottom of my last post to not bother replying because my knowledge or interest in the Olympics is minuscule and I'm likely talking out of my arse as a result. It just seemed a hell of a lot of effort to take a family down for a few events but I've no facts or numbers to back it up. I'll leave you in the capable, tender hands of Stifler xx

How much would you estimate it would have cost for a family of 4 from Newcastle (or similar) to come down to see 3 or 4 events with trains (inc tube tickets), event tickets, accommodation, food etc? That's on top of probably needing at least a few days off work/school. Same goes for England playing their home games on a Friday night but that's by the by. Trains would have been cheap as chips if they'd got in early, ticket prices were reasonable (particularly for the Paralympics, which is what I went to). Not sure why you're going on about accommodation and taking lots of time off work, my brother's a teacher and he brought about 10 kids down to see some Paralympics events and they just did it like a day trip. What did you want them to do, host it all over the country?* People are just having a go for the sake of it. * Oh hang on, they did that. I was under the impression you couldn't just buy tickets for (Olympic) events you wanted to go to? Meaning you could be spending a few days between whatever events you were given? It's a large upheaval (both financial and physical) either way and it's not as easy as just saying hop on a train. I doubt many Londoners made the effort to come to Newcastle to watch any of the spectacular, life changing events we got btw

If Pardew puts out a blatantly weakened team against these then he needs shooting. According to .com we only have 1 decent injured player (R.Taylor) and have just bought 4 apparently very good players to boost the squad. If we can't manage to play well in 2 games in 4 days with a full squad of mostly good players then how are we ever going to win anything? I can already hear his excuses on Sunday if we don't win

How much would you estimate it would have cost for a family of 4 from Newcastle (or similar) to come down to see 3 or 4 events with trains (inc tube tickets), event tickets, accommodation, food etc? That's on top of probably needing at least a few days off work/school. Same goes for England playing their home games on a Friday night but that's by the by.

Eh? I'm just wondering where all the confidence in Real Madrid came from. They're the Man City of their league while Man Utd are smashing up our league.

Did you even watch the match, bro?! All that "Real will smash them" talk is even funnier now.

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m4l3crHJ4V1r2rck2o1_500.jpg

Can't believe how many people were betting against Man Utd.

Us -1 is 3/1 on skybet.

As if Ba's just a "box predator" ffs. He's a far more rounded striker than Cisse despite not being very rounded.

Phil Jones plays like he weighs 20 stone. Typical fat kid in the playground stuff.

I wish I'd have gotten in on this Golden February thing. I too could have lost hundreds of pounds within hours. Today I have X on X to X. I'll fill in the blanks later

Wishful thinking from whoever wrote that. It'll get it's hits though so job done.

NUFCTV haven't got Sissoko Sissokoing Cole in the highlights

Ranger, Ba and Simpson getting their comeuppance recently. Anyone who has annoyed us recently should start being a bit worried

Not necessarily a "moment" but the first impression the new players will have got of us and our stadium is probably as good as they could have got. When they found themselves doing a lap of honour after their home debut they must have know they've made a good choice to join

The question for me is not how we got him so cheap but how we actually got him. Surely we can't have been the best team who were in for a player this good and such a low price? It looks like a staggering piece of business and bravo to whoever pulled it off.

f*** you, OCK! http://i46.tinypic.com/2rgc0hf.gif

Former Manchester City and England right-back Danny Mills at Etihad Stadium on BBC Radio 5 live: "Why do referees have to book players for diving all the time these days?" Really hate football "experts".

If the last 2 results are anything to go by, we could do a bit of damage now due to how open/poor the league has been this year. A top 8 finish is suddenly very possible. Need to sort out that awful goal difference though. 13 games left, realistically think we can expect to pick up points in all of them - maybe Citeh away is one game that could be a stretch too far but with the new boys in the squad, I genuinely don't see why they should fear anyone. Not outside the realms of possibility that we can pick up another 25-30points. All depends if we decide to cut loose in the league and go for the wins (not got a lot to lose) and focus on the Europa league adventure. 52/55pts good enough for top 6? (My initial post has been more almost completely irrelevant because I've noticed the league table I was looking at is wrong ) I do hope you're right though. The way we played at 2-1 down today certainly gave me massive hope that we're just going to go for it now and see what happens. Getting some confidence and moral back is/will be a huge factor in how we finish because we were riding that particular wave last season to great effect.

I was just typing a post about this but deleted it In the Keegan days I'd often prefer a limited Geordie player who'd die for the cause over a talented player who I couldn't really connect with but it's a completely different landscape now. I'll always have a soft spot for players like Taylor because if I played for Newcastle I'd be doing the cheerleader stuff too.