Jimbo

Fuck

Smith upfront with Martins today by the sounds of it.

Time is earned in my opinion.

I don't want him either, but I find it strange that finishing 5th with Bolton is an argument for some for keeping Allardyce, yet Jol finishing 5th with Spurs isn't good enough to appoint him.

Spot on! Saying that tho,he probably suits this club down to the ground - unprofessional To be fair, If Ashley wanted to run the club he'd be doing instead of Mort.

Will he? He couldn't manage that as captain of the club playing under Souness, who he supposedly liked and rated. Thats my fear too, although NONE of us know what he was like in the dressing room. Shearer always struck me as a shite captain in terms of rousing the players on the pitch.

Didn't Carter get bumped off in the end? might just happen to Sam. "you're a big man, but you're out of shape"

Muse - Unintended

Here is an idea for a dark football drama. See what you think. There is this local guy — let's call him Freddy Shepherd — who sacks a legend for finishing fourth, third and fifth in the Premier League — let's call him Sir Bobby Robson — and replaces him with the bloke from the stagnating Blackburn Rovers (Graeme Souness) before appointing an obvious nightwatchman (Glenn Roeder) and then hiring a set-piece specialist whose direct style is diametrically opposed to the club's artistic leaning. This new manager, Big Sam, can be like Michael Caine in Get Carter: here to 'sort it out' in a roughtough kind of way. Now we introduce a sports retailing tycoon who has chosen our venerable institution (hereafter Newcastle United) from the smorgasbord of Premier League investment opportunities. Starting out as a self-declared recluse, Mike Ashley is soon sending bottles of champagne to all his new Geordie friends in dockside nightclubs. On Boxing Day, with the team falling off the pier at Wigan, Ashley is to be found in a replica shirt among the 5,000- strong Toon Army. The front-of-house troubleshooter, meanwhile, could be called, say, Chris Mort, a name that would stretch quite nicely to Mortician. To add further tragicomic bite, we could have the side sponsored by Northern Rock, whose financial ineptitude has forced the Treasury to offer guarantees of £57billion — almost as much as the Whitehall education budget — thus leaving each British taxpayer with a liability of £1,800. Which reminds me that should Ashley elect to sack Big Sam Allardyce and his legion of expert backroom staff, who number 20 according to the Newcastle Journal, the queue for compensation would look like one of those lines of panic-gripped investors outside every Northern Rock branch. I was about to say that not even Joseph Anthony Barton would be tempted to kick this great beacon of civic hope when they were so low in spirit, but of course he already has. Barton was yesterday remanded in custody after being charged, along with two others, with assault and affray in Liverpool centre around 5.30am on Thursday, when he was meant to be nursing an ankle injury in preparation for today's daunting visit to Chelsea. According to yesterday's Liverpool Echo, one of the alleged victims briefly lost consciousness in the incident. Explaining his decision to omit Barton from the team who lost to Wigan, Allardyce had explained the previous day that "another knock might put him out for a while". Or another night out in Liverpool. Barton, remember, has already pleaded not guilty to a charge of assaulting his former Manchester City colleague Ousmane Dabo on the training ground and will be tried in the New Year. Newcastle are in such a state that you just want to put your arm round them and buy them a cup of tea. Not all of it is self-inflicted. Their best player, Michael Owen, has endured savage luck with injuries. But then there is no escaping the truth that Shepherd's last big appointment has gambled on wrong'uns (Barton) and big club rejects (Alan Smith, Geremi), not to mention the glacial Mark Viduka, of whom one reporter wrote at Wigan's JJB Stadium: "How any manager of a struggling side can stomach Viduka's immobility remains one of life's mysteries." Allardyce has become so disorientated by the maelstrom of bad results and sterile performances that he has disassociated himself from his own players, saying: "I'm not happy to have my future in their hands." A parlour game in football is spotting the point of no return for men in Allardyce's position. With that renunciation of his own expensive summer buys, plenty of private bets were placed on him ending up in the elephant's graveyard of men who travelled to Tyneside to make a difference but left wearing a thousand-yard stare. Newcastle have not won in 14 Premier League visits to Stamford Bridge and face Manchester City, Manchester United and Arsenal in January. The African Nations Cup will claim four of their front-line players. At least Owen may be back on the bench today. And the glaring doubts about Alan Shearer's lack of coaching experience could be overcome if the right structure was in place to support him. The manager's job may yet be Shearer's great reward for turning down Manchester United to return to his roots for no reward, in silverware, at least. Otherwise their best bet would be Martin O'Neill. Then again, why should he plunge himself into such terminal instability? What we are seeing are the last convulsions of the Shepherd-Hall family era: a good manager transplanted to the wrong club, with no regard for logic or tradition. Empty populism has run amok. They have the fans, they have the stadium and they certainly have the love. But the big decisions have been coming from people with agendas that conflict with what's right for the team and the club. You look at Mike Ashley impersonating a fan at Wigan and want him to vacate his seat in the crowd, put his normal gear on and start thinking double-quick in case he needs to orchestrate a proper influx of people who understand his new toy and the tough world they're in. Otherwise, 'loved by outsiders, destroyed from within' will be Newcastle's epitaph.

Trying to get the sack ?

This is one thing I will defend Allardyce on, I presume you're talking about N'Zogbia here. Charles has been played at left back for the majority of the season because Enrique has either been injured or deemed unready for the premiership. I recall Beye was left to kick his heels until deemed capable at this level and is now one of our better performers. I genuinely believe Jose Enrique will become a feature of our side for quite some time. I'm pleased Sam Allardyce hasn't thrown a young lad into the Premiership without letting him grow accustomed. I'd wager he'd have played more if we had been playing better and that would have seen Charles pushed further forward and Milner to the right. There are many things that seem to be wrong with Allardyces tactics, but I'm not a Premiership manager so I'd like to think there is rhyme behind his reasons. Instead we've been hamstrung by having our most productive leftwinger lingering at left back, FANTASTIC !!!! Oh and by the way if he's saving Jose Enrique, why did he pick the lad to play so many of the early matches ?

Tell me this post was a joke please. every other manager was staying well clear of Barton in the summer errrr no. One manager was dumb enough.

you've more chance getting a cow to shit gold. 3-0 and a sending off for one of ours. oh and yet more calls for Sam's head as if this result is unexpected, even under Robson or Keegan, this team of ours against that team of theirs... I'd expect us to be bent double with pants in our mouth, clutching our ankles as we're roughly and thoroughly buggered by the Blues. Stop sulking ffs man.

I was fully expecting a poor season, but I expected to see green shoots of recovery, evidence that Allardyce was finding his way and making small improvements that might be the foundations for next season. But all we have seen is regression, negative tactics, awful football, naive team selection, questionable subsitution policy, excuses, blame, some awful transfers. Yes managers need time to succeed, but time doesn't guarantee success, and unfortunately for managers like Allardyce, success earns you time. Minimum expectations have not been met, and have not only not been met, they've been missed by a mile. As for being confident of not being relegated, whoever got relegated in December ? no one, but with us unable to beat the likes of Derby and Wigan, who can be confident of beating any of the remaing teams ahead under Allardyce ? His stubornness and arrogance and inablility to demonstrate alternative tactics have plunged himself in this situation, not the crowd, and certainly not folk on message boards. We've appointed the wrong man, he's a square peg in a round hole and we need to brave enough to make a tough decision.

I agree, but finishing any lower than last season isn't really progress and I doubt Ashley & Mort would be happy with it. Aye. I think better than last season should be a minimum target. I know there's been upheaval at the club etc. but doing better than Roeder should be the least Allardyce should manage. Considering how many tickets XXL Sam has on himself. He does like to big himself up, managerial equivalent of Ali tbh Ali could walk the walk too though Guessing you never saw Big Sam's run at Fulham then. Run ? you mean mince !

He'd just taken a job working under Morrati at Inter Milan, Fayed must have made him an offer he couldn't refuse.

Take a look at this, but remember there is always the risk that you might Brick your PSP.

Not sure if it is still the case, but you used to have to downgrade the firmware of the PSP by running a couple of files from the memory card, not sure if there is an easier way now but I downgraded mine when I first got it, I think it was firmware version 1.5 that you needed to run downloaded games.

"Can I just shock you? I like wine. Despite what I just said earlier." Sign him !

Quoted for truth.

See here is where you are wrong again. You're assuming it's about entertainment, it's not, it's about being able to beat those teams that are shite, something we're not doing. just where do you think Newcastle United have a divine right to finish? Arsenal have been beaten by Boro' Chelsea have been helf by Villa, aberrations for their teams because in between, even playing poorly, they've the quality to grind out results against all but the most elite teams. I'm amazed people still think we' should be beating Wigan away, Boro away etc. We are a mid table side, not even a top half side imo. We're not Robsons team and we're no where near Keegans side. So why in all honesty do you think that we should expect to beat these teams? we haven't beaten Wigan away for 50 odd years, we've been playing poorly all season and scraping through results and yet you people still expect us to go and get a result, despite bitching and moaning louder than a thunderstorm about the paucity of entertainment on display. you all agreed that Shephard should go and with him, the old way of running the club, no more managerial changes every season, no more publicity nightmares. And yet now you want shot of the next guy after 6 months in charge despite us sitting midtable and the January window yet to be taken advantage of. I personally think you're all acting like spoiled brats and am not surprised to see outbursts against the fans from Barton and comments made about the fans by the manager. They initally wanted long term change, genuine revolution at the club and now because that hasn't come covered in glory and rose petals they've spat out their dummy. Grow up says I and care not a jot for the abuse I get. You sound more like a Sam Allardyce supporter than a Newcastle United supporter. Who's going to guarantee entertainment ? Not Allardyce thats for sure, enterainment is not the be-all and end-all, the reason Allardyce needs sacking is because he is dragging our team down the pan with shite tactics and playing "football" so negative you have to question if his intentions are to win at all. Stop wetting your pants about Allardyce, and start worrying about our team, because with this loon in charge we are going backwards fast, the only thing he has been able to display is the stubornness to not change his ideas either that or the lack intellegence to do so.

Not tall enough in my opinion to be a truly great keeper. Hadaway and shite man Hes made a couple of errors in the last season, but then cech has done that in the last 2 weeks! Hes been the best keepr our club has probably ever had and we will struggle to find someone as consistently good as him once he leaves. I don't disagree, I think Given is one of the best players in the Premier League, I just think if he was a wee bit taller he'd be truly world class, I think over the last few games he's only been let down by his lack of height rather than technique or ability.

Just about to start Joe Calzaghe's biog, but also tempted with this one:

It might or it might not, is that a risk we can afford to take right now ?

Not sure how much of that success was down to Tommy Craig rather than Shearer, impossible to tell in my view, as for Verry Terribles, ouch ! Yes I can see the logic in having a more experienced man in there with him, but Terribles ?? Shearer might go on to be a great manager, but I'm not sure I want to take that risk.