Dr Gloom

you've got to laugh at barton's comments too. so typical

all about momentum though isn't it boys? at the moment, west brom can't stop winning while our away form is patchy. if we want the tin pot and the open top parade, we're going to have to dispatch the likes of scunny at home. we're relying on the home form for the title and this is looking like the easiest of the remaining fixtures.

nothing less than a win will do here if we want to win the league; west brom can't stop winning. at least forest's winning run seems to have ended and a top two place looks odds on. a bit of silverware would be nice though

garth crooks - total wanker

but it isn't necessarily the case. You can replace the manager in May or June, give him the whole summer and he could still fuck up. So where does the timing count then ? It is the manager that knows what he is doing is what matters, there is no bad time to appoint the manager who does the good job and buys and sells well for you. i think it's nuts to back a manager then sack him september . if you give him funds, you've got to give the team a few months to see if the new players can gell. when was sir bobby sacked again? wasn't it a day after the window shut or something? if i remember correctly, souness was walked shortly after the closure of a transfer window where he'd just spent a fortune. that's just daft. ashley has a bold decision to make. either sack hughton (or ask him to return to being someone's number two) so he can bring in a new coach. if he does this it has to be - like you said - as soon as promotion is secured so we can build a squad over summer and get them playing together before the new season. the downside to this is we end up looking like the sterotypical impatient, poorly run, thick geordies that the likes of sky delight in portraying us as. who sacks a manager that has just won promotion? or, he backs and sticks with hughton. again, if as we all suspect this is what happens, he should give the manager and the team a chance and not panic and sack the manager just after the window shuts, especially if he's backed him to the tune of a few million quid. I don't agree. Results force situations. If you are bottom of the league or struggling, yet you know you have a group of players who should be doing better, then you have the whole season left to make something of the season. That is what happened with Gullit and Dalglish, particularly Gullit. They were both shown that change could improve the situation, for different reasons, so the change was made. And it improved the situation both times too. It was not the case with Robson, but the club had a manager lined up and if a good appointment had been made then things would have been entirely different. i dunno, if i was a chairman i'd want give a manager a few months - at least until christmas if i'd just let him assemble a side in the summer.

but it isn't necessarily the case. You can replace the manager in May or June, give him the whole summer and he could still fuck up. So where does the timing count then ? It is the manager that knows what he is doing is what matters, there is no bad time to appoint the manager who does the good job and buys and sells well for you. i think it's nuts to back a manager then sack him september. if you give him funds, you've got to give the team a few months to see if the new players can gell. when was sir bobby sacked again? wasn't it a day after the window shut or something? if i remember correctly, souness was walked shortly after the closure of a transfer window where he'd just spent a fortune. that's just daft. ashley has a bold decision to make. either sack hughton (or ask him to return to being someone's number two) so he can bring in a new coach. if he does this it has to be - like you said - as soon as promotion is secured so we can build a squad over summer and get them playing together before the new season. the downside to this is we end up looking like the sterotypical impatient, poorly run, thick geordies that the likes of sky delight in portraying us as. who sacks a manager that has just won promotion? or, he backs and sticks with hughton. again, if as we all suspect this is what happens, he should give the manager and the team a chance and not panic and sack the manager just after the window shuts, especially if he's backed him to the tune of a few million quid.

I'd argue timing is crucial. For example, if hughton is to be replaced let's hope the board don't follow in shepherds footsteps by backing him with transfer funds then sacking him after the window shuts leaving the new manager a 3 month wait and half the season before he can rebuild.

glamour tie this one

football is largely reactionary, you simply can't tell when you will have a bad run of results or something happens that tells you that you need to change. It's the choice of manager that counts, not the timing, but very few are winners in this game, and all the clubs are chasing them. what do you think we should do leazes? stick with hughton if takes us up? will he deserve a crack at the top flight? or say thanks but appoint a manager with a better cv because deep down we all expect him to fail?

I will, as soon as the odds on first manager to get the sack in Premier League are made available. i would agree that he'll be the favourite for the chop but what else can you do as a supporter but get behind him? i think it's an unplayable situation. what do you do? sack the manager that takes us up or give him a chance and get behind him even though you don't fancy him to do a decent job? given that he will almost certainly still be in charge if we are promoted and ashley still our owner i don't see what we can do other than get behind him. you could equally apply that logic to proven trophy winners who had just got you to the FA Cup Final. Lets hope the "timing" of a change is spot on, whatever that means. eh?

I will, as soon as the odds on first manager to get the sack in Premier League are made available. i would agree that he'll be the favourite for the chop but what else can you do as a supporter but get behind him? i think it's an unplayable situation. what do you do? sack the manager that takes us up or give him a chance and get behind him even though you don't fancy him to do a decent job? given that he will almost certainly still be in charge if we are promoted and ashley still our owner i don't see what we can do other than get behind him. It was tongue-in-cheek tbh. yeah, i got that.

I will, as soon as the odds on first manager to get the sack in Premier League are made available. i would agree that he'll be the favourite for the chop but what else can you do as a supporter but get behind him? i think it's an unplayable situation. what do you do? sack the manager that takes us up or give him a chance and get behind him even though you don't fancy him to do a decent job? given that he will almost certainly still be in charge if we are promoted and ashley still our owner i don't see what we can do other than get behind him.

hughton will be our manager next season. we may as well back him

shame, i was lookign forward to seeing him at an all time low at the end of the season

gutted for beckham. that's a horrible injury. doubt he'll come back from it at his age

it's all range rovers too where i live. like you need to take your kid to a school in a 4x4 when you live in dulwich

i've got a feeling we might lose this one. we're due a defeat after a pretty good recent run of results and although boro have been mostly crap this season, our away form isn't the mae west

i think a lot of us hoped boumsong would be the defensive rock to help coax some consistency out of bramble. he turned out to be too similar to bramble to form a partnership with him - both prone to far too many howlers. alex - i get what you're saying about him needing a big strong central defensive partner to get the best out of him. that's why i'm surprised lyon defeated real last night because that cris looked anything but that when we played bayer leverkusen a few years ago. he was chasing shola and lua lau's shadows all night iirc.

hopes - a barnstorming return to the top flight echoing the last time we were promoted, free flowing attacking football, gate crashing the top 4, full houses and becoming everyone's second team again expectations - hughton to get the sack before christmas, ashley to put the club on and off the market at least once, more pr gaffes from llambias, a season long flirtation with relegation concluding with squeaky bum spring time

cris looked awful against us for bayer leverkusen in the champions league. iirc wasn't it shola running rings around him? I was on about Boumsong. Haven't seen enough of Cris really to comment. I've said similar before but Boumsong would rather face someone like Henry, who he played well against a couple of times for us iirc, when Henry was at or near his peak as well than some big lump like Geoff Horsfield or even Shearer when he was effectively past it. I don't think Boumsong is a great defender but he's pretty decent as far as continental football goes. yeah i got that. just thought i'd throw in a comment on cris too. boumsong looked dire at all levels for us tbf.

cris looked awful against us for bayer leverkusen in the champions league. iirc wasn't it shola running rings around him?

to be fair to both players, they arrived with big reputations. i was surprised as annyone to see boumsong and cris at the heart of the lyone defence yesterday. how can two donkeys like that hold out real madrid in the champions league. bizarre

surprised this one isn't on sky

pennant and barton? may as well have dyer and bowyer back, the attitudes on those two

they only owed about 20 odd thousand too. disgrace when you think a club over 100 years old is going out of business for less than a quarter of what robinho takes home from man city every week