Tiotes Witch Doctor

We looked utterly toothless without Shelvey and I think its a very real possibilty that someone like Leeds could pip us to second if he were injured for a prolonged period or suspended, failing to sign another CM could come back to bite us on the arse. A winger would be nice too, take some of the burden off Ritchie to create from out wide, penny pinching still I would suspect.

What if a premier league team comes in for him before the end of the window

Wonder if Real Madrid are still keeping a close eye on his progress?

Agreed, but think Ritchie could do a job if required.

Think he would still get a job in a struggling newly promoted premier league team. He finished 5th once ya na.

Ritchie would probably make a good number 10 actually, very good close control and seems to good at little intricate passing moves, think it would be Ritchie left and Townsend right though if he did come.

"We had to take Cabaye off because of an injury, that brought negative reaction from the crowd and that spread around." Our fault again.

Darlow Yedlin Hanley Clark Dummett Ritchie Shelvey Hayden Gouffran Perez Murphy

Hes a great player in this league but come on man.

Ando just trots out every cliche in the book when it comes to his analysis of the game "did what we had to do" etc.. that kind of tripe, no real insight.

Should be trying to offload the hopeless cunt this window, would be happy for even Woodman to get games over him.

Tiote treating this game like his testimonial it seems

I'm so happy Shelvey is back!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/football/38668204 Wasn't aware it was this easily available.

Sels Yedlin - Findlay - Hanley - Lazaar Ritchie - Shelvey - Tiote - El Mhanni Barlaser Gouffran

Or they all had a massive row and Rafa's leaving forever and everyones gonna die

Could happen this, would probably be replacing Gouff on the wing which is a massive plus and is a ready made premier league signing if we go up. Hope there's some truth in this, I do feel a bit bitter about the way he left but its modern day football, things like this happen all the time, just the nature of the beast.

Wasn't it 6m for Cabella and 10m for Thauvin?

Was he switching position during the game, looked as if he was playing left hand side in highlights. Obviously he can drift in the no10.

Actually starting to think these might go down, they seem to be constantly riddled with injuries and are too skint to buy reinforcements for an already poor squad and starting 11. Please let this be the season.

when I read the article, hopefully nothing in it, but it would be so Ashley. I suppose it depends on how it would be sold to Benitez, they could probably persuade him to just bring in predominantly young talent aslong as he was given the funds to bring in top talent and not just no hopers from France.

That assist was gorgeous and from all I've heard he did well by all accounts but to say the criticism of him has been unjust is just wrong in my view, hes been poor virtually all season and his lack of effort has been even more saddening. Lets hope today is the start of something better as hes bound to get a run of games with Diame/Atsu being away, hopefully the player we all thought he would be this season is still in there somewhere.

There hasn't been much of a plan B really though it has to be said, we've lost every game we've conceded first in haven't we? We do need to improve in that area, whether it be a plan B or sorting out the mentality of the players when going down first in a game.

Costa out Aguero in Hazard out Coutinho in Sitting 3rd 20 points off top in a league where there's a couple of hundred quid up for grabs if I can top the table come the end of the season