Optimistic Nut

No matter how hard they tried, looks like the stewards finally couldn't stop the Sunderland fans getting to Keane in the dugout.

What harm could it have done Shearer? He gets to work for 6-months with the squad, gets to see what they're like in training, who's good, who's not, without the pressure of being the main man, and still gets to spend his Saturday nights on the sofa with Lineker & Hansen. Then come June when Kinnear's contract is up, he's in an easy position to make a smooth transition into our manager. He didn't spend however many years getting his management qualifications to do punditry for too long surely? Think he's missed a trick tbh.

That's where I feel a bit sorry for him. He was thrown into it because Martins & Viduka were injured and Ameobi was out of favour and it was the first game after the Keegan thing. To his credit he got himself a goal.

agreed. Yep.

Exactly how it should be, it's like letting a mugger come to your birthday party. Have we learned nowt from that Hull game?

Hull are probably thinking exactly the same thing. It's got Wigan in the Carling Cup from when Souness was in charge written all over it.

Tell you what mate, you couldnt have picked a more apt nickname!!! Seriously though, it's only 5 points between us and Bolton in 7th, if someone had said in July that come December we'd be within a couple of wins behind an Intertoto Cup spot, I think we'd have taken it. I agree its a small gap but cant see anything in our set up that makes me think it will happen. I agree to an extent, although the only two teams in the pack I can honestly say will be more consistent than us between now & May are Man City & Spurs. 8th at the very least is there for the taking. Top-ten certainly isn't out of reach.

The Blyth match would be surreal. The vast majority of Blyth fans are probably Newcastle fans first, so would be an interesting away section that day.

Tell you what mate, you couldnt have picked a more apt nickname!!! Seriously though, it's only 5 points between us and Bolton in 7th, if someone had said in July that come December we'd be within a couple of wins behind an Intertoto Cup spot, I think we'd have taken it.

I reckon Xisco & Enrique will go out on loan to La Liga sides, we'll sign a left-back on loan.

Schweinsteiger was meant to be coming in to replace Milner for about £6m. If Wise or whoever thought we were going to get Schweinsteiger for £6m then he was having a laugh. Would cost at least double that imo.

Surely Bolton & Fulham have shown the last few weeks why we can't rule out the top 10 just yet?

I know its like how we all wrote off Luque after one season and look at him now A bit of a difference between writing someone off after a season, and after about 200 minutes football in a team which was in turmoil.

While it is harsh and he's come into a poor team etc. he doesn't look too cut out for the PL imo. Happy to be proven wrong though. Unfortunately for Xisco, he'll never get a run of games this season. When Viduka's fit, he'll always first-choice if Kinnear wants a target-man, and if he's not, then he's hardly going to drop Martins & Owen for him. I definitely think there's a player in there though. Can see him being another Tomasson.

Are people seriously writing off Xisco already? F*ck me, imagine if Arsenal had written off Adebayor this quickly, or Chelsea had dumepd Drogba after his slow first season, etc.

Someone on N-O made a very good point that by giving him a contract until June, it stops him from leaving us in the lurch short-term. He's been strongly linked with Charlton this week, so imagine how much worse things could have been had he got fed up with the uncertainty of going month-to-month and went with the long-term deal closer to home? At least this way we don't have to go back to having Hughton & Money looking after things on their own.

I think with the players we've got he'll get us comfortably into a lower mid-table spot, which is in-keeping with the last 4 years really.

Hopefully it means CNZ back in, but I wouldn't be surprised if he puts Geremi on the right and Jonas on the left.

http://stats.football365.com/dom/ENG/PR/october.html http://stats.football365.com/dom/ENG/PR/november.html So 10th best team in both October & November.

As long as the team is getting positive results then i'm not too fussed These positive results you speak of have us in the relegation zone 4 defeats in 6 before he came in, 2 defeats in 8 since he took over.

Or it could see the likes of Ramage replaced by Bassong, Milner replaced by Jonas, Faye replaced by Coloccini...

True, although realistically they probably wouldn't get that much further in the UEFA Cup either. I'd love to see them scrape through and draw Man Utd in the next round.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=34155511913 Started this group on Facebook a few weeks ago...today I had someone off the list add me on their friends' list...none other than Temuri Ketsbaia's wife.

Let's be honest now, Roeder's idea of scouting was flying out to Rotterdam once a week...something he's probably still doing now with Norwich to have a look at that lad Kuyt.

In a nutshell, I reckon... - Kinnear will stay, or at least be given a contract, until June. - Enrique & Xisco will go out on Loan to La Liga sides. - We'll sign a left-back on a permanent contract. - Owen will wait until the summer, seeing who takes over and also who becomes manager, before deciding whether he's staying or going. - Club will be sold in April.