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2013/14 - Reasons for Positivity? UPDATE: Three!


Ketsbaia

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Guest chicken little

Seeing HBA & Sissoko both in the starting lineup.

 

... feeding rooney. going to be pure mint like.

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- Adapted French signings from January with full preseason under their belt and more time to settle into the area

- Squad fit again with a break and clearer head

- New signings

- Another campaign in the PL, with a clean slate to hopefully do us proud

- Possibility of a new manager, and even some additions to the coaching staff if not?

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Good stuff. Next season can't possibly be as bad, and if it threatens to be then I think we'll have a new manager anyway.

 

This is it, like. For all the doom, gloom and hysterics, we're still in the Premier League. I'll be looking forward to this season as much as any, because I love going to and watching our games.

 

We've got the whole summer ahead to make whatever changes we need to make. But, if that doesn't include the manager, there's hope that the club may have learned to start being more acommodating of his strengths.

 

Good thread. :thup:

 

I see your point, but can we really be happy with this? As in should this be considered an acheivment? Is this what we are now to expect?

 

There's a very valid case for cracking out the anguish to that, mate. I wasn't talking about expectations, achievements, or anything else. This isn't the thread for it. Simply stating a fact: We are in the Premier League (say, we are Premier League).

 

Nah I know, I agree. But f*** me, I'm not hanging around to squeeze out little wins to justify positivity. I'll always be positive, but there's nowt wrong with haranguing people when something's s***. Just seems a bit of a time waste to me. As Stu says, my life must be s***, I've got to fill it with more meaning.

 

I'm not being deliberately obtuse here, but, I don't know what you mean from that post. Are you saying I'm doing those things? Apologies if I've read it completely wrong, or I'm being a bit thick.

 

No No, not at all. I'm, just defending my negativity :lol: Or what would be perceived negativity by not accepting such small things as positives.

 

I'm fed up, man. I think emulating a cup run that the Swanseas, Wigans, Birminghams of this world are capable of should be a f***ing given, quite frankly. International players and new signings settling down as well. I suppose it's a positive if you've just been through the bedding in season, but you know. New signings is a positive, but that happens every summer (supposedly). Playing to Pardew's strengths doesn't seem like an exciting prospect to me, but we'll see.

 

Basically I want to see some more encouraging positives. Some bigger leaps, some bolder moves. All I can imagine now is an improvement on this seasons dross, but not much. Apart from increased luck, I cant see our current incumbents deciding on implementing that much more in order to achieve this.

 

Nothing was aimed at you, I wasn;t countering to your opinions. Just got in to a quote conversation I suppose.

 

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HBA is my reason for positivity. If he's fit, we'll be fine. I guarantee we'll have a much better season if he plays more than 25 league games.

 

More chance of us signing Rooney than Hatem playing more than 25 league games for us.

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Guest icemanblue

Good stuff. Next season can't possibly be as bad, and if it threatens to be then I think we'll have a new manager anyway.

 

This is it, like. For all the doom, gloom and hysterics, we're still in the Premier League. I'll be looking forward to this season as much as any, because I love going to and watching our games.

 

We've got the whole summer ahead to make whatever changes we need to make. But, if that doesn't include the manager, there's hope that the club may have learned to start being more acommodating of his strengths.

 

Good thread. :thup:

 

I see your point, but can we really be happy with this? As in should this be considered an acheivment? Is this what we are now to expect?

 

There's a very valid case for cracking out the anguish to that, mate. I wasn't talking about expectations, achievements, or anything else. This isn't the thread for it. Simply stating a fact: We are in the Premier League (say, we are Premier League).

 

Nah I know, I agree. But f*** me, I'm not hanging around to squeeze out little wins to justify positivity. I'll always be positive, but there's nowt wrong with haranguing people when something's s***. Just seems a bit of a time waste to me. As Stu says, my life must be s***, I've got to fill it with more meaning.

 

I'm not being deliberately obtuse here, but, I don't know what you mean from that post. Are you saying I'm doing those things? Apologies if I've read it completely wrong, or I'm being a bit thick.

 

No No, not at all. I'm, just defending my negativity :lol: Or what would be perceived negativity by not accepting such small things as positives.

 

I'm fed up, man. I think emulating a cup run that the Swanseas, Wigans, Birminghams of this world are capable of should be a f***ing given, quite frankly. International players and new signings settling down as well. I suppose it's a positive if you've just been through the bedding in season, but you know. New signings is a positive, but that happens every summer (supposedly). Playing to Pardew's strengths doesn't seem like an exciting prospect to me, but we'll see.

 

Basically I want to see some more encouraging positives. Some bigger leaps, some bolder moves. All I can imagine now is an improvement on this seasons dross, but not much. Apart from increased luck, I cant see our current incumbents deciding on implementing that much more in order to achieve this.

 

Nothing was aimed at you, I wasn;t countering to your opinions. Just got in to a quote conversation I suppose.

 

 

:lol: Ah, fair enough. I'm a bit battle-fatigued, seeing arguments everywhere.

 

For what it's worth, I don't think anyone really needs to defend their negativity, within reason. I've only ever taken issue with the extreme, blinkered negativity. I don't disgaree with any of the points you've made in the rest of the post either, I think that's what we'd all like to see. Unfortunately, that's all tempered by the fact we're under the stewardship of our current owner.

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HBA is my reason for positivity. If he's fit, we'll be fine. I guarantee we'll have a much better season if he plays more than 25 league games.

 

More chance of us signing Rooney than Hatem playing more than 25 league games for us.

 

Strange thing is his fitness record before joining us was very good. I still think we can't read too much into most of his injuries here; only the latest one is of a muscular nature. The other two were freak injuries.

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Ok, realise that this might be stretching optimism but:

 

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/48414000/jpg/_48414866_vuckic.jpg

 

Wont be injured?

 

Sigh. I really like Vuckic. No idea what sort of player he's going to be now, after all these injuries.

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Earlier this season, when his players fleetingly looked capable of winning the Europa League, Alan Pardew suggested that Newcastle United and Sunderland deserved more expansive media coverage. He questioned why the north-east's "big two", with their magnificent grounds, huge crowds and enormous fanbases, were consistently squeezed off the back pages by the Manchester, London and, to a lesser extent, Merseyside clubs.

 

Newcastle's manager had a valid point; a widespread ignorance of the region was highlighted when, some years ago, a senior national newspaper sports desk executive visited Sunderland and, startled by the sight of sandy beaches, admitted he had not realised the city was situated beside the North Sea.

 

One thing London-based editors have traditionally been keen on, though, are north-east "crisis" stories and, down the years Newcastle, especially, have frequently obliged. So it was that Pardew soon had reason to wish his club would disappear from the headlines as the team slid inexorably towards a relegation skirmish and he angrily rebutted reports of dressing-room splits.

 

As Sunderland flatlined under Martin O'Neill national interest remained modest but the appointment of Paolo Di Canio and immediate resignation of David Miliband as the club's vice-chairman over the new manger's perceived fascist sympathies soon changed all that.

 

For a few days Sunderland were a hot topic but then Di Canio distanced himself from fascism, the news hounds grew bored and a relegation struggle resumed. Courtesy of fine wins at Newcastle, by 3-0, and at home to Everton, Sunderland survived but the team should never have been depending on Wigan to do them a favour. And particularly after the club had spent more than £30m in the past two transfer windows.

 

Di Canio becomes visibly annoyed, his voice increasing in volume, when he discusses "what has happened at this club in the past five years". Although no one is mentioned by name, he clearly feels Roy Keane, Steve Bruce and O'Neill have much to answer for. "If we were a smaller club or did not have the resources there might be an excuse," Sunderland's manager said. "But the owner [Ellis Short] has put a lot of money into this club in the last few years and it's one of the bigger clubs in the Premier League."

 

There have been too many poor signings to mention on Wearside in recent seasons and Short's overhaul of the scouting policy – the former chief scout Bryan "Pop" Robson has been dismissed and his network dismantled – is likely to include the imminent appointment of Roberto De Fanti as Sunderland's director of football. A registered Fifa agent, De Fanti, whose clients include the Holland midfielder Nigel de Jong, is a consultant at the Stadium of Light.

 

Meanwhile Di Canio and his all-Italian support staff will devote pre-season to repairing what the manager dubs the squad's "weak mentality" and lack of physical fitness. Di Canio has claimed "the environment was dead" when he succeeded O'Neill with the dressing room divided into "little groups", declaring it "a miracle" that the team have taken eight points from his six games in charge.

 

There is clearly a lot of work to do this summer but whether Sunderland will partly finance another spending spree but sell their highly rated Belgium goalkeeper Simon Mignolet and perhaps their coveted Benin schemer, Stéphane Sessègnon, remains to be seen. Whatever happens Di Canio requires creativity, pace and enhanced central midfield control.

 

While the Italian has been happy to discuss his dressing room's sometimes awkward chemistry before revealing – albeit half-jokingly – that his young striker Connor Wickham could benefit "from having his face slapped a little bit" when his mind wanders, the more conventional Pardew is not quite as candid. Newcastle's failure to build on last season's fifth place finish has been a huge disappointment but, whereas Pardew was lucky with injuries in 2011-12, this term fortune has frowned with the treatment rooms frequently overflowing.

 

Mike Ashley's blueprint, whereby signings sourced by the excellent chief scout, Graham Carr, are almost all aged 26 and under and imported from better value markets abroad, invariably France, may make financial sense but it leaves the squad light on experience and Premier League nous. It did not help that the squad was not strengthened last summer and, although five newcomers arrived from France's Ligue 1 in January, they were ultimately hit hard by culture shock.

 

When Pardew, who seems certain to keep his job, meets Ashley for a postmortem in the next couple of weeks the manager is expected to appeal to be allowed to invest in some Premier League experience. The dressing room, though, will remain largely francophone and, having poured scorn on talk of tense undercurrents – even, unwisely, banning a reporter who raised the issue in print – Newcastle's manager needs to ensure nothing gets lost in translation next season.

 

Pardew, who is expected to reinforce his backroom with a new, extra coach, could do with also resolving the style issues that at times saw Newcastle top the Premier League charts for the number of long balls unleashed by respective teams. His players have never looked as comfortable or fluent as when they settled into a 4-3-3 formation late last season and there are concerns that the favoured 4-2-3-1 system does not always bring the best out of potentially key individuals such as Moussa Sissoko.

 

With Fabricio Coloccini, who let his manager down badly by trying to engineer a move back to Argentina in January, likely to leave, Newcastle need at least one new centre-half and two new strikers. They must also hope that a lack of European football does not see a cadre of their better performers, most notably Hatem Ben Arfa, Yohan Cabaye and Tim Krul, lured away from Tyneside.

 

Yet, like Di Canio, Pardew is a fine coach who does much of his best work on the training ground – when the demands of the Europa League limited his involvement it showed – and, providing he and Ashley learn from this season's debacle, there is no reason why Newcastle should not be a top-eight side this time next spring.

 

Di Canio remains a relatively unknown quantity but while Short's hitherto inspired gamble could yet end in tears Sunderland's American owner might just have unearthed a rare managerial talent, finally capable of reawakening this most dozy of sleeping giants.

 

Forty years after Sunderland's 1973 FA Cup final triumph against Leeds United produced the last trophy won by the Tyne-Wear rivals, it is high time they and Newcastle began giving Manchester, London and Merseyside a run for their money.

 

Probably could go elsewhere...

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HBA is my reason for positivity. If he's fit, we'll be fine. I guarantee we'll have a much better season if he plays more than 25 league games.

 

More chance of us signing Rooney than Hatem playing more than 25 league games for us.

 

Strange thing is his fitness record before joining us was very good. I still think we can't read too much into most of his injuries here; only the latest one is of a muscular nature. The other two were freak injuries.

 

I agree in spirit, though. He's our saviour when he's fit and on the pitch.

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:lol: Ah, fair enough. I'm a bit battle-fatigued, seeing arguments everywhere.

 

For what it's worth, I don't think anyone really needs to defend their negativity, within reason. I've only ever taken issue with the extreme, blinkered negativity. I don't disgaree with any of the points you've made in the rest of the post either, I think that's what we'd all like to see. Unfortunately, that's all tempered by the fact we're under the stewardship of our current owner.

 

Oh of course. it's their fault. Ashley, Llambias and Pardew. Of those 3, there's one that would be a lot more realistic than the other 2 to be replaced, yet people are complaining about our set up but saying we shouldn't be calling for Pardew's head because of Ashley. So what, we just sit here and fall further out of Love with the football team? Get even less inspired by how we perform. Take any positive we can and be happy with it?

 

(Again, not aimed at you, I'm just talking to you)

 

Stability would be good, but boring, under-achieving stability would be worse than AIDs. Breaking out stats to try and justify 5 passes in a fucking game, man. Or 3 shots more than the team 3 places above. Fucks sake, where's the passion, man? Boring is what it all is, and it's just getting more boring.

 

 

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Ok, realise that this might be stretching optimism but:

 

http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/48414000/jpg/_48414866_vuckic.jpg

 

Wont be injured?

 

Sigh. I really like Vuckic. No idea what sort of player he's going to be now, after all these injuries.

 

I guess he'll have to drop down to a level that is less athletic and places less demands on the body. Or go abroad.

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