acrossthepond

I'm convinced whoever replaces Pardew is bound to be a trademark Mike Ashley disappointment. Someone like Curbishley would fit the bill perfectly - English, desperate, cheap, nobody wants him. Bearing that in mind, I'm just glad the man himself has left. Setting to one side the dogshit football and the lickspittle attitude toward Ashley, neither of which are likely to change with the next appointment, he was just so dislikeable as a human being that he lowered the tone at the whole club.

Agreed completely. Every midfield needs a water carrier. The problem is that our entire midfield has been nothing but water carriers since Cabaye went. Sissoko has been trying to fill the role (when he's not wasted out on the wing) but he is a different type of player to Cabaye entirely. All graft and no craft in the midfield means our strikers are not getting service and are forced to fashion opportunities out of nothing, which Cisse and Perez can do, but they can't be expected to do so every game and repeatedly. Tiote, Colback, Anita, and Abeid are all serviceable players (Tiote perhaps better than serviceable but not on current form) but they all perform the same role. I don't think de Jong is the answer either, not that anybody really knows what type of player he is or where Pardew is going to play him. Ryan Taylor is a limited footballer but he at least offers some form of creativity. Cabella is not a central midfielder. Basically I don't think we have anyone at the club currently who can fill the midfield role we need and haven't had for nearly a year now. So our strikers, such as they are, continue to feed off scraps/wait for Sissoko to do something good/wait for our opponents to screw up. Not exactly a recipe for success but it's the same one we've been following all of 2014, with predictable results.

More of his expert man-management and player improvement. Mishandle the player for more than a year, then start playing him in his correct position and claim the improvement is down to his own management. Genius.

The same reason that Pardew does anything, desperation.

Another terrible first half performance. If we were playing a more clinical side we'd be well behind by now. Gouffran off for Cabella, Tiote off for Cisse, go for it in the second half because whatever this approach is, it isn't working.

There's a surprise. Welcome to never being a competitive club again, Rangers.

Considering Pardew is seemingly known for his defensive setups and a limited, unadventurous style of play with covering wingers and grafting water-carriers in the middle, we shouldn't be getting fucking howked on a regular basis. Yet it happens every season. Any time we go 1-0 down I immediately start thinking that it's going to snowball into a 3-0 or 4-0.

I think "dogshit" is a little too kind for Alnwick. The game is lost, let's throw on the 4th choice keeper, he can't be any worse.

Newcastle starting XI: Alnwick; Dummett, Coloccini, Williamson, Haidara; Colback, Sissoko; Perez, Cabella, Gouffran; Riviere.

I can't believe even Pardew would be stupid enough to send out a weakened team for this tie. Chucking a cup quarter-final will prove beyond any doubt whatsoever that he and Ashley have no ambition for this club and any credibility gained over the last few weeks would disappear instantly. Sadly I can completely see him "resting players for the derby" and then us getting stuffed in that match as well. I'd rather win this game than beat the mackems on Sunday, I think. This is our best chance to win anything in years. We've already beaten Spurs, Liverpool and Chelsea this season and there's no reason we can't do it again.

Let's say we go ahead and beat Spurs tonight with a patched-up team, scrape through a semi-final against Sheffield United, and go on to win the whole cup. Does Pardew become a legend? Is Ashley's model validated? The spiteful part of me wants to answer no to both questions. I don't think Pardew will ever be a Newcastle legend even if we do win silverware during his tenure. He's just too unlikable and too contemptuous of us and the North East, and I feel that any success we may end up having in this competition will be slightly overshadowed by the fact that Pardew blatantly sent us out to lose against City. The same goes for Ashley. We've heard from the horse's mouth that winning this cup was never a priority and if we do somehow pull it off, it wasn't part of his business model or whatever the fuck we call his plans for the club these days. I wouldn't credit either of them, I don't think.

He's almost got a point. Anita is a water-carrier which is apparently all Pardew looks for from his wingers (see Jonas and Gouffran post-Pardewing) so it wouldn't shock me if we saw him out wide at some point. This is the man who played our best central midfielder and the driving force of our team as a right winger for almost 2 seasons, after all.

The implication that Geordies would somehow be more receptive to your racist ravings is incredibly insulting. I'm as Geordie as you are - I was born in Newcastle, was brought up in Walker, and no matter what colour I am, where I live now, who my father was, or what words I say when I get down to pray, Geordie is what I am and what I will always be. I honestly reckon I'm probably more of a Geordie than you are - being one is about hospitality, camaraderie, and togetherness, not xenophobia (I'll let you look that one up) and your pathetic brand of cowardice. When Pav wore the famous t-shirt you were probably the only one sat up in the stand going "course he fucking isn't", and thumbing through an atlas so you could figure out just which ethnic slur to apply to him. So basically you can fuck off with that shit about not enough Geordies on here and that's why you're tragically misunderstood.

Firstly, my post was not addressed to or in any way about you, and secondly, why are you such a fucking coward? Say it again and don't delete it this time like the coward you are. Call me a terrorist, bomb-maker, raghead, whatever your epithet of choice is. I know that's what you really feel, because you are so ignorant that in your pathetic little mind, Muslims can only be one thing. So just say it. Everyone on this board knows you are a racist. Why keep trying to pretend you aren't, unless you're not man enough to stand behind the convictions that your life experiences, however sadly twisted and provincial they might have been, have brought you to hold. You are a racist. At least be an honest one.

Klopp's head's been turned. Blatantly thinking about a move to England now, reminiscent of 'Appy 'Arry after all the England talk while he was at Spurs.

Some shocking dives on display like, that's true, and Alexis's whiny face needed a slap. I think the yellow-card waving only hurt his case, I thought Dummett charging him down in the corner and bringing him down was a nailed-on yellow card until the ref got a load of Alexis waving an imaginary card and decided otherwise. We almost always lose at the Emirates so I was expecting nothing from this game, but the feeble lack of ambition still hurts. I feel like the only time we ever perform is when we're not expected to, like the cup game against Man City or the home game v. Chelsea. Any time we're on a run or starting to look decent something derails us without fail. Sissoko back v. Spurs and the mackems should definitely help, our midfield was flat as a pancake today.

It was a nothing finish, he could've hit it with his cock and it would've gone in from that range and against that defence and keeper. Another dogshit team selection and here we are, they haven't been good and that makeshift defence had holes we could've exploited. Instead we started with Tiote and Gouffran in midfield and Perez on the wing...

Elliott is a bog standard keeper and Alnwick is even worse. Understandable that your 3rd choice keeper is never going to be very good but fuck me, that was shocking.

Get a life already like. Bore off until the next time we lose a game and you can come back with apocalyptic predictions.

That link appears broken, AH, which is a real shame. She is so fucking hot it's unreal.

What a load of shit. Citeh had fit keepers when they had their crisis a couple of years ago and they didn't want to play the Faroese kid (Nielsen?) and they got dispensation to bring in an emergency loan. Darlow isn't even in our PL squad list, we couldn't play him if we wanted to. I don't know what the FA think they're playing at, but I do know it would never happen if it were Chelsea or Man U who needed a keeper.

Amateur night from Abeid, he was fucking rubbish. Embarrassing strikes of the ball at times. Two shots into Row Z and a diabolical corner right at the death. Offered nothing all night, barely at Colback/Anita level of recycling the ball. I want to like him and he's put in some good shifts over the winning run but he was atrocious. Cabella our best player on the night despite only completing 45 minutes. No surprise that the end of our winning streak has coincided with Gouffran's return to the side, he is useless and we may as well be playing with 10 men. Even when he tracked back he was comically forced into conceding the foul by Boyd. Cisse may score from chances in the box but his all-around play is nonexistent. He brings no-one into the play and sometimes seems barely unable to control simple chest-high balls when outside the box. Back to the same old shit from Pardew. Excuses prepared for January now that we've got some points on the board. Another chance to challenge the European places soon to be strangled in the crib.

Double stupid yellows there. What a fucking cunt Carroll is though, carrying on like that over nothing.

Tiote rushed back, Gouffran starting, zzzz.

Gouffran playing at all is laughable, he is so rubbish these days. Taylor going off killed any momentum we had, he was really driving us forward.