Optimistic Nut Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mick Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. I'll add Silvio Maric. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. I'll add Silvio Maric. We got 1/2 what we paid on pistone didn't we We paid 4.5M (somehow) and got 2.5M back IIRC. Still a goodprice. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 I actually thought Bobby made more bad buys than good 1's tbh (not helped by the influence of Mick Wadsworth mind), it was the signing of Bellamy and Robert which just totally transformed our team completely which he should take 100% credit for. Never seen a team so transformed when them 2 joined. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mick Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 I actually thought Bobby made more bad buys than good 1's tbh (not helped by the influence of Mick Wadsworth mind), it was the signing of Bellamy and Robert which just totally transformed our team completely which he should take 100% credit for. Never seen a team so transformed when them 2 joined. I only thought that Bobby made 2 or 3 bad buys, 1 was Cort and that was down to injuries and the other was Viana who didn't work out, a third would probably be Bassedas but I didn't think he was that bad. The others were probably at least value for money at that time. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 I actually thought Bobby made more bad buys than good 1's tbh (not helped by the influence of Mick Wadsworth mind), it was the signing of Bellamy and Robert which just totally transformed our team completely which he should take 100% credit for. Never seen a team so transformed when them 2 joined. I only thought that Bobby made 2 or 3 bad buys, 1 was Cort and that was down to injuries and the other was Viana who didn't work out, a third would probably be Bassedas but I didn't think he was that bad. The others were probably at least value for money at that time. Hmm I would say Cort, Viana, Jenas (1/2 a good season and that was it from him) and Gavilan. The fact was cort and viana were big expensive flops is something we are used to tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disco Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. Always thought he was decent myself. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. Always thought he was decent myself. King Kenny's decision to play him on Overmar's in the 1998 Cup Final still ranks as very high on my shocking tactical decisions. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disco Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. Always thought he was decent myself. King Kenny's decision to play him on Overmar's in the 1998 Cup Final still ranks as very high on my shocking tactical decisions. Best yet right there. --- Who else would you have played? Pearce and Barton both played or Watson? All of whom would have struggled one of the best wingers of modern times. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Duper Branko Strupar Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 Robson got half a good season out of Pistone as well as our money back for him. Miracle worker man. Always thought he was decent myself. King Kenny's decision to play him on Overmar's in the 1998 Cup Final still ranks as very high on my shocking tactical decisions. Best yet right there. --- Who else would you have played? Pearce and Barton both played or Watson? All of whom would have struggled one of the best wingers of modern times. Just someone that had more pace, Pistone was one of the slowest defenders I've seen also he defended that goal awfully tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TRon Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 I actually thought Bobby made more bad buys than good 1's tbh (not helped by the influence of Mick Wadsworth mind), it was the signing of Bellamy and Robert which just totally transformed our team completely which he should take 100% credit for. Never seen a team so transformed when them 2 joined. I only thought that Bobby made 2 or 3 bad buys, 1 was Cort and that was down to injuries and the other was Viana who didn't work out, a third would probably be Bassedas but I didn't think he was that bad. The others were probably at least value for money at that time. Bobby's buys were good when he had more control over who came in, like Bellamy, Jenas, Robert, Milner and Ambrose. When Fat Fred allegedly started dictating which players could stay and go the blueprint changed. Suddenly players past their sell-by started appearing like Butt, Bowyer and Kluivert. This is where Keegan probably proved less of a soft touch as he wouldn't be dictated to on principle. I would rate Bobby higher for the fact he probably was forced to work within a budget and still produced the results. Keegan was going head to head with Man U for signings at the time. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
quayside Posted January 12, 2011 Share Posted January 12, 2011 I actually thought Bobby made more bad buys than good 1's tbh (not helped by the influence of Mick Wadsworth mind), it was the signing of Bellamy and Robert which just totally transformed our team completely which he should take 100% credit for. Never seen a team so transformed when them 2 joined. Yup - two absolutely massive signings. But those really were different times. Bobby was allowed to gamble a bit and had a margin for error, and he earned the right to do that. But that's not the way it's done now. And I don't just mean us. Only Man City are playing that game and we all know their financial situation. Most clubs are trying to keep it tight and transfer dealings are subject to much more scrutiny. Rafa Benitez was the last of the old style "let's have a punt" managers and he looks like nothing more than an anachronism now, with the current squad at Liverpool as his legacy. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
alpal78 Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Mick, you completely undervalue what Tiote brings to our midfield. He is a defesive midfielder only in name and people say that to simplify things but he is not in the mould of Smith or John Mikel Obi at all. His role is not just to stop play and get tackles in. He is more of the Essien, Xabi Alonso, Xavi (though obviously not at their level) in the sense that he dictates our tempo and how we pass the ball from defence to attack. Against Stevenage, without that link, even Colo decided to hoof the ball up because there was just no outlet. Passing it to a midifielder would have meant just losing the ball. True quite a few of our players underperformed against Stevenage but I would say that was largely because of Tiote's absence...that is how important he is to us. Without him players like Nolan, Barton have to try and do things on their own and let's just say that, that's not their strength at all. Based on that, I can at least understand (though I disagree with the decision) why Pardew tried to gamble putting Tiote on, putting on another below average striker was not gonna change anything, it's not like we had Carroll on the subs bench. Having said that, if it was me I would not have risked putting Tiote on at all, in fact my view is that until we establish ourselves as a mid table club, the FA cup is the least of our concern, I would have just fielded our youngsters along with players like Ranger and Xisco and ask them to have a go at Stevenage. Your assertions that Hughton would have not done this or done that, like "I do not believe for one minute that we would have seen the display against Stevenage under Hughton" or "I have no doubt at all that we wouldn’t be going into the mackem game without Tiote if Hughton was still here" is unfortunately just that, bollocks assertion. Despite your best believe, nobody can say for sure what Hughton would have done. All this coupled with the fact how you intentionally omitted the part that Pardew had a 10 point deduction when you come out with your super "Pardew had the highest budget in the division and his target was to reach a play-off position and he failed", tells me that you are either unable or unwilling to be objective in your assessment of Pardew. Stevenage aside (which yes I hold him accountable for), he has exceeded my expectations in the other 5 games. I have no doubt at all that we would have only got maximum 4 points under Hughton for those 5 games, two can play the bollocks assertion game. I completely undervalue what Tiote brings to our midfield? To be honest I think you're going way over the top regarding Tiote and this game. He is a very good player and one that we're almost certain to miss this weekend. Having said that, we absolutely walked a division which had a lot of better teams than Stevenage playing in it and we did that without Tiote. We were playing a team which didn't need Tiote to beat it and it was a game in which only one or two players came out with any sort of credit, Tiote wasn't going to turn around the games of so many players in so many positions. Earlier this season we played a team from the same division as Stevenage and one higher up the league. We fielded a team which contained 11 different players from the one that beat Villa the week before and one that didn't contain Tiote, guess what, we beat them. What do you mean I intentionally omitted the part that Pardew had a 10 point deduction? Pardew knew that his target was and he knew that he had a 10 deficit to make up, he spent £millions to achieve the play-offs and he failed. Why should I mention the points deduction? I would have thought that most people know that clubs like Southampton, Leeds and Portsmouth have had deductions. I'm not gonna argue on the value of Tiote because that is subjective, to each his own. My point was that he is more just than a DM, so putting him on does not mean we were becoming more defensive. You are right majority of our players underperformed against Stevenage, I don't know the reason for that, could be a combination of fatigue, attittude, Barton on the left, Tioteless midifeld and it's hard to predict whether we would have fared any better had Tiote not been sent off. Part of the problem at least is that our entire midfield was being bypassed and overan by the high tempo game that Stevenage played. So whilst I disagree with the decision to bring Tiote on, I can understand why Pardew did it. What is the alternative? If as you said, bringing Tiote on wasn't gonna change things, then what do you expect Pardew to do? Just stand around and not even try to change things? That would be straight from Hughton's manual of management wouldn't it, perhaps you would prefer that? Well I don't, when things go wrong (as they inevitably will sometimes), I want the manager to take charge and try to change things around instead of just looking handsome in a coat on the sideline doing nothing. Regarding the 10 points deduction, I think you were trying to paint Pardew in a very negative light when you ommitted that nugget of fact and stated "Pardew had the highest budget in the division and his target was to reach a play-off position and he failed". Now you claim that you thought everyone knew that already . If you were interested in an objective assessment, you would have mentioned it outright in your first statement and not wait for Greg and Neesy to point it out to you. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AyeDubbleYoo Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Pardew isn't the only manager who can't decide whether he cares about the cup. Look at what Ancellotti did against us in the Carling Cup... brought on Kalou and Benayoun and they both got injured. I would rather just accept defeat to Stevenage, or play our strongest team from the start... but it doesn't seem to work like that in reality. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmonkey Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Kalou and Benayoun are hardly key players for Chelsea though. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Optimistic Nut Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Pistone certainly wasn't slow he was very quick tbh. The only reason he was picked right-back that game because Overmars would have raped Watson or Barton for pace. As it turned out he raped Pistone anyway. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AyeDubbleYoo Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Kalou and Benayoun are hardly key players for Chelsea though. Well that's debatable, they both feature regularly for the first team anyway. It was just an example though, no doubt Liverpool did it with Gerrard and Arsenal with Fabregas etc enough times. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmonkey Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 If it hasn't already been quoted, this is .com's views: While the challenge that saw Tiote handed a straight red card was reckless and needless (although comparable to the one that Joey Barton was booked for at Wigan), why the midfielder was on the pitch at all is a mystery. Bear in mind that we were two goals behind and Tiote is hardly what you'd call a creative midfielder. Add in the fact that he left the pitch in mid-match on Wednesday with an apparent hamstring tweak, already has eight bookings and Pardew had both Shane Ferguson and Danny Guthrie as options and our exasperation becomes clear. Whether he was harshly punished or not is immaterial - he could just as easily have picked up an injury - he simply shouldn't have been on the pitch. Full stop. End of. They're spot on imo. May be wrong, but I'm pretty sure when Ranger came on we had him up front on his own, with Lovenkrands switching to the left flank and Barton moving infield. I.e. we switched from 4-4-2 to 4-5-1 to chase a lead. So not only did Pardew risk Tiote prior to a vital game vs the Mackems in a game that looked dead and buried with the team looking beyond awful and hopeless, but he threw him into a formation that is pretty much one of the worst for chasing a two goal deficit... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AyeDubbleYoo Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Just because Tiote isn't creative/attacking, it doesn't mean he couldn't have changed the game. That's highly naive. He was brought on because we were getting overrun in midfield and couldn't get hold of the ball. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
UV Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 IMO risking Nolan & Barton, with the latter so he could be played out of position on the left wing was a worse decision than bringing on Tiote, and just because neither of them were actually sent off or got injured doesn't mean it wasn't a poor decision to play them, especially if they were as fatigued as Pardew says. Squad permitting, none of our key players should have been on the pitch from the start IMO, and Guthrie & Ferguson should have started, with Nolan & Barton only coming in later if needed. If squad players aren't considered good enough to start against a side in the bottom half of League 2, then what are they doing even on the bench in Premiership matches? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmonkey Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Just because Tiote isn't creative/attacking, it doesn't mean he couldn't have changed the game. That's highly naive. He was brought on because we were getting overrun in midfield and couldn't get hold of the ball. That's hardly a fair representation of what we're saying. The whole point about Tiote not making a difference is that those around him were playing in "mega s***" mode. Partly due to Pardew's selection/tactics (Joey Barton on the left wing, ffs), partly due to the players missing ("no Jonas and no Enrique makes Newcastle something something"), and partly because some of the players are just s*** and were easily contained by Stevenage because that's their real level when not carried by better players (our strikers that night for example). Hence, as you imply, even if he wins the ball back, it's still up to others to provide the creativity, because all Tiote will do is give more possession to the midfielders around him. But if those players are playing abysmally, then is there any real use in that? For example, this is what I see the two sides as arguing: A: The "Tiote would NOT have changed the game" crowd: 1) Tiote wins the ball back. Good defensive play. He passes to Barton on the left. Barton picks out a 50 yard pass and drops it in behind the left back. Ranger shows the first touch of a rapist and it goes out for a throw in. 2) Tiote closes a Stevenage player down, causing him to lose the ball. Perch picks the ball up in his own half. Three seconds later the ball ends up going out for a Stevenage goal kick. 3) Tiote intercepts a pass. He twists and turns, maintaining possession under pressure. His teammates stand around, staring in awe at skills they didn't think were possible outside of a Pixar animated movie. Stevenage close Tiote down, so his only option is to pass back to Krul or Coloccini. Whichever one gets it aims a long, high ball into Ranger who is marked by a big Stevenage centreback. The next morning the Stevenage centreback wakes up with a headache having won every header the previous night comfortably, killing a number of braincells in the process. B: The "Tiote WOULD have changed the game" crowd: 1) Tiote wins the ball back. Good defensive play. He passes to Barton on the left. Barton picks out a 50 yard pass and drops it in behind the left back. Ranger picks the ball up, and in the space of about a milisecond, unzips his outer body suit to reveal the 1996 Brazilian Ronaldo undernearth. Nile Ronaldoger dribbles past the entire Stevenage defence and goalkeeper, leaving them all for dead, before sitting on top of the ball on the goal line waiting for the Stevenage players to come close. As soon as they do, he lies down on the ground and taps the ball in for a goal with his head. 2) Tiote closes a Stevenage player down, causing him to lose the ball. Perch picks the ball up in his own half. Perch flicks the ball up, showing deft control, and runs forward whilst juggling the ball. He looks up and sees Nolan bombing down the left flank at 30mph. Perch picks him out, but overhits the ball slightly. Not a problem for Nolan, who does a vertical 360 jump-sumersault, controlling the ball in the process before landing on his feet. Nolan shimmies past three Stevenage players and gets to the byline before laying an inch perfect pass to Routledge who is steaming in at 60mph from 30 yards out. Routledge smashes the ball towards goal, right onto the inside post and into the back of the net. The power of the shot is so intense that the post breaks in two with one part flying into the stands, nearly killing a spectator. The Stevenage keeper looks on as the entire goal collapses whilst Routledge and his teammates celebrate his nweborn diamong earring. 3) Tiote intercepts a pass. He twists and turns, maintaining possession under pressure. His teammates realise he needs space. A coordinated series of off-the-ball runs then take place, runs so well timed and complex that the next morning Pardew receives job offers from Arsenal, ManU and Real Madrid, begging him to replace Ferguson, Wenger and Mourinho respectively. The movement gives Tiote ten options of passing to players around him, with the Stevenage players trying desperately to keep up with them. Instead of passing to them however, Tiote realises something - noone is closing him down because of the movement around him. He then makes a beeline for the Stevenage goal, straight through the middle, like Moses through the Red Sea. Before you can say "red card", he's through on goal, with only the keeper to beat. But he doesn't try to score - why? Because lo and behold, the movement of his teammates was so intense and well timed that Tiote now has five players either side of him, all onside, all with an easy tap in if he passes it sideways. He passes to Ranger, the star of the movie "my two left feet", giving him the opportunity to score his first non-deflected-fluke-off-the-shins goal for Newcastle Utd. Ranger duely obliges. That is honestly how I see it. Hence why Tiote would've made no difference imo, even if in theory and on paper, completely ignoring the abysmal performances/tactics/players/selection, he might have given those around him more attacking opportunities. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 :lol: Top stuff. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TRon Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 Give tmonkey the manager's job. He clearly knows far more about football than Pardew tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AyeDubbleYoo Posted January 13, 2011 Share Posted January 13, 2011 All I was saying is that being a DM doesn't mean it was necessarily silly to bring him on. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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