acrossthepond

Another 90 minutes of pure dirge. I really don't have much else to say - we were awful and it showed. No jammy free-kick to rescue us this time. Get used to seeing a lot of results involving 'Newcastle 0' tbh.

Just trying to tune myself out of England until after the Euros tbh. Capello doesn't have a clue and lacks passion for the job as well. He's a mug and we'll not be competitive until after he's gone.

A player has to be judged on his consistency. Martins produced some moments of magic but for most of his time with us was shit, thus, he was shit (or, as it could be more politely described, a 'cult hero.') We all fall for that kind of player sometimes (see my avatar) but we still know in our heart of hearts that they are shit. Leon Best is shit. Best has scored some good goals and showed some striker's awareness and finishing skill, but the overwhelming majority of his performances have been awful, thus he is awful. Even against Fulham, he didn't play well, but did score a couple of goals. If that can continue, then he's worth having in the side, but I fear that the number of games where he plays like shit and does nothing (i.e. Scunthorpe) will far outweigh the number of games where he plays like shit and still scores (i.e. Fulham), which will in turn far outweigh the number of games where he plays brilliantly (i.e. Arsenal last season.) He's still a better option than Lovenkrands, but worse than Ameobi for my money. I hope Ba comes good and can forge an effective partnership with Ameobi, but we have to accept that both of those have poor fitness records and that our backup strikers, such as they are, will likely be featuring a lot this season, and for that reason we're going to have to hope that Best has more games like he did against Fulham.

What an utter load of shit. Slither back into whatever vodka bottle you crawled out of, you slimy specky bastard. Where's the Carroll money? No mention of it? What a surprise!

You're not wrong about that, but I don't think the people listed on the second line are the ones you're looking for. Anyway, for all that you talk endless shite ( ), you are definitely a true supporter and someone whose opinion is more worthy and valuable than, say, CT's or Kevin's, who are both just trolls/WUMs, and the board will be worse off without you. I'd give it a couple of days to think it over and come back - you've earned my respect for being man enough to back your convictions and to pay up when they were wrong, unlike a certain other sly gobshite who doesn't have the courage of his convictions.

It was a shite (actually, worse than that, it was reeking) article, but it got the point across: the board have once again failed to deliver on promises. I hope 30k show up for our next home game. That might clench the fat cunt's sphincters a bit, but I doubt it. There's still plenty of money left to be made from this squad. Actually, what I really hope is that we spend 90 minutes chanting "Where's the money gone?" or variations thereof vs. Blackburn. That'd get national media coverage, if nothing else.

Getting sigged. Any idiots still think he, Enrique or Nolan left this club for more money? Is it sinking in, morons? We sold our best player for 35 million, have never replaced him, and have not spent even one penny of the money we received for him. Not one penny. Ashley has pocketed all but 300k of the Carroll money, advertising, sponsorships, the PL money, and the TV money. Get that through your thick skulls. The owner that the Ashley apologists venerate has fleeced the club for far, far upward of 35m and continues to do it. He and Dekka are laughing right now at our expense. Santon? Great signing. You still don't get it, though. If he comes good, he's getting sold on deadline day for 20 mil, and we'll have more panic bids for players we're never going to land, and then more excuses like 'we had a few irons in the fire but just couldn't get them over the line, we weren't held to ransom, we'll be back to spend in January/August/January/etc.' This club is going absolutely nowhere except down. How many seasons do you think we'll stay up when our owner plainly couldn't give a shiny shit about seeing us succeed? With respect, everyone gets this bit of the picture. Daft to suggest otherwise. ...I don't want to drag up quotes, but I will if I have to...

Getting sigged. Any idiots still think he, Enrique or Nolan left this club for more money? Is it sinking in, morons? We sold our best player for 35 million, have never replaced him, and have not spent even one penny of the money we received for him. Not one penny. Ashley has pocketed all but 300k of the Carroll money, advertising, sponsorships, the PL money, and the TV money. Get that through your thick skulls. The owner that the Ashley apologists venerate has fleeced the club for far, far upward of 35m and continues to do it. He and Dekka are laughing right now at our expense. Santon? Great signing. You still don't get it, though. If he comes good, he's getting sold on deadline day for 20 mil, and we'll have more panic bids for players we're never going to land, and then more excuses like 'we had a few irons in the fire but just couldn't get them over the line, we weren't held to ransom, we'll be back to spend in January/August/January/etc.' This club is going absolutely nowhere except down. How many seasons do you think we'll stay up when our owner plainly couldn't give a shiny shit about seeing us succeed?

300k spend Disgraceful. Well, anyone still reckon that Ashley has any ambition whatsoever for this club? 30 million profit in January, 300k net spend 8 months later. Do that math, 'team positive.'

Net spend in this window, anyone? Less than a million, I believe. Let's get HF in to produce the numbers.

Doubt there was ever really a bid. Smokescreen, just as predicted, and just like N'Zogbia in January.

Source, source, source?

Three and a half hours left, so expect a tale of a mad bid for a player in half an hour that sadly fell through because there wasn't enough time.

I think this is a really class signing, one of the two players to be genuinely excited about that we've acquired this season (the other is Cabaye.) Hope he can hit the ground running - luckily, unlike Enrique, he won't have Fat Sam in charge to brutally mismanage his development and break his confidence.

Did that just happen today?

Just one day left....

Not opening that last post, you have no clue what you're talking about and you aren't even trying to refute anything I said, so I'm done.

'It's a pretty simple point that doesn't need all the rants.' More of the ad hom that you try to employ to make it sound like you have a clue and I'm the one who's unreasonable. The 'pretty simple point' is that Jonas is our best winger on current evidence and needs to be starting every game. If you want to play Marveaux over Obertan and see how that goes, I would be very happy with that plan, but I just demonstrated how Jonas is obviously not the one responsible for our problems scoring goals and you're talking about someone who you've seen play exactly once and who you know nothing about, but who should replace our international winger who's been part of the first XI for going on 4 years. This is the same as when you tried to say Ferguson was fit to replace Jonas, then tried to say LuaLua was fit to replace Jonas. Meanwhile, one can't get a game over Jonas OR Ryan Taylor, and the other is on loan in the Championship. You didn't actually know how good or not those players were, because you'd never seen them, but you just don't like Jonas for irrational and wrong reasons (because, not to harp on this point too much, you know nothing about football) and so you want him out of the team. Jonas jonas jonas. Enrique hasn't been great? It's Jonas's fault, not that his head's been turned by a more ambitious club than ours. We can't score? It's Jonas's fault, not that our strikers are awful and Barton and Nolan are gone. It's raining? Well, Jesus Christ, it must be Jonas's fault. You don't have any idea what you're talking about, as per usual, and your anti-Jonas crusade is probably the thing that most clearly indicates how little you really understand about this game. So why don't you leave discussing it to people who have some inkling and stick to talking about cooking and gardening? Thanks.

So, no answer to anything I said, once again. I'll be as clear as possible. We scored loads of goals last season. Jonas was playing almost every game during that season. Somehow, his shitness did not impair us from scoring that many goals. It is now this season. We have had trouble scoring in our first four games so far this season, in which Jonas has played 3/4 games. I'm assuming that he has remained at the same level of 'shitness' as last season. The attacking players in our starting XI for this season are very different compared to the attacking players in our starting XI from last season. In fact, they are significantly worse. Cabaye is probably going to be better than Nolan, but Obertan is worse than Barton, R. Taylor is worse than Enrique, Best/Lovenkrands/Ba are worse than Carroll, and Simpson is the same. Now, moron, do you think it is Jonas who is responsible for our weaker attack this season, or the fact that we sold our good attacking players? I would start HBA over Jonas, but until he's back, Jonas has to remain in the team because he is a vital part of our attack, no matter what someone as hopelessly contrary, obsessed and totally wrong as yourself thinks. EDIT: Two smileys in a one-line post, too. I think you fancy yourself as some kind of airy, dismissive expert who is able to dismiss plebs like me with a witty quip. Laughable.

Ohhhh, so the reason the strikers can't score is because Jonas is shit, not because we've sold all our good goalscorers and the players who were providing for them. Yes, it's all clear now. Makes total sense. But wait...wasn't Jonas starting every game last season, when we scored more goals than we had in any of our PL seasons since 03/04? Hmm, guess it doesn't add up after all. The reason we aren't scoring is because we don't have goalscoring players (because we sold them all and replaced them with garbage when we bothered to replace them at all), not because of Jonas's deficiencies.

CT knows nothing about football and has a bit of a vendetta against Jonas, so feel free to disregard whatever gobbledygook he spouts on this topic. This is the moron who thought LuaLua would displace Jonas by the start of this season, after all. Marveaux should be playing when he's fit, I totally agree. He should be on the left and Jonas should be on the right.

Muntari was abysmal for Sunderland but excellent for Pompey 2-3 seasons back. Still not interested. Santon coming here is a very exciting idea, I have to say, but I note that his agent is the one talking up this move: See that bit about him being linked with Roma? Could be the usual agent bullshit to get Roma to up their offer.

Taxi for Arsene!

Stand by what I said about Obertan, he's just another Routledge, although I will give him credit for tracking back and defending. Maybe he does need a bit of a run in the team to gain some confidence, but all I see is headless chicken running and temerity when faced with a defender atm. If we're letting players go for free, Smith should've been the first, and his contract should've been cancelled. Best was so awful against Scunthorpe that it just makes you wonder sometimes. He should be 5th choice at best, behind the two new strikers we aren't going to buy, Ba and Shola. He'll have to do for 3rd choice at the moment though.

Also, Obertan did little to nothing throughout the game, and I hope Marveaux is being readied for time in the first team, because Obertan is just another Routledge. I don't know how many times he received the ball in space and was afraid to take on his man or put in a cross, then turned away and passed back or lost the ball. Not good enough tbh, invisible for most of the game, as he was against Sunderland.