Alan Pardew

[Dave]

HTT

[Dave]

Pardew's at Old Trafford at the moment anyway. No doubt checking out how they handle 'long passes'.

[Mick]

Some fantastic overreactions in here.  As usual.  I genuinely don't know what people expected to happen this season, but on any level we have to be ahead of where most people expected us to be.  Yes, we are in danger of throwing away our good work and that is immensely frustrating, but did anyone really think we were going to maintain a top 6 challenge all season?  That would have been a minor miracle.

 

As it stands we are going through a bad patch, but we are still in 7th.  Personally I think we will manage to hold onto 7th and that would have to represent a good season for us at this stage.  Looking at the teams above us and their levels of investment and the years that they have been entrenched in the top 6, I can't believe anyone would think we 'should' be taking them on and beating them.  At least not at the moment.  Expectations have risen ridiculously high on here.  Pardew would almost have been better off not doing so well at the start of the season with the way people are now expecting us to perform.

 

It doesn't matter what people were expecting of this season before a ball was kicked because expectations change over time.  I doubt that many expected us to go down at the start of 2008/09 season but as the season went on people’s expectations changed and it wasn't much of a surprise at the end.  This season is different and instead of performing below expectation we've gone the other way and performed better than most will have hoped, at least points wise.  Since Bonfire night we’ve won one game and that’s now close to two months and I doubt even the worst pessimists would have expected that we’d go two months with 1 win, did you?

 

Even earlier when we were winning we were getting a lot of luck and people were going on about Pardew being a good manager.  Now the results are not going our way it’s only right that people express concerns at the way things are going.

I don’t think the team are playing that much worse (yesterday aside) than we were when winning and we’ve rarely seen a change in our game even though Pardew said our style was going to change.  From time to time we do try to play football on the deck but for far too long we’ve bypassed the midfield by just hoofing the ball from back to front. 

 

For far too long we’ve played players who are not performing while potentially better players have been left on the bench and now we’re not getting results people are rightly questioning those decisions.

 

You can accept any s**** that's served up without questioning it, that doesn't mean other should do the same.

 

As for my expectations, I think we'll probably end up between 10th and 8th which will be a couple of places better than my original hopes for the season.  I also think our team is capable of finishing slightly higher but they’ll not do it because of the points lost due to managerial decisions. 

 

[Guest BEN BEN BEN ARFA]

I am sorry Chris Hughton

[Mick]

 

 

Think months is a bit of an exaggeration.  I do have issues with Pardew's team selection and tactics (although tactics-wise I am not as convinced as everyone else that Pardew has instructed the players to play long ball, I just think we have some average players who can't play any other way), but some of the comments about Pardew are way over the top.

 

Maybe the manager hasn't told them to hoof the ball long, I have seen absolutely nothing to suggest that he's told them no to do it and that's his job.

[Dr Venkman]

When do we ever get anything from Liverpool away anyway? It's annoying to lose but if we have to lose I'd rather it was to the teams from the top 6. At the moment, with our budget, 7th is the best we can realistically finish.

 

if i see a team put out with intent, that looks like it has a coherent plan to win the game, i'm happy. i was happy during the Wigan game even before we scored, afterwards people were saying we were lucky to win it but i maintained that you can't win every week and our method of play had been consistent and a little bit of class made the difference (not to mention Ben Arfa's introduction making the difference, funny that)

 

I freely accept that Wigan at home is a totally different kettle of fish to Liverpool away, but West Brom and Swansea at home was just as frustrating imo. Since Norwich we've completely given up playing football and Pardew's continued persistence with Obertan and Raylor is eye wateringly maddening. It's also worth noting how completely bereft of ideas we were against Bolton until.....Ben Arfa came on, we were terrible in that game.

 

Our league position is fantastic, but we're only going in one direction under Pardew's current mindset, he needs to sort it out and that's been the case for months now, it's not a new development.

We have a small squad. We can't really rotate it very much. When players aren't playing very well there aren't many options to change it. People seem to think Santon instead of R.Taylor and Ben Arfa instead of Obertan (or the second striker) will automatically mean we are a better team. I hope the theory is proved correct in practice.

 

Ben Arfa instead of Jonas or Obertan or Best, depending on which game he's on the bench for. Santon instead of Raylor or Simpson or Obertan. There's a few options and quite a few players not performing. Can you tell me in all seriousness you don't think Ben Arfa deserves a chance over Obertan, or even Santon? Considering whenever he's played he's looked our most dangerous winger, imo.

 

I think it's worth repeating how angry I was at repeatedly hearing Pardew instructing our players to 'get it forward' and 'hit Ba' last night. It didn't work once last night and I'm struggling to think of any part of any game where we've looked effective knocking it long other than the second half of Chelsea at home, a game we comfortably lost.

 

Pardew said they had a team meeting and discussed what they were and weren't good at before Bolton, we played ineffective long ball football for the majority of that game and we did it for 90 minutes last night. It's looking like it's something he thinks we're good at, what do you think?

[Mick]

 

We have a small squad. We can't really rotate it very much. When players aren't playing very well there aren't many options to change it. People seem to think Santon instead of R.Taylor and Ben Arfa instead of Obertan (or the second striker) will automatically mean we are a better team. I hope the theory is proved correct in practice.

 

We have a small squad but we also do have options and we're not fully utilising them and that's down to Pardew.  Santon is clearly a better player than Ryan Taylor and Ben Arfa is almost certainly better than Obertan.  We don't know that anything will automatically improve us, we do know that certain things which we are repeatedly doing are not working so we need to do something different.  If I try something that doesn't work I usually do something different next time in the hope that the end result is different, why should Pardew be any different?

 

We’ve also got Jonas who now looks completely burnt out because of the work he’s had to do, work that he wouldn’t have had to do if he’d had Santon behind him.

 

What’s wrong with dropping Jonas for Ferguson against a couple of the lesser sides to re-charge his batteries?

 

What has playing the long ball got to do with our squad size?  The answer is nothing and the manager is either encouraging us to bypass what should be a strength or he’s allowing it to happen.  At one point yesterday we put something like 30 passes together so we’re more than capable of doing it yet we’re not and that is bordering on madness.  If we can put 30 passes together against Liverpool at Anfield then we should be able to do it against lesser teams, we’re not and that has nothing to do with the standard of our players who can do it.

 

[Beren]

Some fantastic overreactions in here.  As usual.  I genuinely don't know what people expected to happen this season, but on any level we have to be ahead of where most people expected us to be.  Yes, we are in danger of throwing away our good work and that is immensely frustrating, but did anyone really think we were going to maintain a top 6 challenge all season?  That would have been a minor miracle.

 

As it stands we are going through a bad patch, but we are still in 7th.  Personally I think we will manage to hold onto 7th and that would have to represent a good season for us at this stage.  Looking at the teams above us and their levels of investment and the years that they have been entrenched in the top 6, I can't believe anyone would think we 'should' be taking them on and beating them.  At least not at the moment.  Expectations have risen ridiculously high on here.  Pardew would almost have been better off not doing so well at the start of the season with the way people are now expecting us to perform.

 

You've misunderstood the majority of posters if that is your interpretation of the criticism on here.  Maintaining such a challenge with our squad was always going to be an uphill struggle, but the manner in which we set about it is something we have control over.

 

Equally, the decisions made - some repeatedly so - are within our control. If everyone in the world can see Raylor regularly gets raped (to use a Pardewism) down our left and opposition teams astutely overload that corner of the pitch, should the decision-maker who stands idly by be immune from criticism? If he leaves out our most creative player while we stutter to a goalless draw with Swansea at home with half-truths about 'sharpness', should we stay quiet still? If he has us playing long balls game after game? Or are we really not allowed to vent exasperation and frustration just because we're currently "over-achieving"?

 

Not having the resources to compete with the top 6 is one thing - which will be accepted by all but a very small minority on here, not using existing resources and having the intention to compete with the top 6 with what we have is quite another.

[ChrisJbarnes]

Some fantastic overreactions in here.  As usual.  I genuinely don't know what people expected to happen this season, but on any level we have to be ahead of where most people expected us to be.  Yes, we are in danger of throwing away our good work and that is immensely frustrating, but did anyone really think we were going to maintain a top 6 challenge all season?  That would have been a minor miracle.

 

As it stands we are going through a bad patch, but we are still in 7th.  Personally I think we will manage to hold onto 7th and that would have to represent a good season for us at this stage.  Looking at the teams above us and their levels of investment and the years that they have been entrenched in the top 6, I can't believe anyone would think we 'should' be taking them on and beating them.  At least not at the moment.  Expectations have risen ridiculously high on here.  Pardew would almost have been better off not doing so well at the start of the season with the way people are now expecting us to perform.

 

Couldn't put it better myself.

[dcmk]

I'm a bit shocked that he believed Downing was 'on fire' therefore needing 2 people to mark him in the second half - this was a post match interview where he was saying the team on the whole should have been more positive and was looking for 'somebody to take somebody on and be a bit more constructive', quite contradictory.

 

[TaylorJ_01]

He's pissing points away with his daft team selection and tactics.

[Hanshithispantz]

The only baffling decision he has made so far that has actually came off is the Ameobi sub against Tottenham. Everything else that has been "Pardew what the fuck are you doing?" has proved to be fucking idiotic after the final whistle.

[Guest BlacknWhiteArmy]

We hear a lot in his prematch interviews about how we must 'contain' and 'neutralise' them, I wish we'd focus a bit more on what we're good at and just use it. Or alternatively what they're not good at.

[Andy]

I'm a bit shocked that he believed Downing was 'on fire' therefore needing 2 people to mark him in the second half - this was a post match interview where he was saying the team on the whole should have been more positive and was looking for 'somebody to take somebody on and be a bit more constructive', quite contradictory.

 

 

Again, he's more concerned about dealing with the opposition than causing them problems. It's been said a lot of times that he works with the defence in training far more than the attack, and that mentality is obviously going to be reflected on the pitch. We set ourselves up to combat the opposing team's strengths instead of playing to our own strengths.

[Jagten]

He said he wishes we had been more positive... Here's a suggestion alan, why didn't you tell them that. Preferably during the game.

[Guest Dontooner]

It doesnt really matter to me so much as to where we finish any seasons, its just the brand  of football we play. I still prefer watching this current team before the dreadful Smiths,butts,Kevin Nolan, Bartons where we were more limited but had a fiery spirit. We have more flair now but its kinda limited too as the players either could not showcase it or are benched. Even if we finished 15 but played good football i would glady pay to watch and stick behind the team. Its frustrating to watch us weekin weekout playing with good flair players but with a toothless performance.

 

I always cant help to feel we degrade players... HBA , Cabaye and many other past players we had , could easy perform at a higher standards but we always hold them back with mediocre managers.

We are kinda stucked anyway, since i cant see Pardew going anywhere as he is  indeed a good middle man for the club atm. 

 

Its is so difficult to ask for a Manager to play to the strengths of the Flair players? Apparently it is when you have a less talented manager that doesnt know how talented players could influence the team. Hence his bizarre selections and failed compliance to bed in the flair players. I have not seen HBA or Cabaye play a game where they reproduce 60% of the form they had at their previous clubs but maybe the english league just has no place for flair players...

[Yorkie]

I'll have to admit that i was caught up in the frenzy of the first quarter of the season, and thought we were in for a great year where we'd concern some of the big guns. Think i even said at one point, not so long ago, that we'd maintain our position and finish fifth.

 

That's probably unlikely now but we've got every chance of staying in the Top 8 until May. As has been said, Pardew's positives and negatives as a tactician aside, January will act as the pivot. We'll either maintain our current position of Europa League contenders, or slide into bottom-half mediocrity. I count the transfer window and our ability to cope without Demba in all that. That's what will shape the second half of our season.

[JH]

We're gannin' doon then

[Tiresias]

I think most managers want a mix of the pragmatic, have to do the best with what you've got, and the idealistic, having a style of play, working towards it and trying to impart an ideology to the squad.

 

The trouble is Pardew seems to sometimes have the worst of both worlds, he isn't forcing the team to play good football, and considering some our players, seemingly doing the opposite, he's not pragmatically sticking Ben Arfa out wide but not taking the gamble and starting him behind the striker. It's like he's ideologically stuck to a team set up that was only ever pragmatically forced upon him anyway by Ben Arfa being unavailable to begin with.

 

When I saw Vuckic in the starting lineup, I was actually quite impressed, disappointed not Ben Arfa, but thought that's more like it, short passing around a midfield keeping ball on the ground good footy. To some extent Vuckic didn't perform, nerves or whatever, I can forgive him that, but it was hoofing it over the midfield that made no sense. Why bolster the midfield only to take them out of the equation with hoofing it? I'm starting to think Pardew is a 4-4-2 merchant who panics about not having 2 men up front, and he thinks Ben Arfa is a luxury that shouldn't be a regular player.

[Wullie]

I don't think it's hindsight to say that results were better than performances at the start of the season. A few games we were dominant in and played some good stuff - Blackburn, Villa and particularly Stoke, which was a magnificent showing - but there was a lot of games where we:

 

a) looked totally unable to create anything

 

b) got away with a lot of last ditch defending and magnificent goalkeeping, which isn't usually something you can stretch out over a season, if you're conceding chances, at some point teams are going to start taking them

 

and c) got lucky with some very questionable refereeing.

 

A bad run of form like this has been coming, which is why when we were in the ascendancy we should have been trying to bed players like Ben Arfa and Santon in and giving the young players a few minutes here and there, as plenty of people were saying at the time. Instead we clung to a particular XI for as long as possible before things started to go tits up, at which point it's a lot more difficult for the likes of HBA, Santon, Vuckic, Sammy to come in.

[Mick]

I don't think it's hindsight to say that results were better than performances at the start of the season. A few games we were dominant in and played some good stuff - Blackburn, Villa and particularly Stoke, which was a magnificent showing - but there was a lot of games where we:

 

a) looked totally unable to create anything

 

b) got away with a lot of last ditch defending and magnificent goalkeeping, which isn't usually something you can stretch out over a season, if you're conceding chances, at some points teams are going to start taking them

 

and c) got lucky with some very questionable refereeing.

 

A bad run of form like this has been coming, which is why when we were in the ascendancy we should have been trying to bed players like Ben Arfa and Santon in and giving the young players a few minutes here and there, as plenty of people were saying at the time. Instead we clung to a particular XI for as long as possible before things started to go tits up, at which point it's a lot more difficult for the likes of HBA, Santon, Vuckic, Sammy to come in.

 

I've been saying that throughout the season and got stick for it, we're going to struggle to change in now after so many games and when the confidence is shot.

[TRon]

When do we ever get anything from Liverpool away anyway? It's annoying to lose but if we have to lose I'd rather it was to the teams from the top 6. At the moment, with our budget, 7th is the best we can realistically finish.

 

I'm pretty sure that was Pardew's team talk before the game tbh.

[Wullie]

When do we ever get anything from Liverpool away anyway? It's annoying to lose but if we have to lose I'd rather it was to the teams from the top 6. At the moment, with our budget, 7th is the best we can realistically finish.

 

I'm pretty sure that was Pardew's team talk before the game tbh.

 

[Skeletor]

I'd be interested to see if he had two fullbacks he trusted whether he would still be this negative. I think he probably would. We'll never find out with Ashley holding the transfer funds any way.

[Skirge]

Alan Pardew says NUFC should have been more positive

by Lee Ryder, Evening ChronicleDec 31 2011Comments (17) Recommend

 

ALAN PARDEW feels that Newcastle United weren't positive enough at Anfield last night after watching his side bow out of 2011 with a disappointing defeat.

 

The Magpies also lost ground with Liverpool after the Kop side rose to fifth in the table with a four-point cushion between the two teams.

 

Newcastle failed to hold on to their lead at Anfield and while Daniel Agger’s own goal was the first Toon strike at Liverpool since 2004, Pardew emerged afterwards to say: “I’m a little bit disappointed we weren’t more positive.

 

“We got in good situations, and I wanted somebody to take somebody on and be a bit more constructive, like Yohan was when we nearly got the equaliser (after Demba Ba had an effort hooked off the line).

 

“Those two incidents, the free-kick and clearance off the line, determined the result.”

 

And although Pardew tried to remain upbeat after the 3-1 loss, he also admitted: “We’re disappointed. We got ourselves in a good position in the game, and at 1-1, in the second half, it started to look like we were starting to impose ourselves even more on the game.”

 

 

United fell behind when Cheick Tiote was harshly penalised for a foul on Agger which resulted in Bellamy scoring his second of the game with a free-kick, during which Danny Simpson and Tim Krul got in a mix-up.

 

Former Charlton Athletic manager Pardew said: “The free-kick was a turning point.

 

“It shouldn’t have been given in the first place. We made an error in terms of Danny and Tim getting in each other’s way.

 

“I think Tim would have saved it quite comfortably.

 

“It’s a tactic we use to defend that post if we think they’re going to bend it over. We’ll perhaps have to review that.”

 

 

 

Read More http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/newcastle-united/nufc-news/2011/12/31/alan-pardew-says-nufc-should-have-been-more-positive-72703-30037656/#ixzz1i82JhHD0

 

 

 

 

Alan Pardew: NUFC are one of the big clubs

by Steve Brown, Evening ChronicleDec 30 2011

 

ALAN PARDEW is relishing the opportunity to pit his wits against managerial legends Kenny Dalglish and Sir Alex Ferguson over the next six days.

 

But rather than foster an inferiority complex in competition with the Liverpools and Manchester Uniteds of this world, the Newcastle boss is keen to remind fans that Newcastle United remain a “big club” as well.

 

NUFC travel to Anfield tonight to face Liverpool before hosting Premier League champions Manchester United on Wednesday.

 

 

 

They have not won on the red half of Merseyside since a League Cup victory in November 1995, and failed to claim a league triumph there since a 2-0 win in April 1994.

 

However, Alan Pardew insists such statistics have never troubled him, either as a player or manager.

 

 

And asked if he relishes taking on the likes of Liverpool and Manchester United, the NUFC boss said: “Yeah, of course, they are huge clubs.

 

“But so are we, we’re a big club, we must never forget the traditions and the history of this football club.

 

“We’ll take that to Anfield and we’ll get the respect that we deserve and hopefully get a win.

 

“It’s a great stadium, and the atmosphere’s going to be absolutely brilliant.

 

“That’s what you set the games up for. That win at Bolton has set it up, so hopefully we can produce our best. You’d like to think we can.”

 

Reflecting on Newcastle’s miserable Anfield form, Pardew added: “Those stats don’t bother me, they’re more media-related than anything else.

 

“I have to say, just as a past player, not as a manager, it never really bothered me.

 

“It’s something to lean on as a manager after, and say ‘Well we ain’t won here for so long, so we weren’t expected to win’.

 

“But it’s not something I look to. We want to go there and try and win.”

 

Doing so will mean nullifying the threat of former United favourites Andy Carroll and Jose Enrique.

 

Despite struggling since his £35m move to Liverpool, Carroll is, Pardew maintains, a “great player who will deliver”.

 

And while delighted by Ryan Taylor’s “astonishing performances” having replaced Enrique at left-back, the Toon boss admits his side do miss the Spaniard. “Andy is a great player,” Pardew said. “I think that when he gets a run in the Liverpool team it’ll be better for him and better for them too.

 

“(Luis) Suarez’s suspension suggests he’ll probably get one now and I’m sure he’ll deliver.”

 

On Enrique, Pardew added: “You’re going to miss a great player and he has been Liverpool’s best player in my view.

 

“So, of course, yes, we do miss him.

 

“But we have done incredibly well without him and that’s mainly due to Ryan Taylor.

 

“He’s somebody who’s really gone in there as an emergency left-back and managed to keep producing.

 

“He made the goal for Hatem just the other day. Astonishing performances from him.

 

“But we still miss Enrique, we loved him dearly.”

 

 

 

Read More http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/newcastle-united/nufc-news/2011/12/30/alan-pardew-nufc-are-one-of-the-big-clubs-72703-30032151/#ixzz1i82XIm5c