Mike Ashley

[AyeDubbleYoo]

Ben Arfa only started 16 league games in both the last two seasons. I know he just wasn't selected for half of last season but I hold out hope that any team interested in him will see his appearance record for us and think better of it.

 

I genuinely can't see anyone buying him for the kind of money it would take for us to let him go.

[Happy Face]

"I don't want Pardew here. Here's 40 pages of reasons why he should stay"

 

Aye.

 

I don't want Pardew at the club for exactly the same reasons I didn't want him from day 1.  That doesn't mean I started chanting "Pardew out!" at his first game against Liverpool.  All of his failings that are apparent now were apparent then.  If anything, he has over achieved in his time here, considering my expectations.

[alexf]

Also seeing how many games Jonas has started makes me sad. He really has had a terrible season and it says alot that he almost had the most amount of starts.

 

Cisse starting so many also shows how badly we need new strikers. You have to be able to freshen up your attack and manage your striker's form throughout the season so that when he has a bad patch (as Cisse did) you can rest him.

 

We simply couldn't do that with having Shola as the back up and Pardew not having much faith in using Gouffran upfront until very recently.

[TRon]

 

Here you can see just inconsistent the past season has been.  This time, only 3 managed 30.  We had to go through the 8 most played players before we'd covered half of the seasons selections.  27 players were needed this time. with only 2 playing 2 games or less. Which means our core was a much wider spread of 25 players.  There was none of the consistency in team selection of the year previous, and with that comes less opportunity to work up a settled system.

 

On the other hand that blows Pardew's biggest excuse out of the water, tiredness, Europe, extra games, blah blah. You can't have it both ways.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

 

Here you can see just inconsistent the past season has been.  This time, only 3 managed 30.  We had to go through the 8 most played players before we'd covered half of the seasons selections.  27 players were needed this time. with only 2 playing 2 games or less. Which means our core was a much wider spread of 25 players.  There was none of the consistency in team selection of the year previous, and with that comes less opportunity to work up a settled system.

 

On the other hand that blows Pardew's biggest excuse out of the water, tiredness, Europe, extra games, blah blah. You can't have it both ways.

 

I think with Europe, lack of training/preparation time is almost more important than tiredness.

[Happy Face]

 

Here you can see just inconsistent the past season has been.  This time, only 3 managed 30.  We had to go through the 8 most played players before we'd covered half of the seasons selections.  27 players were needed this time. with only 2 playing 2 games or less. Which means our core was a much wider spread of 25 players.  There was none of the consistency in team selection of the year previous, and with that comes less opportunity to work up a settled system.

 

On the other hand that blows Pardew's biggest excuse out of the water, tiredness, Europe, extra games, blah blah. You can't have it both ways.

 

I don't think you have to have played every game in a season to get tired.  Benitez was complaining about tiredness at Chelsea before christmas.  Sissoko played something like 10 games in 30 days after he signed.  1 game every 3 days for a bloke that's never played the game at the pace we do in England.  It was inevitable his form would wane.

[TRon]

 

Here you can see just inconsistent the past season has been.  This time, only 3 managed 30.  We had to go through the 8 most played players before we'd covered half of the seasons selections.  27 players were needed this time. with only 2 playing 2 games or less. Which means our core was a much wider spread of 25 players.  There was none of the consistency in team selection of the year previous, and with that comes less opportunity to work up a settled system.

 

On the other hand that blows Pardew's biggest excuse out of the water, tiredness, Europe, extra games, blah blah. You can't have it both ways.

 

I don't think you have to have played every game in a season to get tired.  Benitez was complaining about tiredness at Chelsea before christmas.  Sissoko played something like 10 games in 30 days after he signed.  1 game every 3 days for a bloke that's never played the game at the pace we do in England.  It was inevitable his form would wane.

 

Which makes it even more surprising Pardew didn't use Anita more as he's a central midfielder who could definitely have been used more if other midfielders were suffering from fatigue.

[Interpolic]

 

Here you can see just inconsistent the past season has been.  This time, only 3 managed 30.  We had to go through the 8 most played players before we'd covered half of the seasons selections.  27 players were needed this time. with only 2 playing 2 games or less. Which means our core was a much wider spread of 25 players.  There was none of the consistency in team selection of the year previous, and with that comes less opportunity to work up a settled system.

 

On the other hand that blows Pardew's biggest excuse out of the water, tiredness, Europe, extra games, blah blah. You can't have it both ways.

 

I don't think you have to have played every game in a season to get tired.  Benitez was complaining about tiredness at Chelsea before christmas.  Sissoko played something like 10 games in 30 days after he signed.  1 game every 3 days for a bloke that's never played the game at the pace we do in England.  It was inevitable his form would wane.

 

His form nosedived after 2 or 3 games.

[Raconteur]

I don't think you're trolling at all. Exactly the opposite, to be honest. You're offering clear, concise reasoning to your own opinions. People don't have to agree, as it's still an opinion, but at least you're making an effort to provide your evidence. Those charts do paint a clear picture of your argument in this instance, and they look lovely.

 

Cheers.

 

I was surprised Dave seemed to be suggesting it it because I thought he would know from my previous form on here that I'm not any sort of WUM at all.  I know from posting here before that good posters like him and Wullie can easily understand the basic points I'm making, while not necessarily having to agree at all.

 

Can't see anything in those diagrams or the description of them that could be construed as trolling.

 

You are trolling because your initial response to my post was a textbook straw man. In fact, I reproduce the wikipedia example, because it so closely parallels your post:

 

The straw man fallacy occurs in the following pattern of argument:

 

    Person 1 has position X.

    Person 2 disregards certain key points of X and instead presents the superficially similar position Y. The position Y is a distorted version of X and can be set up in several ways, including:

        Presenting a misrepresentation of the opponent's position.

        Quoting an opponent's words out of context—i.e., choosing quotations that misrepresent the opponent's actual intentions (see fallacy of quoting out of context).[4]

        Presenting someone who defends a position poorly as the defender, then refuting that person's arguments—thus giving the appearance that every upholder of that position (and thus the position itself) has been defeated.[3]

        Inventing a fictitious persona with actions or beliefs which are then criticized, implying that the person represents a group of whom the speaker is critical.

        Oversimplifying an opponent's argument, then attacking this oversimplified version.

    Person 2 attacks position Y, concluding that X is false/incorrect/flawed.

You then punctuated said straw man with a gratuitous, trolling smiley face.

 

Next, you ignored the entirety of my argument with a one line, logically dubious "Our players played significantly fewer than players at other clubs due to injury" and attempted to support this hypothesis with the explosion of colour that in no way countered my argument nor added to your own. Therefore, another textbook fallacy; this time the red herring. (Further, when ignoring my argument, you skipped over the grounds on which I consider injury to be an invalid defense of our poor form, which still stands unchallenged).

 

Your explanations were based on sandy foundations at best, and can be countered on a number of grounds. For instance, the addition of five first team players in January. The impact of this, for instance, sees Debuchy starting 14 games and Simpson 12 (accoring to your figures), which theoretically adds weight to your position of "wider spread of core players." In fact, it has nothing at all to do with injuries yet seemingly adds credence to your argument. Your argument also ignores the ridiculous team selections of the manager, which has seen starts given to players such as Perch and Bigirimana that a better manager might have given to Anita. (And while that may be wildly hypothetical, is there a single Toon fan who would have chosen Perch or Bigirimana over Anita, ever? Anita could easily have as many starts as Jonas, which would have narrowed the spread of core players, to use your parlance.) Again, while seemingly adding to your theory, it in fact has nothing to do with injuries.

 

Therefore, sir, I suggest that your arguments are specious, your logic flawed and your manner of debate fallacious. And given your well-established preference of piling blame on Ashley while absolving Pardew, I stand by my labelling of you a troll.

 

And given my lengthy response to a troll, you probably got that thrilling tingle just from seeing a wall of text. That's okay, I only replied because I was sad that decent posters like Ian W and Inochi felt the need to stick up for you. Those two are principled debaters who defend their positions well. You, sir, do not.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I stuck up for him because I didn't think he was trolling, I still don't. I thought trolling meant posting things deliberately to win people up or belittle them, which he wasn't doing at all.

[Interpolic]

I still don't understand why Marveaux was on the pitch for so few minutes over the course of the season despite nearly always being available for selection and setting up and scoring goals a lot of the time he featured. Well I do understand it but I can't accept it.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I still don't understand why Marveaux was on the pitch for so few minutes over the course of the season despite nearly always being available for selection and setting up and scoring goals a lot of the time he featured. Well I do understand it but I can't accept it.

 

Agree with you on this one, there are a few similar examples of weird selections and substitutions, obviously.

[Incognito]

I don't think you're trolling at all. Exactly the opposite, to be honest. You're offering clear, concise reasoning to your own opinions. People don't have to agree, as it's still an opinion, but at least you're making an effort to provide your evidence. Those charts do paint a clear picture of your argument in this instance, and they look lovely.

 

Cheers.

 

I was surprised Dave seemed to be suggesting it it because I thought he would know from my previous form on here that I'm not any sort of WUM at all.  I know from posting here before that good posters like him and Wullie can easily understand the basic points I'm making, while not necessarily having to agree at all.

 

Can't see anything in those diagrams or the description of them that could be construed as trolling.

 

You are trolling because your initial response to my post was a textbook straw man. In fact, I reproduce the wikipedia example, because it so closely parallels your post:

 

The straw man fallacy occurs in the following pattern of argument:

 

    Person 1 has position X.

    Person 2 disregards certain key points of X and instead presents the superficially similar position Y. The position Y is a distorted version of X and can be set up in several ways, including:

        Presenting a misrepresentation of the opponent's position.

        Quoting an opponent's words out of context—i.e., choosing quotations that misrepresent the opponent's actual intentions (see fallacy of quoting out of context).[4]

        Presenting someone who defends a position poorly as the defender, then refuting that person's arguments—thus giving the appearance that every upholder of that position (and thus the position itself) has been defeated.[3]

        Inventing a fictitious persona with actions or beliefs which are then criticized, implying that the person represents a group of whom the speaker is critical.

        Oversimplifying an opponent's argument, then attacking this oversimplified version.

    Person 2 attacks position Y, concluding that X is false/incorrect/flawed.

You then punctuated said straw man with a gratuitous, trolling smiley face.

 

Next, you ignored the entirety of my argument with a one line, logically dubious "Our players played significantly fewer than players at other clubs due to injury" and attempted to support this hypothesis with the explosion of colour that in no way countered my argument nor added to your own. Therefore, another textbook fallacy; this time the red herring. (Further, when ignoring my argument, you skipped over the grounds on which I consider injury to be an invalid defense of our poor form, which still stands unchallenged).

 

Your explanations were based on sandy foundations at best, and can be countered on a number of grounds. For instance, the addition of five first team players in January. The impact of this, for instance, sees Debuchy starting 14 games and Simpson 12 (accoring to your figures), which theoretically adds weight to your position of "wider spread of core players." In fact, it has nothing at all to do with injuries yet seemingly adds credence to your argument. Your argument also ignores the ridiculous team selections of the manager, which has seen starts given to players such as Perch and Bigirimana that a better manager might have given to Anita. (And while that may be wildly hypothetical, is there a single Toon fan who would have chosen Perch or Bigirimana over Anita, ever? Anita could easily have as many starts as Jonas, which would have narrowed the spread of core players, to use your parlance.) Again, while seemingly adding to your theory, it in fact has nothing to do with injuries.

 

Therefore, sir, I suggest that your arguments are specious, your logic flawed and your manner of debate fallacious. And given your well-established preference of piling blame on Ashley while absolving Pardew, I stand by my labelling of you a troll.

 

And given my lengthy response to a troll, you probably got that thrilling tingle just from seeing a wall of text. That's okay, I only replied because I was sad that decent posters like Ian W and Inochi felt the need to stick up for you. Those two are principled debaters who defend their positions well. You, sir, do not.

 

I think you're completely barking up the wrong tree tbh.

[pi_D]

I still don't understand why Marveaux was on the pitch for so few minutes over the course of the season despite nearly always being available for selection and setting up and scoring goals a lot of the time he featured. Well I do understand it but I can't accept it.

 

[Raconteur]

I stuck up for him because I didn't think he was trolling, I still don't. I thought trolling meant posting things deliberately to win people up or belittle them, which he wasn't doing at all.

Very well, but I disagree.

 

His first response was gratuitously condescending and was certainly intended to wind up AND belittle. As I said in the megapost above, I felt his following argument was unsound and the use of pie graphs a fig leaf to cover his trolling.

 

But that's okay, because I can disagree civilly with you

 

[Hanshithispantz]

I don't think he's "trolling", I just think he's using purposely irrelevant or distorted graphs and charts with little to no context in an effort to give ground to a non-existent argument and fuel his own ego.

 

He doesn't think Pardew is good enough for this club and he has had this opinion ever since he signed. It pretty much starts and ends there, regardless of whether or not we have been in Europe or whether or not we have had injuries etc. He isn't good enough for the club. He'll continue to debate against his own point though because he doesn't believe Mike will get anyone better and he gets to play around on excel a bit more.

[Interpolic]

I still don't understand why Marveaux was on the pitch for so few minutes over the course of the season despite nearly always being available for selection and setting up and scoring goals a lot of the time he featured. Well I do understand it but I can't accept it.

 

Agree with you on this one, there are a few similar examples of weird selections and substitutions, obviously.

 

Anita was also unfortunate, albeit to a lesser degree. One of our best players in that horrible winter run then never got a look in.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I don't think he's "trolling", I just think he's using purposely irrelevant or distorted graphs and charts with little to no context in an effort to give ground to a non-existent argument and fuel his own ego.

 

He doesn't think Pardew is good enough for this club and he has had this opinion ever since he signed. It pretty much starts and ends there, regardless of whether or not we have been in Europe or whether or not we have had injuries etc. He isn't good enough for the club. He'll continue to debate against his own point though because he doesn't believe Mike will get anyone better and he gets to play around on excel a bit more.

 

I guess so, it's done in the interests of creating a debate though. I do the same thing sometimes, without the graphs. I explore various arguments for and against Pardew and how valid they are, it's possible to do that while still thinking that ultimately he's pretty poor. Just makes it more interesting chat IMO.

[TRon]

I still don't understand why Marveaux was on the pitch for so few minutes over the course of the season despite nearly always being available for selection and setting up and scoring goals a lot of the time he featured. Well I do understand it but I can't accept it.

 

Yes. like Anita Marveaux has been largely ignored even when fit, certainly we could have made far more and better use of him than we have. When he's forced his way into the side it's been due to injuries and he's then gone on to embarrass our gormless manager by usually being the best player on the pitch.

 

p.s. I don't think HF is trolling, or if he is it's in a very mild sense of the word. Anyone who resorts to pie charts to make a point takes this stuff far too seriously to be trolling.

[Interpolic]

I don't think it's trolling either, a few points have been extremely tenuous though.

[Hanshithispantz]

I don't think he's "trolling", I just think he's using purposely irrelevant or distorted graphs and charts with little to no context in an effort to give ground to a non-existent argument and fuel his own ego.

 

He doesn't think Pardew is good enough for this club and he has had this opinion ever since he signed. It pretty much starts and ends there, regardless of whether or not we have been in Europe or whether or not we have had injuries etc. He isn't good enough for the club. He'll continue to debate against his own point though because he doesn't believe Mike will get anyone better and he gets to play around on excel a bit more.

 

I guess so, it's done in the interests of creating a debate though. I do the same thing sometimes, without the graphs. I explore various arguments for and against Pardew and how valid they are, it's possible to do that while still thinking that ultimately he's pretty poor. Just makes it more interesting chat IMO.

 

It just seems like an unnecessary diversion from his major argument, that Mike Ashley won't get anyone better, that ultimately seems to be his major concern with sacking Pardew, not that he thinks we would be losing out on his departure directly.

 

If it is genuinely interesting to people though then fair enough, some of his points I've agreed with as I would never claim that Pardew is completely inept, he's just a one trick pony, I really believe that a lot of those points are pretty much common opinion though, and are only being debated because people get set in full on argument mode and end up debating against points that they actually agree with. It doesn't help when there's a dozen people all debating at the same time either, it takes one silly comment from 1 daft cunt to be scrutinised and send the next 4 pages down an alleyway

[basjen]

http://img4.joyreactor.com/pics/post/funny-pictures-auto-graph-thing-375754.jpeg

 

[loki679]

Only 860 pages til we get Christmas Tree off the front page.

[Happy Face]

Therefore, sir, I suggest that your arguments are specious, your logic flawed and your manner of debate fallacious. And given your well-established preference of piling blame on Ashley while absolving Pardew, I stand by my labelling of you a troll.

 

And given my lengthy response to a troll, you probably got that thrilling tingle just from seeing a wall of text. That's okay, I only replied because I was sad that decent posters like Ian W and Inochi felt the need to stick up for you. Those two are principled debaters who defend their positions well. You, sir, do not.

 

"Sir"?

 

OK, I'll respond line by line to your original post and then to the behemoth above.

 

How did a team that finished fifth and had five first-team players added in January finish in fifth place? (And if you mention Europa League or injuries I will stab you in the face)

 

This is the question I was looking at with my pie charts.  I didn't mention Europa or injuries, like you asked....I based it solely on Premier league appearances and the inconsistency in the line ups Pardew was able to put out.

 

You chose to bring injuries and Europa into it (have you stabbed your own face yet?)

 

That ignores the fact that our players played significantly fewer ganes than many at more successful clubs. It ignores the woeful domestic cup runs, and the fact that in the EL group matches, we sent out virtual reserve teams on occasion.

 

The first sentence being due to injury.  The latter being less true as we advanced, to the point where teams we put out against benfica were almost entirely first teamers.

 

Nor does it acknowledge that some injuries were the direct result of managerial mismanagement (such as Ben Arfa being played when clearly unfit) or through institutional mismanagement (the failure of the club to investigate the occurance of muscle injuries borders on negligence, while the lack of fitness which potentially leads to injuries is, again, directly under the control of the manager.)

 

I'd been told not to mention injuries, but if you're asking me to now,I broadly agree.  By the same token I have seen complaints at how little Ben Arfa got starts when returning from fitness recently.  Only coming on from the bench for 3 weeks.  Another example of Pardew being damned either way.

 

the addition of five first team players in January. The impact of this, for instance, sees Debuchy starting 14 games and Simpson 12 (accoring to your figures), which theoretically adds weight to your position of "wider spread of core players." In fact, it has nothing at all to do with injuries yet seemingly adds credence to your argument.

 

I'm not sure how this counters my point?  I agree with it,  Simpson has been in and out of the side due to the arrival/suspension of Debuchy.  so either Debuchy has been playing alongs ide a CB and behind a RW that he's never played with before...or Simpson (the lesser player) has been filling in.  Who played RB for the other 12 games?  I think Anita played some there....further inconsistencty within the team...and that's just one position.

 

Your argument also ignores the ridiculous team selections of the manager, which has seen starts given to players such as Perch and Bigirimana that a better manager might have given to Anita. (And while that may be wildly hypothetical, is there a single Toon fan who would have chosen Perch or Bigirimana over Anita, ever? Anita could easily have as many starts as Jonas, which would have narrowed the spread of core players, to use your parlance.) Again, while seemingly adding to your theory, it in fact has nothing to do with injuries.

 

I've seen very little from Anita that suggests he deserves a place over Perch if we're talking about the holding role he fills in the absence of Tiote. 

 

Anita wasn't fit for 1 game Bigirimana started (Arsenal), he played with him in another (Man U), so that criticism relates to one game (Reading).

 

I didn't realise    was a cunts smiley.  Sorry.  how about

[Interpolic]

I don't think he's "trolling", I just think he's using purposely irrelevant or distorted graphs and charts with little to no context in an effort to give ground to a non-existent argument and fuel his own ego.

 

He doesn't think Pardew is good enough for this club and he has had this opinion ever since he signed. It pretty much starts and ends there, regardless of whether or not we have been in Europe or whether or not we have had injuries etc. He isn't good enough for the club. He'll continue to debate against his own point though because he doesn't believe Mike will get anyone better and he gets to play around on excel a bit more.

 

I guess so, it's done in the interests of creating a debate though. I do the same thing sometimes, without the graphs. I explore various arguments for and against Pardew and how valid they are, it's possible to do that while still thinking that ultimately he's pretty poor. Just makes it more interesting chat IMO.

 

It just seems like an unnecessary diversion from his major argument, that Mike Ashley won't get anyone better, that ultimately seems to be his major concern with sacking Pardew, not that he thinks we would be losing out on his departure directly.

 

If it is genuinely interesting to people though then fair enough, some of his points I've agreed with as I would never claim that Pardew is completely inept, he's just a one trick pony, I really believe that a lot of those points are pretty much common opinion though, and are only being debated because people get set in full on argument mode and end up debating against points that they actually agree with. It doesn't help when there's a dozen people all debating at the same time either, it takes one silly comment from 1 daft cunt to be scrutinised and send the next 4 pages down an alleyway

 

I do agree that it's a strange business that he wants the manager out but makes these arguments that defend Pardew's justifications for us being so poor. I don't think there's a big enough sample size of managerial appointments to say we'd get Dave Bassett in next either.