acrossthepond

I really hope we don't go back in for him. He's a good player and better than Jonas, for example, but he's moody as hell, caused problems during his first stint here, would probably cost an arm and a leg as Wigan's best player (and we all know how Dave Whelan gets on with Fat Mike) and generally is not worth it.

He's shit but his attacking headers are nothing to be sneezed at. I was ready to say ship him out, but we may as well keep. He won't be on mega money, probably at the same level as Williamson, good squad player to have.

Less than 10m net, I would say. We will buy this summer - even Ashley knows he'll never get away with spending nothing this time, what with the Carroll windfall - but it will be poorly spent and in positions not needed. And yes, I'm a humongous pessimist, we're going to get walloped 8-0 on Sunday, we'll go down dead last next season and we'll sell everyone until Sammy Ameobi and James Tavernier are our only senior players left.

The clause didn't start with 'when'. 'When' is the conjunction. 'We already know that Pardew would win hands down' is an independent clause and can't be joined to the previous clause with a comma whether or not you include 'when.' I still don't see the point in working it out to the pound when we already know that Pardew would win hands down. Both of the red clauses are independent. 'When' can join them, but a comma cannot. That's a comma splice. I wonder if this is just more of your trolling or if you genuinely don't know grammar but think you do. (What may be pedantry to you is the stuff of life and death to my students, Chez. I am infamous for the brutal strokes of red that cut a swath through the hazy constructions and usage of passive voice that they offer me, hoping I will 'go easy' this time because their English teachers don't even cover grammar any more. )

TN man, we have seen what happens in the summer, and in January, and in summer and January and summer and January and on and on and on. I just don't understand what signs you think there are that indicate that this summer is going to be any different. I've never understood it. I like to think that I'm not a doom and gloom type as far as NUFC is concerned. I don't think we're doomed to failure next season. But I have absolutely no faith in the fat wanker who owns us and holds the purse strings and I have no faith in the puppet who picks the team either, and with that unholy combination I just don't see how we will press on from the position we attained this year. We do have a solid foundation. It's the other two that are the problem. I don't believe that we will spend any substantive amount of money, and that's not based on my being 'miserable', but on the evidence of all the past transfer windows. I believe we are more likely to see parts of the 'solid foundation' sold off than to see upgrades brought in. And I do believe we can attract quality players - Fulham, Birmingham, WBA, even West Ham brought in decent players and they're in similar situations to us. But I don't think that we fork out the required amounts to attract quality, and that we will continue to gamble on unproven players for low fees and wages and to hope that some of them come good. When enough of our new recruits do turn out to be decent, we will attain moderate success, as we did this season. When it doesn't happen, we will flounder. We gambled on our Premier League status in '09 and lost, and we gambled again this January. We won this time. What's to say we'll win next time Fat Mike or whichever of his cronies actually makes the decisions thinks we're safe/good enough? If all of that makes me miserable or my outlook on NUFC shitty, so be it. I want to believe we will succeed, as opposed to some who I genuinely believe are pleased that we are unlikely to, as it vindicates their beliefs. But I see no evidence to indicate that we will push on from here, and plenty of evidence that indicates we may regress.

And most importantly...wait for it...he wanted to leave us because we were always playing him at LB! Why would he ever come back here to play LB for us again? It boggles the mind what these morons will come up with. It's fair enough wanting to be optimistic about our club, God knows we could use some optimism (you know, like the optimistic feeling most of us on here had around November before we sacked our best manager in 6-7 years and sold our best striker without replacing him) but fuck me, you've got to have absolutely no sense of pattern recognition not to see what's going on here. See you on September 2nd. Watch your mouth you little bitch. You're a moron who thinks FM is reality, your posts are cringeworthy, and you're an embarrassment. Up to this point, I've not joined in with the group of people who always have a go at you for your idiotic predictions and constant berating of people who are 'overly pessimistic' (i.e. they live in the real world whereas you live in cloud cuckoo land) because I felt sorry for you, but your increasing arrogance (as though there's anything to be arrogant about when you're predicting we'll sign or even go after Huntelaar, Derdiyok and van der Wiel) is really not attractive or endearing.

You really have to work on your comma use, mate. It's driving me crazy. Look, two independent clauses (that is, parts of a sentence that could grammatically stand on their own) cannot be joined by a comma. A comma is used to join a dependent clause to an independent clause if the def. comes first. For two independent clauses, you have to use conjunctions or a semicolon. Considering we already know that Pardew would win hands down, I don't see the point in working it out to the pound. OR I still don't see the point in working it out to the pound when we already know that Pardew would win hands down. OR I still don't see the point in working it out to the pound; we already know that Pardew would win hands down. The content of your posts is bad enough without having to look at those awful superfluous commas staring out at me like tiny wisdom teeth and tearing into my cerebral cortex. Sort it out.

And most importantly...wait for it...he wanted to leave us because we were always playing him at LB! Why would he ever come back here to play LB for us again? It boggles the mind what these morons will come up with. It's fair enough wanting to be optimistic about our club, God knows we could use some optimism (you know, like the optimistic feeling most of us on here had around November before we sacked our best manager in 6-7 years and sold our best striker without replacing him) but fuck me, you've got to have absolutely no sense of pattern recognition not to see what's going on here. See you on September 2nd.

He looked raw as hell too (as should be expected for his first appearance), but if he can keep the enthusiasm he might develop into a player, unlike his brother who has always lacked the proper attitude. Very pleased with that result and performance. Obviously it was a howler from Krul but I'm not ready to give up on him yet.

I thought we were quite good, all things considered. Jonas and Ferguson both excelling. I like Jonas in the sort of floating forward-ish role he's playing at the moment. Defence is looking shaky however, Torres looks feeble but Anelka always scores against us and he worries me. Put Ranger on for Lovenkrands, Ranger is shit but he truly cannot be worse than Lov was in the first half.

Its not an alias of Leazes but it is an alias That's a deep alias, September '05. Long time to cultivate a fake account just to pull it out for some Leazes-baiting. Some people.

FYP. Nick-Kielce-Poland, Do you like coconuts? :icon_lol: :icon_lol:

This is Fat Mike's 4th year here, so the previous 6 seasons were under Shepherd. Let's say we do finish in the top 10 this season. That's 1 top ten finish (not even confirmed yet) in four seasons for Fat Mike and 4 top ten finishes out of 6 seasons for Shepherd. You do the maths on that one and let me know if you really think that's a 'fact' in Fat Mike's favour or not. EDIT: I see Leazes already beat me to that one.

Can't say he's not done a good job. Of course, it makes a huge difference when you're backed to the tune of 50m in January. Hate him and hate Liverpool, hope they crash and burn, but they won't.

...

Cringeworthy thread, but jonasjuice's patter is a little less shit than your average troll's so I give him the thumbs up. Seriously though mate, if your aim is to be a WUM, we've got enough of those.

That had to be some sort of dodgy deal, doing a 'favour' for a mate or some such. Old red nose has obviously dropped a few clangers in his time but most of them at least came well recommended - this lad wasn't even pulling up trees in Portugal's third division! Makes no sense.

If we then used the money we'd got off of selling the first four for profit to buy superior players in those positions, yes. And I would be too. But that's where it all falls down. That simply is not going to happen. We've now sold Carroll for a 35m profit. Are we going to buy a superior striker to Carroll with that money? Probably not. Are we now going to buy a good striker with that money and use the remainder to improve other problem areas of the team, like CB, fullbacks and wide players - let's say Demba Ba 12m, Chris Samba 10m, Phil Jones 8m, SWP 5m (and I'm just picking names out of a hat here without regard for realism/wages/whatever)? That would be brilliant and - if you ask me - the best possible use of the Carroll money, although we need more than one good striker to come in. But is any of this going to happen? No, and I think we all know it will not. We'll be linked with endless players, we'll make some derisory bids, some good players will go and we'll sign some dross on free transfers/bargain basement deals and then we'll have a late flurry of activity leading to another deadline day where we sign no-one. During this entire process, we'll sign some unproven players from foreign leagues. One may come good, a couple will be decent, the rest will be crap. And at the end of the day, our net spend will be under 15m, probably even under 10m.

I confess, I'm disappointed. I was really looking forward to seeing him get a run-out. Still, he'll undoubtedly be better off with the benefit of a restful summer and a full preseason.

It's easy when you are utterly incapable of recognising patterns.

That's so shit man. Ben Arfa looks like his leg is killing him.

I reckon Muhammad might disagree like. Muhammed he's just a plastic muslim. Good clip of him on youtube of him at Eldon Rec though from 1977. Not that Muhammad. Ah the other Mohammed, the one who's got about as much chance of being real Moses has of sailing Noah's Arc up the Tyne with Shergar stood proudly at the front of the deck. Genghis Khan wasn't a Muslim and there's absolutely no historical doubt that the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) existed. Thousands of accounts of his life exist, documented both by his allies and the people he converted and by his enemies among the nonbelievers of Mecca. I honestly think that there will be little to no backlash in Muslim countries that are not already pits of terrorism (Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan.) Bin Laden was not loved in the Arab world, especially not in his homeland, and I don't think there's anyone who's not already an Islamist/terrorist who will be suddenly moved to embrace extremism because of the death of a lunatic who brought a bad name to Islam and Muslims in general.

Muslims across the world are going to go scatty at this one. Killing the bloke is one thing but they should have let them decide what to do with his body. We bury within 24 hours as Craig said. The idea of 'burying him at sea' was so that none of his mates could set up his grave as a saintly shrine. I don't know how to feel about the news. Obviously pleased that he is dead - those who take the sword should die by it - but I am bemused at the timing and at the way it was presented as a fait accompli. I think more proof should have been given (I believe this news, I don't want anyone to misunderstand me here - but there will be many who will not believe it, and the proof should have been more comprehensive.) As far as treating the body goes, it can be dumped in a river, flown out to space or chopped up and fed to pigs for all I care. A man who did not live as a Muslim, no matter what he claimed to be, should not be buried as one.

Quote me then you disgusting little yank fuck, or fucking button it. If Blackpool stay up, are Brett Ormerod, Ian Evatt, Chris Basham and Keith Southern Premier League players? Did you ever stop to think that the reason we're staying up isn't because of bargain basement players like Mike Williamson, but because they've largely been carried by the members of our squad who actually are PL quality? For every Smith there's been a Tiote, for every Williamson there's been a Colo, for every Lovenkrands there's been a Carroll...oops, no, Best? Shola? Looking awfully light in that department. Liverpool's recent form since they backed their new and capable manager with cash to buy quality players - brilliant. Ours since we lost our best striker without replacement? Increasingly poor. I wonder if there's a connection. Now, you utter, utter wanker, can you make any prediction as to which way you suppose our transfer dealings will proceed from this point onward - that Premier League quality players will be bought to complement the Tiotes, Coloccinis, and Bartons, or that Premier League quality players will be sold and replaced (if at all) with more Williamsons, Perches, R. Taylors, and Lovenkrands?

But still borderline headcases like ASM in his new guise of 'angrysockmonster', Nick, Qwertyo, et al are lining up to tell us that the squad's fine and doesn't need investment, and in fact having the lowest net spend in the last 5 seasons (a period of time that just happens to coincide with the period of time during which we've been the most shit we've been in 20 years) is actually a POSITIVE thing, and signing quality players just turns the team into a vehicle for the new players instead of improving the squad, so we don't need to do that either. It's all OK, Williamson is a Premier League player because we stayed in the Premier League this season. QE-fucking-D.