David Kelly

To my mind, we've decided to replace Cabaye with Cabella and SDJ rather than like for like. I would have liked to see Grenier come in and provide a player a bit deeper who can do more with the ball. But I don't think it's a massive problem the way we've gone instead. I'm happy we've brought quality in who can score and create goals. We've so far failled to replace Remy though which is a big worry. I don't think Ashley gives a fuck about moving the club forward mind you, but a goal scorer will keep us up and with the other players we've signed, possibly allow us to have a good season. It's a massive risk gambling on Riviere (a player who has no massive scoring pedigree) and Cisse (a player who's touch in front of goal has deserted him so badly it appeared there was a very strong possibility we would have sold him had he not got injured) along with three young uns to score enough goals for us.

Raylor couldn't get a game on a regular basis for us in the championship. He covered leftback at the start of the season you're talking about and did ok for a while with Jonas helping him out a lot. Once he started to think he could actually do anything other than hold his position and defend he got crucified (the chelsea game being a perfect example). His set pieces are also generally much poorer than is remembered. People think of his goal against the tramps or the ones he scored against us for Wigan but the majority were actually pretty poor. He's (or at least he was, who knows what standard he will return at) a decent squad player but nothing more. Theres no way I'd think about starting him ahead of Santon or Haidara (who I think has the potential to be our best leftback by some distance). Dummet, well he's not even championship standard to yes I'd play Raylor ahead of him. With regards to SDJ, I'd never read that before, what I've read and seen of him suggests someone who plays off the striker but I haven't seen much of him so I'll not argue too much with you there. Gouffran's a striker who we've used as a wide attacker. Yes he works hard but that hardly makes him a central midfielder. Graft would be the only thing he has in his locker that you would want from a centre mid. I'm sorry but suggesting him in the centre of the park is either a wind up or lunacy.

Natalie Wood too.

You've got a championship rightback/right mid at left back, a striker and a number 10 as centre mid, and a centre mid as a right attacker. I can only assume you're on the wind up with that team CT.

With SDJ and Cabella that formation suits the players we have. Personally I'd rather see that than Pardew try to force a 4-4-2 when we clearly don't have the players for it. That said, I'm not convinced (purely from his record in France) that Reviere is going to score enough goals for us to keep us in the top half let alone actually try and progress from last season. I do expect more goals from further back, SDJ and Cabella should be much more likely to score but that's not really enough to compensate for not having a striker capable of scoring the goals that Ba/Remy can. Talk in one of the papers this moring is that we will look to bring in Campbell on loan from Arsenal since we can't find a good deal on the likes of Lacazette. While Campbell could be a useful addition, he's unproven in a decent league and if he was a success we wouldn't get to keep him. To me it would be yet more penny pinching and proof that Ashley will only ever sanction spending the money we get from selling players. Hopefully Celtic sell Forster if claims of a 25% sell on clause are correct. That might actually allow us to buy someone else.

My dad described him as clearly the worst player he'd ever seen in a manure shirt. I'd now describe him as the worst player i've ever seen in a Newcastle United shirt who's played more than 10 games (obviously to exclude the likes of Fumaca and Rob McDonald who clearly weren't really footballers at all).

Tomasson had a goal wrongly disallowed against Shef Wed too. If that had been allowed it could have been a very different story for him with us.

I actually still wouldn't mind going sometime so do tell us what it's like. I loved the day we had at the Ashes last year. We were going to go for a day at the Trent Bridge Test but after the winter we didn't bother. Given the shite wicket they put on I'm glad we missed it.

Aye, thinking about it that makes sense. With Kroos and Xavi Alonso/Modric behind.

It's well worth continuing with. There's an excellent bit in a diner with him, a prostitute and sir Davos. Not sure if you'll be past that bit yet or not. I'm looking forward to seeing his new one. Got great reviews but a couple of my mates went to see it and didn't think it was a good.

Was going to go to a game a few weeks ago. But the lass me mate was going to get us free tickets off couldn't get them any more and we didn't really fancy paying for it. I hope this helps.

One of the best films I've seen in the last couple of years. What a beautiful fucking day!

Ginger who can play leftback or centreback.

Di Maria sored 4 in 34 league games with 18 assists. James scored 9 in 34 league games is 11 assists. Pretty comparable record, you could argue James was in a poorer league, but you could argue that Di Maria was playing with much better players. Either way they seem to have based this signing on the back of an excellent world cup for James after Di Maria had probably his best season for Madrid when he finally became an important player for them. I've little doubt that he'll do well for them but I'm interested in how he will fit in with Ronaldo, Bale and Benzema.

I don't really see the benefit in us loaning players like that. If he's a success Arsenal won't sell him at the end of it, if he's not then we won't want him. And I couldn't really see him coming as a starter so he's not likely to make much of an impact when he is here.

Sissoko's more likely to be used wide right, Cabella wide left and De Jong behind the striker. Tiote, Anita & Colback is probably more like what we will see.

Second half has been understandably poor given the number of substitutions but I'm sure it's been a usefull run out. And regardless what anyone says about results not mattering in preseason games, it's got to be good for us to pick up some wins. Especially given how poorly we finished the season. Nice to see Armstrong score. He took it well after a decent ball by Campbell.

Watching this on me phone at work thanks to me mates BT password. We've looked pretty decent against obviously limited opposition. DeJong looks much stronger than his brother and technically very good. Took his goal well and was nicely involved in the build up to Riviere's. Aarons has looked promising. I'm waiting with baited breath to see if CT turns his questionable attentions from wor Shane to him now.

Cook and Prior are both looking like they need dropping now (Prior possibly for good as he doesn't look as fit behind the wickets now and in Butler there's a more obvious replacement). I'm not sure we'd be in any better state with Pietersen mind. He's done pretty much fuck all since being dropped and wasn't looking great in the test team before that. The whole of senior team let us down over this latest test though. Root, Ali, Ballance, Plunket have all looked like they're in pretty decent touch for at least part of it whereas Cook, Prior, Bell and even Broad and Anderson haven't really performed.

Was he? He only really played for us for a season and a half as a first team player. In the championship season he played 42 times and then in up to January the next season he played 20 times. I'm not sure that really suggests he was injured a good amount of the time. Not saying that means I'd go for him like.

Don't think he has yet. There's talk of them wanting to sign one but I've not seen anything about it actually happening.

Fucking hell horrendous news this. Think he was posting when I first joined the old board. 31 is far too young. Thoughts go out to his family and friends. Rip.

Borini clearly not as thick as he looks.

Another with a far from exciting strike rate. I'm concerned csd might be right with us penny pinching when it comes to strikers

That's my view like. Just employ the person who we can get who can do the best job. None of them are heroes or role models they're just people getting paid a disgusting amount of money to do a job. I've long since given up expecting anything more from them.