acrossthepond

West Ham lost at home to Stoke. End of the line for Zola I'd imagine.

Possibly irrational but nevertheless genuine affection for Iain Dowie.

Hull leading 2-0 at home to Fulham. If West Ham-Stoke finishes 0-0 they're just a point behind. Come on Dowie lad (Who would've thought almost a year on from last season's disaster that I'd be cheering Hull on to stay up?)

Christ, I don't think I'll be able to take the next nine months of your shite. The whole summer will be filled with endless posts of you assuring us that Fat Mike and Hughton have everything in hand, the transfers will come, never mind those players we're losing as they were the 'wrong' sort of players anyway (as in, they were actually good). Then when the window closes it'll be "we've got to get behind the team, our backing is important, Hughton can keep us up" and then when around Christmans after Hughton is sacrificed and Fat Mike puts the club up for sale again it'll be "don't worry, the takeover will be completed by the end of the week." Heard it all before. Broken record. Fuck off already. Well then dont keep reading my posts and commenting on them for fucks sake. You are definitely the most negative poster on this board, so much so, that I swear you must be a relative of Sam Allardyce. At least I have opinions, right or wrong, you just constantly spout shit without any attempt at a reasonable argument. Im sure you actually hope all of your post comes true. If it doesnt, dont forget to come back on and give some credit to those you constantly slag off. In the meantime , and I'd gladly take that bet you offered to peasepud. If Hughton is still in a job at Christmas I'll leave this board for 6 months. If he's gone, so are you. At least it'll spare me having to listen to your "positive outlook" as we go down again. Love how you said "those" I constantly slag off as though it weren't just you. You're the only one thick enough to spout this particular brand of self-delusion and Ashley loving. I would love nothing more than for us to be successful. You make it sound as though my hatred of Ashley and his cronies would somehow eclipse my love for NUFC. But no matter what, even if he brought in Mourinho to manage us and signed Messi and Jesus Christ to play up front, I would never believe another word to come out of Mike Ashley's mouth again. He has no respect for us, treats us with the utmost contempt, and is only in this to make money as cheaply as possible off us. Would I rather have Ashley in charge and us winning things or Shepherd and his ilk in charge and us winning fuck all for another fifty years? Ashley, for sure. But I am realistic enough to know that all we're going to win under Mike Ashley is the Championship title and probably more than once. I don't want to be right, but the facts are all there. If you really think Ashley would change his ways, well, I've got oceanfront property in Kansas I can give you a good price on.

Can we not rename this thread the "Christmas Tree Propaganda Thread" and give you free reign to post whatever pro-Ashley nonsense you like in here but keep it out of the rest of the board?

Christ, I don't think I'll be able to take the next nine months of your shite. The whole summer will be filled with endless posts of you assuring us that Fat Mike and Hughton have everything in hand, the transfers will come, never mind those players we're losing as they were the 'wrong' sort of players anyway (as in, they were actually good). Then when the window closes it'll be "we've got to get behind the team, our backing is important, Hughton can keep us up" and then when around Christmans after Hughton is sacrificed and Fat Mike puts the club up for sale again it'll be "don't worry, the takeover will be completed by the end of the week." Heard it all before. Broken record. Fuck off already.

It all started to go downhill after Sonic Adventure 2. Both the Adventures were class games. Everything from Sonic Heroes up to the present day has been pure shite. I'm glad that Sonic Team are off this game because they have plainly ran out of ideas and they had one of the greatest franchises on the road to ruin. Looks class and if it's even in the same league as New SMB it'll be a huge hit.

It's 2022 actually, now that I look it up, and they are the hosts of the Asian Cup next year which is meant to be a preview of how far their infrastructure has progressed. Same with that recent friendly between Brazil and England. Not that they have much of a chance.

2018, aye. And they are all indoor and air-conditioned. Meant to be the future of Gulf football and all that nonsense. I could see a joint Qatar/UAE bid getting it at some point in the not-too-distant future. Big money to be made there.

Bit hot in June / July though No more hot (ok, maybe 5 degrees F or so hotter) than Pasadena/Orlando/Dallas were at USA '94. I see your point like.

I think if they wanted to play the world cup in Africa, it should've been in Egypt. I admit to some bias in this matter, but there are several factors in favor of Egypt: Closer to pretty much everywhere on Earth than South Africa. Actually has rule of law. Considerably better infrastructure. Not quite as corrupt as SA. Actually has a good national side. Some of the cons: English-speaking is limited outside of big cities. Would be pretty hard to find anything approximating a pub. Serious work would be needed to upgrade non-Cairo stadium facilities (but wouldn't that be needed for any African country?)

From http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id...and&cc=5901 : Keep in mind that this Harry Harris clown who wrote this piece is a massive gobshite and an old Fleet Street hack who's been making shit up for English rags for years. But it does paint a sobering picture. They already tried the "boatload of free transfers" strategy once and it failed. I wouldn't be surprised to see them go down a second time in succession.

As an attacking left-back he's one of the best, can't defend to save his life though. Rather have Enrique.

KP Boateng/Belhadj/James won't want to go anywhere as they want to be in their World Cup squads. Ben Haim and Diop might fetch a fee, Hreidarsson is getting on, isn't he? EDIT: Ah, I see they'll be loaned right back to Pompey, so never mind. Any of those could move.

3 points when 1 would've done. That's the sort of performance we have been lacking in most of our away games this season. Well done.

GET IN FISTS OF FURY!

This rabble sound like a lot of right cheaters and of course you never know what a patented Shit Championship Ref will decide to give or not give.

I don't want to lose either of them. Carroll has always looked a Neanderthal though, not surprised in the least. And just when he was hitting form.

Nobody is saying that we are not going to play the hand we're dealt - that is, support the team despite all of the hardships we have suffered because of Ashley. It is obvious from our Championship turnouts that few if any have turned their back on the club and rightly so. That doesn't mean that we should for one second do as this wally suggests: forgive Ashley for all of his multitudinous transgressions and gratefully accept him as our saviour. He is a cancer of this club and while we are as powerless to cure it as any cancer sufferer is, that doesn't mean that we are about to say "oh, it's no worse than a bad cold, no harm done." CT's list of Ashley's positive attributes all describe what has happened this season. Even if we somehow accept that this proves that Ashley has the acumen to properly run a Championship football club and to get them promoted (and in doing so, we are discounting the fact that we came down obviously a class above the rest of the dross in this league, and so therefore all we had to do to get back up was not implode - should we hold an open top parade because Fat Mike managed to not implode?) then it still only proves he can run a Championship football club. And for the last 16 years, NUFC were a Premier League club. Who accompanied our change in league status? Oh yes, it was Ashley. And there is plenty of evidence to suggest he cannot run a Premier League football club.

3500 posts in and you are as you ever were - a classless gobshite WUM. You are either on the club's payroll or you are absolutely clueless. Either way, fuck off already.

nufcblog, says it all.

I'd like to hear CT explain what trophyshy said earlier about how the Ashley regime still hasn't apologised for deliberately and intentionally misleading (and lying to) the fans. That really sums up who these people are to me. They are just lying scum who are here to make a profit and will do whatever it takes, and every so often they will try to offer us some kind of sop or sacrificial lamb (Ashley's relegation 'apology', bringing in Shearer and sacking Wise (but not appointing Shearer after the inevitable happened), best fans in the world bollocks, claiming to be selling the club when it's really looking bad) while abusing us all the way. They don't care about this club any further than their next payoff and everything is being done in the short term. There is no sign of planning ahead. None. We've got players who are Championship level, a manager who's Championship level, new signings who are Championship level, and we're expecting to take that to the PL next season and succeed somehow. Some will point to the 5 million pounds or so we spent in January and say that's evidence that Ashley is willing to support the club financially, but 5 million pounds won't take us very far (considerable understatement) in June. We don't need to 'strengthen' the squad, we need to rebuild it. Because right now we have the same core of players who weren't good enough to keep us up the first time, minus most of those who were actually decent, and there's only one outcome there. Then there's the issue of who will spend the money if it is made available. Hughton got the green light to buy players in January and he did some good business on Routledge but blew money on a useless player in Best and if it's going to be a case of buy one decent player and buy one shit player at the same time in June then we may as well stay down and avoid the embarrassment of what will happen to us next season. Hughton isn't good enough for the PL in terms of tactics and team selection or in terms of buying and selling players. It's all gearing up to be a triumphant return to the PL, buy some shit players and sell some good ones, get thrashed over and over again, fans begin to turn against the board, they try to hold us off for as long as possible talking about "stability" and reveling in having achieved the monumental accomplishment of getting us promoted again (they will spin it as an accomplishment and we will be expected to politely overlook the fact that they got us relegated in the first place) until December rolls around and they choose Hughton as their next sacrifice, then bring in another out-of-work nobody manager (or maybe take the even cheaper option and promote Calderwood) and it will just be a repeat of last season. Yes, I am a doom monger. Because doom is what we are looking at with Ashley in charge.

Don't think it'll catch on as a terrace anthem though!

We should thrash them even without Lovenkrands with that lineup. I think Ranger would be better off getting a start instead of a nothing player like Best. Carroll and Ranger linked up very well when we destroyed Ipswich 4-0 and this seems like an ideal place to give him some first team playing time. Of course, Hughton will play Best in an attempt to at least get something out of his shit purchase, but I think we will still win.

Those games sound like a pair of absolute crackers - who says the Europa League's for losers?