Away Day Gadgie

One of my favourite players from recent times. He'll pick up at least a couple of suspensions this season though. He plays with a very high intensity so he's always gona go in a bit too hard or a bit late, which i don't have a problem with cos you'd lose half the player it you tried to take that away from his game. Sorry for the cliche but i think it's definitely relevant here.

That just looks like typical Pardew form mate

Aye fair point. I'm actually a big fan of the lad and said in another thread he'd be one of our better players this season, but he had a stinker today. He'll be much better in the next game ?

Good result and performance, we could've actually won by more if we hadn't wasted so many counter attacks. Elliott - Didn't have too much to do but did it well. Manquillo - Poor in the 1st half but much better in the 2nd and used the ball well. Lascelles - Matchwinner! Clark - Solid Gamez - Some clever bits of forward play, not too much to do defensively. Pleasantly surprised. Hayden - Very poor, one of his worst displays for us. I was calling for him to be hooked about 5-10 mins before he was. Merino - Bossed it. Shameful dive though! Murphy - Pretty poor but confident he'll get better. Ritchie - Class workrate again, had some good moments and got another assist. Perez - Shite in the 1st half, better in the 2nd, should have scored! Joselu - Very good hold up play, unlucky not to score and managed to stay involved. Pissed me off with his weak attempt from the edge of the box though.

Looking forward to Pardew explaining why he never played him

Guaranteed to screw us. He loves giving big decisions against us, and if he doesn't get the chance to do that he makes sure he gives all the small ones the oppositon's way.

He's a fat pisstaker. It's like saying you'll give someone £20m if they build you a house, but they can only use a bucket and spade to do it. I absolutely despise this cunt, his trolling is actually getting worse!

What a load of shite. Far too many token players in there and it's a proper Man U wankathon.

A lot of Allardyce's signings tend to be players at the end of their career. Not sure how he would handle the keep them under 25yrs old brief. Aye he also likes to sign about 10 players every transfer window aswell. By law of averages, 2 or 3 will be decent. Doubt he'd be able to play that game working under Ashley.

That's actually a really good point and not one i've ever heard before ?

You should have heard TalkSport piping 'Big Sam' off live on air this morning. Horrendous stuff. Typical English media. They keep telling us that the likes of Pardew, Allardyce and Redknapp are "good managers" despite the fact they've won a grand total of 1 FA Cup between them, including their playing careers. Basically they're born losers but get a free pass because they're English. At the same time the media will stick the knife in on someone like Klopp or Pellegrini saying they aren't cut out for the Premier League or don't understand English football. I'd say someone who has had a 20 year managerial career and failed to win a major honour is the definition of not cut out for it.

He does keep shooting himself in the foot like. This is probably the first time he's been in serious consideration for starting as the main striker under Rafa, and now he's on the sidelines again. Aye! I'm not his biggest fan but he's in good shape and scoring goals, he's should be a serious contender!

It's still irritating me that he got himself banned. Considering the form he's in, he would've been a very good option for us in these next 3 games.

http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11835/11023249/marcelo-on-romario-roberto-carlos-real-madrid-and-his-world-cup-mission-with-brazil Really enjoyed this interview with Mercelo. Found it heartwarming when he talks about what his grandad did for him and despite everything he's achieved in the game, he sounds like a proper decent bloke.

NUFC are well known for paying massive wages marra! Not even the Chinese could compete with them!

We are not in a position to "send the right message", we need to win football games. Shelvey is infinitely superior to Perez and should be brought in for him imo. However if Rafa won't play a more flat central 3 and prefers to go with Perez in the hole, even though he doesn't really play that role that well, then he'll drop one of Merino or Hayden, my guess would be Merino. Shelvey will be up for this one too, anxious to repay the team for his stupidity and keen to put one over his old team. He's also the player we were built around in pre-season, I can't imagine all that preperation will be thrown away by Rafa. Thing is, we did actually win our last football match reasonably comfortably without Shelvey. Rafa has talked about competition for places quite a lot since he came here so he's got no reason to drop someone who performed well for a guy who let everyone down on the first day of the season. Shelvey is a good player but he's not (and never will be) a world beater, add to the fact his performances in 2017 have been average then i can't think of one reason why he should waltz straight back into a side that just won convincingly. I'd be really surprised if Rafa did that.

Most reports today claim so. ?

Are Yedlin and Lejeune definitely back for this?

I don't want Shelvey straight back in, it sends the wrong message. I'm sure he got straight back in after his suspension last season and maybe at the back of his mind it made him think he's indispensable. To be fair that was true to a certain extent as he had been outstanding and we didn't have a Merino to step in for him. This situation is different as Merino, Hayden and Perez all played well in the last game so it's a perfect opportunity to let him know he's not "all that".

Agree with this. I'm no going to pretend i'm an expert on finance or accounting but i think it seems fairly obvious that Ashley has been bleeding the club for years. Even thinking back to the Andy Carroll sale, that money wasn't reinvested back into the playing squad as promised. I think Pardew or Llambias tried to say most of it had gone on wages but that was total bullshit obviously. Whenever i try to work out what Ashley is up to i tend to think of the most greedy and devious scenario as default, do that and you're probably not too far away from the truth.

Says it all really. How depressing!

If Ashley wanted rid of Rafa because he's popular, then why not get rid after promotion when talks were held to persuade Rafa to stay? He could, in theory, have parted ways with Rafa and brought in a puppet with barely a murmur of discontent (most of us would have considered it a real possibility that Rafa would leave after what happened in January). Could have put out news stories about Rafa wanting to move on or wanting different challenges compared to what NUFC can offer to placate fans. Obviously we don't know if contract clauses would have affected those discussions, though if Rafa was unhappy with the discussions what other option would he have had other than to leave? And whilst I imagine Rafa allegedly communicating his unhappiness with the transfer situation through the media during the summer may have irked Ashley, Rafa did the same in January, so it's nothing new. Nothing makes sense with Ashley. There's many possibilities, but one of them that I won't rule out just yet is that this is all to do with not wanting to spend until the money is actually received and banked. Wishful thinking probably, but it's still a possibility. That's a fair point but my thinking is that Ashley felt it was within his interests to keep Rafa here short term. Like you said, before those discussions there was a lot of suspicion amongst supporters over what was gona happen with Rafa, that statement put a lot of people at ease and had them looking forward to the new season under the best manager we've had for 13 years. I would imagine that statement secured quite a lot of season ticket sales and renewals. Remember Mike Ashley's sole aim is to advertise his brands (s*** Direct and Flannels) and those boards look a lot more attractive in a full stadium than a half empty one, especially at a club like Newcastle that is known for packing the stadium out. He would've also been aware that there's a small possibility that Rafa might stay on a while and have us in a healthy situation by the time he leaves so it was worth pissing him around for a few months. Some journalists are already saying Rafa won't go until there is a scenario that suits him personally, we don't know when that will be, it could be next week or it could be the end of the season, either way it looks like the fat man will get some compensation for him. He'll be very chuffed with himself when that happens no doubt.

I agree with whoever said we need to target his shitty company. If we can somehow damage their reputation and their share price goes down, Ashley and major shareholders will get pissed off and the fat cunt will be forced to sell us to take the heat off.

Even though i saw this coming it doesn't make me any more dissapointed or angry. It's very clear now that Ashley and his cock slaves are trying to force Rafa to resign. Rafa thought he had a good relationship with Charnley but i'm sure he realised today that the little worm has been leading him along the whole time. Getting rid of Carr and putting the new "head of recruitment" was purely to try and appease Rafa in the short term after we failed to get any early transfer work done, i wouldn't be surprised to see him get the boot once Rafa is gone. This Justin Barnes c*** that's been brought in is only there to make sure Ashley doesn't get taken to court again and to make things awkward for Rafa, they're hoping Rafa won't be able to take any more and walk, or just as good he takes another job and the fat man scores for some compo. If these rodents all die a slow, painful and humiliating death i'd be ok with that. ? Mike Ashley feels threatened by anyone who is popular with the fans - Keegan, Shearer, Hughton and now Rafa all forced out and treat like s***. Even popular players with an opinion get shown the door (Nolan, Barton etc.). It's much easier for him to appoint a yes man and use him as s*** deflecter, no matter how useless he is. Thinking about who our next manager is gona be genuinely makes me feel sick. Whoever it is, i won't be "giving him a chance" i'm afraid!

Probs just the fact Ryan Bertrand is canny good.