Papa Lazaru

FYP

Its great that nobody can really say what our XI would be for certain! And knowing Big Sam it will change depending on home or away, depending on the opposition and will change within games if he's not happy or say wants to close a game out.

I bet he's ready to seriously hit the bottle now that he's out on his arse, not that i'm for a moment suggesting he'd be prone to doing such a thing!

I'm really hoping we take full advantage of this (hopefully) one season out of europe. Whilst the likes of Spurs get tired out by a load of extra fictures, pick up more knocks and injuries and have a fixture backlog, we can have a rest, keep people at peak fitness and be at 100% for ever league game. To take the step up to the next level we need to be back in europe, but this one season out could really be a good thing, just s it was once before under Bobby.

That bit there instills me with so much hope and confidence in the bloke. Nothing is left to chance. I know you can't quantify for every little detail in football, but this sort of planning is such a breath of fresh air. Everything is planned under Big Sam! And lets be honest, all things going well, all those players are capable of scoring more than there set targets there, yes even Shola!

Great stuff from Big Sam as ever and good to hear that 1 or 2 more players are likely to arrive before the end of the transfer window. But one of the most important parts, and i agree totally with him is the problem the fans have become at home which has become pretty destructive. The completely shite, negative and at times just unpleasant atmosphere at St. James directed to the team and individual players made it a place most of them didn't want to play and as Sam says, they would likely want to avoid gettign the ball and if they did would'nt maybe do much with it. Of course the players and certainly the two managers can take their share of the blame, but if the fans got behind them like they used to instead of booing everything, whigning and targetting certain players for abuse it would really help out Allardyce with what he's trying to achieve. Unfortunately to a large number of fans abusing players and letting everyone know how angry they are has become far more important that backing the team for 90 mins.

Anal Oliver will be gutted if he does the business this season, and will still no doubt be insisting that we're selling him to raise money!

Another great thing is we won that game 3-1 away from home, without Owen, Given, Barton and the two new defenders we've bought!!!

Whilst it was great to see us 3-0 up and playing well, it was perhaps more important what happened in the 2nd half. Yes they scored past us, but that was an excellent bit of play by Anelka, but other than that we fought, battled and kept them out and we started to kill the game, spoil it, slow everything down and generally do what needs to be done in these situations. And shock, horror, a toon manager actually used subs properly and tactically when they were needed, instead of sitting on the bench doing fuck all! He made changes to help us defensively and brough more height on in case they bombarded us near te end which was the right thing to do. As people have said its only one game, but the way we've gone about things as a club since Mort and Big Sam were settled in is in direct contrast to Fat Fred and Roeder et al.

Indeed, if his club were whiter than white then he can have an opinion, but since they aren't he can piss off and get back to looking for the one ring!

Since the club value Dyer at £8m that would be about right, as selling Nobby for less than £2m and having to replace him would be daft! Not that its happening anyway! Replacing Nobby now wouldn't be that hard. He's nowhere near the player he was a couple of years ago. To find another Solano from his best years would be impossible though. I'd certainly take £10m for the pair of them tbh. I know what you're saying, but i'd like to see him have a season here under Big Sam and he does provide something a bit different to the rest of our midfielders even if he isn't at his peak. His game was never really about pace at his best, and he's an incredibly intelligent player who should have plenty of runners and hard working players around him under Sam. In the friendlies against Celtic and Juve you could see that his vision and reading of the game is still second to none. He is most times aware where players are or running to and is able to pick them out. We now have enough grafters in the squad, getting rid of maybe the last bit of brilliance and aesthetics would be criminal imho. I agree, he could play a very important part this season imo, and if he stays the same goes for Dyer as like Nobby he offers something different to the other midfield options we have.

You've clearly not had much to do with their fans then. They both think they have a devine right to be in the Premiership. Neither can accept that teams in their division can beat them. I'd love to see both of them (and Leeds) drop down to League 2 (which I guess Leeds are nearly there anyway). I've never believed in this "right" of certain clubs to belong in the prem, its a load of bollocks, you deserve to be in the division you're in. Leeds have no more right to be in the prem than say MK Dons if they could manage it! And the same applies to the toon as well, we deserve to be in the prem as long as we do well enough and aren't relegated.

Since the club value Dyer at £8m that would be about right, as selling Nobby for less than £2m and having to replace him would be daft! Not that its happening anyway! Replacing Nobby now wouldn't be that hard. He's nowhere near the player he was a couple of years ago. To find another Solano from his best years would be impossible though. I'd certainly take £10m for the pair of them tbh. I know what you're saying, but i'd like to see him have a season here under Big Sam and he does provide something a bit different to the rest of our midfielders even if he isn't at his peak. His game was never really about pace at his best, and he's an incredibly intelligent player who should have plenty of runners and hard working players around him under Sam.

If as you say the other guy punched him first (a late tackle is part of the football and not the resulting fight) then despite the fact he's went to town on the guy in retaliation above and beyond what people would accept, i'm sure he'll get away without a custodial sentence.

Since the club value Dyer at £8m that would be about right, as selling Nobby for less than £2m and having to replace him would be daft! Not that its happening anyway!

Exactly, aside from the fact the 2 clubs won't be doing a deal as its bollocks, Nobby loves it here, is happy and couldn't wait to get back here from Villa when given the chance. He will play less games for us now, thats inevitable, but he'll be involved and has that class and vision as you say, which combined with Big Sam's ability to get the best out of older players will see him make a more than usefull contribution for us this season.

I don't think its the case for a minute, but i'd love it if somebody at the club was deliberately feeding Anal a load of shit to regularly humiliate him! As for the story itself, what a sack of shit. The hammers have pissed us off, and vice versa so hey, lets do another deal straight away with each other! Big Sam has a small squad still and won't be looking to shift another player out on top of Dyer still havign a chance of leaving, and especially not one who won't bring in a big fee.

That was always going to be the outcome, they broke the rules and got done for it and on appeal they had no chance. Every club in their divison was likely to vote against them as it means there's a good chance they get relegated meaning you're less likely to, or if you thought they were in with a chance of promotion then they aren't likely to now!

Since Anal Oliver and the chronicle have more than once said it was 4.2m i am going to stick my neck out and say it is definitely 6.3m without question!

Not sure of the score but i quite fancy a win as well with Viduka and Smith likely amongs the goals. I'm going to go with a 2-1 win!

I hope that say by halfway through the season, when Big Sam's backroom team and new methods have had time to bed in and the players are reaping the benefits, we will see a big reduction in the injuries you can avoid and also we'll see a big difference in the fitess of players over 90 mins. The worry with Given is that he's had a lot of trouble with groin injuries since the serious injury last season and that needs sorting, and Owen has played so little football for a year now that he's at risk of picking up more minor injuries.

I am really looking forward to seeing Enrique playing for us, hopefully the first genuine class LB in many a year. The fact that he's big, likes to get stuck in and enjoys the physical side of things suggests he'll have a very good chance of settling into the prem which has been a problem for many spanish players. As for who Sam will play at LB against Bolton, you'd guess he'd go with Ramage for height to counteract what Bolton would be expected to do, but there's been a few times i've read that Sammy Lee will be doing things a bit differently and playing a different way and so maybey they won't be as likely to hit high balls against our LB, so he could just as likely go with Zog if he feels happy with him in a LB role. Be interesting to see what happens with Dyer, and perosnally if Sam and his team think Dyer is right mentally i'd use him as his pace on the break in tough away games either starting or from the bench can be very useful.

I have a feeling that they've gone back to get him after seeing a sense of frustration amongst the fans about the lack of quality signed. In a sense a Shepherd type "keep them happy" type signing As I said I know they wanted him earlier but I think if they had got Nugent and Baines for example then they wouldn't have upped their bid. Either way they've shown they will actually spend some money this time round. The thing their fans forget is the state their squad would have been in on getting promoted compared to established prem teams, and they have also signed alot of unproven players who will be a gamble in the prem.

I know nothing about Gordon, just like most of the mackems despite what they'll claim (he's already world class and better than Given on a thread over on SMB) so i don't know how good he is. But there's no way a keeper would be going for this sort of money unless he's a top player imo and its the first time the mackems have shown any real ambition in my lifetime. He's not going to turn them into a top team or anything by himself but as they keep saying it is a show on intent and its not what they've done in the past when promoted. They'll still be finishing behind us in the prem though, and really that's allmost of their lot care about!

You've accurately described it! Impressive special effects and action, good sense of humour about it i thought, which was required to balance out the lack of plot and some really duff lines of dialogue in the script! Good mindless fun, soon forgotten but enjoyable for me.