OTF

Commentator having a go at Enrique whinging about the free-kick called against him, saying he got nothing of the ball. Enrique wasn't saying he did, more that he got nothing of Walcott who dived. Small victories.

..and Leon Best off-side again.

Their defense is looking pretty ordinary. Something to aspire to for ours.

Great ball to unleash Jonas from Enrique, and not a bad cross from Jonas on the deck.

Best was only off-side by 10 yards then.. come on Linesmen give us a break...

4-0. Noone to blame for this, he was marking van Persie.

Good cross from Lovenkrands. Take note Jonas.

Leon Best man... just looked like he was about to take it to the corner to waste time. Next thing he commits a foul in the box to rid himself of his defender and with a free-header the attempt is closest to going in the moment before it hits his head.

The defender marking van Persie would have been to blame for their third, had there been one.

3-0

We've responded with a shot that was within 20 yards of going in. One for our highlight reel.

2-0 down

Joey Barton tackle = great through ball for Theo Walcott to run onto and slot away.

and we're 1-0 down

Lovelyhands is playing on the right of midfield

The sooner we see Ferguson play a full match in the league the sooner CT will shut up about him.

Difference is Ashley made his money buying low and selling higher and is trying the same approach with Newcastle United. Other mobs are still making metric fuck-tons of cash out of natural resources and the like where they can't go wrong. Their clubs are their playthings for bragging rights amongst the mega-rich. Ashley's relatively small time, but still wants to do things his own way. He'll end up stepping on too many toes and noone will be interested in dealing with him on a club level and no players will want to come here because we won't compete on wages, there's no real ambition and St James' is a 50,000 seater shop window.

They can stick their bullshit media leaks up their arses.

If Colo is any sort of doubt Pardew should err on the side of caution. Sol Campbell is available, might be well past it but it's better than risking Coloccini and potentially damaging his confidence by playing him in a whooping.

Pardew saying he's interested or hasn't been ruled out means nothing. Says that about everyone, just shows he has no idea about what the fat fuck and Dekka will do.

So true. It would take him being more than half decent for manure to come in and buy him for the 10m+ that Cashley would be holding out for.

Don't need to wait to see that.

Next few weeks our midfield needs to concentrate on keeping possession. There's no sense in sending the ball up to forwards who can't retain it or creat chances. Our midfield keeping it and working it more will take the pressure off the guys up front who aren't equipped or experienced enought to play against Premier League defenders. With that in mind one up front is fine with Nolan in midfield behind. I don't think Coloccini should be moved out of central defense, I don't like the idea of having noone at the back who can play the ball out/is decent on the ball in general. When Coloccini was suspended our defenders were just hoofing the ball up field. If our midfield can work hard enough at retaining possession chances will eventually open up, especially agains the likes of Arsenal who won't put 10 men behind the ball.

Best is shite and makes poor use of his effort.

Without Carroll there's no sense in hoying the ball upfield. Even with him it only really worked if he a good relationship with the person playing off him. With Ameobi now missing there's even less than no sense in the long balls. We're much better off working the ball around on the deck, looking for options through the middle, or getting it wide and trying to draw fouls, get corners or else get in decent crosses. We're occasionally dangerous from set-pieces (in the first half against Fulham Barton put in a good ball that their defender had to head clear), so we may be resigned to hoping to score off them.