maggiespaws

What we need right now - apart from someone with a shitload of cash to lose - is someone who will put the club first, and desire to get back up asap whatever it takes, and a manager with the same attitude and capability to do it, otherwise, rudderless as we are with no direction, 5 or 6 players who need to get out of the club and be replaced by 6 or 7 who want to be here, we are in grave danger of sliding further down. I completely agree. I can see where you are heading with this and I can't deny that Shepherd wanted the club to do well as he genuinely is a fan. He backed his managers and aimed for the top. All of which are the sorts of traits we need from a chairman/owner. It's the other stuff the comes with him I find damaging and I just don't see him as a sensible, long term solution. Looking at some of the comments on here, for all of his failings; I can't in good conscience, blame him for Owen (despite the manner in which he brought him to NUFC highlighting on of my problems with him). Owen was a proven goalscorer and I was as excited as hell when he arrived. Unfortunately (and typically) for us it backfired spectacularly. Compare him to Ashley and he looks like a great prospect. Compare him to other chairmen of relatively successful clubs and he come up short in my opinion. I know you hold a candle for him Leazes and in fairness I can't argue with some of your logic on the matter, I just think that you seem to forget/ignore many of his failings because of your memories of the good he did, particularly when comparing him to the thieves and crooks we had prior to him and SJH.

Saw them for the 3rd time at the Oasis gig in Mcr last month. I was a little underwhelmed if I'm honest. The sound was poor to be fair (guitars were barely audible); but they concentrated on their new album - which at the time wasn't even out. It was difficult to get going when they're playing a load of stuff you've never heard. They missed out loads of their best stuff too as a result. Don't think I'm keen on their new album either I need to listen to it a few more times though before I make a proper decision.

I can't get excited about the prospect of the return of FFS. It's taken me a couple of days to actually post this and I know I'm still not going to properly articulate my thoughts. It's just wrong. The whole line about 'better the devil you know' - bollox. MA has been nothing but an unmitigated disaster, but hell, by all accounts he had a bad hand to start with. Regardless of whether or not he did his due diligence etc, the fact of the matter is that financially, and business wise we were in a bad way. League wise, we were better off, obviously - but for how long? We've been in steady decline site we sacked SBR and who's idea was that. who's idea was it to bring in his subsequent replacements. I can't argue about the fact he backed his managers, but it wasn't with his own money was it. Everyone is entitled to make a few mistakes, but we have continuously made bad investments for years. I'm struggling to think of many players we've bought in recent years who've been a worthwhile investment. Beye? Bassong? Not all of those bad investments have come under MA - a lot of them came under the watchful eye of FFS; someone who has more experience. FFS has had his successes but those were years ago and he could do nothing to halt our decline when it was needed. In fact, his lack of leadership, business/common sense etc did little else but make things works. By the end, under him we were a laughing stock, clueless, rudderless and categorically without a plan. FFS plan was to throw more money at it. When did SJH start to take a back seat? - I honestly can't remember the answer to this. It would be interesting to map our decline against the time at which each perosn was in control. I remember us talking on here years ago about how SBR had make FFS look good. Dont get me wrong, I'm not naive enough to not realise that we need someone to throw money at the club, you do need to spend money to be successful but more weight needs to be placed on HOW we spend the money. I don't see the strategic thinking, planning and guidance coming from FFS. I've already made my concerns public at our drastically reduced purchase price and the problems that could mean. It seems, they might well be coming to the surface. We need MA to be out, but FFS coming in is not the answer.

I'm not going to get whipped up into the whole 'this could be our year' bollox, but Murrey just gave Ferrer his arse on a plate. Exactly what was needed going into his first semi at Wimbledon. A quicker game was a welcome relief after the previous match. Now, if Roddick and Hewitt could play a 4hr slog that would be nice

I know what yo mean papa, but this was always going to happen. Its just not great timing.

It certainly does look like they are just slashing costs like a 70% sale at SD. Lovenkrands looked like he could do a job in the Championship and would have been a cheap choice too. On a free and his contract could have been negotiated low because of demotion. Fucking idiots. Admittedly it's a difficult situation as do you give contracts to players the next administration don't want? Problem is, if the sale doesn't get sorted out asap, the season will start and we'll be fielding the fucking tea lady and we've let anyone go who's any good/up for contract.

On the basis that the above is your general opinion of anyone from outside a 5 mile radius of SJP I'd take that with a large pinch of salt. As for the Romanian lass, well I'd say her chances of making it BIG look to be getting smaller as the year gets on

Totally agree. I liked Henman, but never felt he would win Wimbledon as there always seemed to be a few stronger contenders out there and as I say, lacked the edge. The country would have been pissed for a week if he'd won it like Had a very good all-round game (which got him into the top 5 iirc) but never quite had a weapon in his armoury (like a really top class serve, for example) to win him a grand slam title (which is that 'edge' you're talking about). Indeed, that's exactly what I'm talking about. Agree with the point about the rain and Ivanisevic. I'd forgotten about that. That one really could have gone his way

Totally agree. I liked Henman, but never felt he would win Wimbledon as there always seemed to be a few stronger contenders out there and as I say, lacked the edge. The country would have been pissed for a week if he'd won it like

Excellent match last night. Wawrinka was playing out of his skin and Murrey still kept plugging away. I have more confidence in Murrey than I ever did in Henman. Henman lacked the cutting edge for me. Not enough bite. I dont care if Murrey's boring or miserable. He plays good tennis and his attitude is of a 'never-say-die' mould. He plays to win and it's those sorts of players who achieve. Hell, Sampras was cold, calculating, miserable and boring and the best of his generation by a mile. The fact Murrey kept his head last night and kept Wawrinka at arms length shows just how much he's matured in the last 12 months. Will he win it? Who knows. Is he in with a decent shout, hell yes.

Where'd you get that from, mate? Looking to put my Wii in HD but it seems like you've got a canny deal. Same could be said for the battery pack. Wii Fit Battery pack - £4.55 from ebay seller (uk) edigitalelectronicsuk6. However, I think I have a duff one. Waiting to hear back from the seller about next step. HD cable - $5.09 from Hong Kong seller bobowaytoway. I think it was about £3 or so. Ordered it a little over a week ago. Not got mine yet but my brothers arrived today and we ordered at the same time.

A few accessories for the Wii and Xbox: Xbox 360: - DVD/multimedia remote - Wired headset Wii: - Dual charging station and 2x 2800mh batteries - HD Cable (480p) - 2x Gun controllers - Wii Fit rechargable battery pack - 2nd Nunchuck Works out at about £100 or so's worth of accessories but thanks to our industrious Asian cousins in Hong Kong, and the power of eBay I think I've spent a little over £30.

I was about to post this too. Top, top, top album. The sheer diversity on it makes this album a cut above if nothing else. Such a shame they were forced to endure a 4yr recording hiatus. John Squire is one of my guitar heroes too.

Just managed to get 2x tickets for the Thunder gig in Manchester next friday after they were sold out. My Dad is suitably impressed as he really wanted to go

Mint. I think I might order a pair form play then when payday comes

Are they any good? I've been looking at them 'cos they've been on special at play.com. I'm hoping the noise cancelling will make them good for train journeys to/from work.

Never had you down as a Knorks man Meenz. I always thought you appreciated more manly attributes.....

Son of mongoose could understand

It's really not. It's an abomination. A chav shirt for a chav owned club.

10/10 to the designer. He really met his brief (assuming it was) - "I want you to come up with a shirt design that will take the club one step further down. Give everyone one more reason to laugh at the fuckers. I want something people can take the piss out of for the whole season, just in case they don't give us anything else on the pitch to laugh about" FFS

My brother is taking part in the Stick it to MS world record attempt. Basically, the US currently hold the record for getting 533 drummers playing simultaneously in one room in 2005. This year, the UK will attempt 600 drummers at the Birmingham NIA all in aid of MS. All 600 drummers have registered and the event happens in a couple of weeks. If anyone can spare a couple of quid to sponsor him it would be really appreciated His just giving page is http://www.justgiving.com/geordieboystu Cheers, Steve

paws, I'd disagree. As long as the next owner can get rid of all stench Ashley the cunt has left behind, they'll get a pat on the back and a pint from me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not about to get the "Ashley In" banners out but nor am I about to burst into "Ding Dong the Witch is dead" either. All I'm saying is that this has the potential to go from bad to worse. MA is not going to give a shit who he sells to, as long as they stump up the cash. This could mean that a wealthy investor can get us at a knock down price leaving greater funds for investment. Or it could mean that someone with much less can buy us and we struggle to get out of the Championship because we can't afford to buy that extra mile (PNE for example). It will ruin the summer break because no-one can plan for anything. We can't even sort out our manager until the future is sorted because a) he's not likely to sign a deal and this might influence who buys the club (ie the new owner might be put off if they dont like AS and would have to pay him off like we did with Fat Sam). All in all, same NUFC shit, just a different day.

Not read the whole thread, so apologies if this has already been said but, one of my first thoughts when reading this is that we are too cheap. £80-£100mil opens the field to a whole new level of investor - which I think is bad (stick with me - it'll make sense). For that kind of money, we could end up with a owner who can buy the club but cannot invest heavily, unlike a billionaire owner. Even if we do bounce back up (and that's a big fucking if) we could end up like Everton - no pot to piss in and bouncing around mid-table hoping to catch a lucky run. At least Everton have a good manager in Moyes.

Yesterday, whilst at the George Thorogood gig in Manchester; I pre-ordered a hangover. It arrived at 07:00 this morning along with my alarm call Work sucks today

Kate in leather. Hell yeah! .... and Van Helsing too /pants