#BoycottMikeAshley

[essembeeofsunderland 811]

Because of the parachute payments,Ashley would accept another relegation and if we failed to bounce back at the first attempt,he would sell any half decent players to claw his money back.

[Monkeys Fist 38815]

We should start following Mike's helicopter closely right until he gets home then just drive off.

[JawD 31]

And you wonder why you get ridiculed daily on here?

 

An injury to Remy and our 3 remaining strikers managed 13 goals between them last season. Have a look at last seasons table and see how many goals you needed to score to stay up.

 

Ben Arfa can't score screamers every game. In fact we are lucky if he does it every 6 or 7 games. We are fucked

 

Exactly. Look at last season.

 

Perch played 21 games (excluding Europe) that someone else needs to fill in now.

Danny Simpson 18

Ben Arfa played half of the season due to injury and you can expect he will be out at some point this also.

Cisse last season scored pretty much 1 in 3 which as your main forward isnt great.

Ba scored 13 and we have to hope that Remy will replace those goals (I think he will tbf)

 

What happens though when Cisse or Remy are injured? Who steps up tot the plate?

 

The season that we finished top 5 Cabaye and Tiote were fucking immense in the centre. Now we arguably have more choice and stronger options and yet are struggling to find that same midfield that worked so well.

 

If Pardew can get the side ticking (tough with so much negativity around the place) then we could do ok but as soon as the injuries start to hit, and they will, we'll be severely weakened. But also, if he fails to get them to tick/gel like the end of last season, we're fucked. Its hardly a side that looks like it can roll up its sleeves when we need to dig in.

[trophyshy 6434]

You're forgetting Soupy, I think they're expecting him to play a part this year.

 

Whether he's up to it or not, just another lazy, cheap gamble.

[The Fish 9010]

A boycott solves absolutely nothing, Ashley already has the money and couldn't give less of a monkeys about how we view him.

 

We'd be better off putting our efforts into finding a new owner ourselves

[sweetleftpeg 0]

He already has my money, and the boycott would give the S***** D***** brand even more publicity, which is EXACTLY what he wants. In fact, this would play in to his hands and he'll be begging us to do it.

[trooper 940]

He's got the ST money he's got the shirt money thats ALL he's bothered about a half empty ground wouldn't bother him in the slightest.

[David Kelly 1117]

If he can keep us in the league making £30 million a year why the fuck would he sell us?

Well I doubt he'll be able to get £30m out a year for a start and without spending we'll eventually start bringing less and less so it's no longer worth his while. But ultimately I just don't believe he's at all interested. If he could leave tomorrow without losing a load of money I'm sure he would. But he can't so this is the way to claw his money back.

[David Kelly 1117]

Exactly. Look at last season.

 

Perch played 21 games (excluding Europe) that someone else needs to fill in now.

Danny Simpson 18

Ben Arfa played half of the season due to injury and you can expect he will be out at some point this also.

Cisse last season scored pretty much 1 in 3 which as your main forward isnt great.

Ba scored 13 and we have to hope that Remy will replace those goals (I think he will tbf)

 

What happens though when Cisse or Remy are injured? Who steps up tot the plate?

 

The season that we finished top 5 Cabaye and Tiote were fucking immense in the centre. Now we arguably have more choice and stronger options and yet are struggling to find that same midfield that worked so well.

 

If Pardew can get the side ticking (tough with so much negativity around the place) then we could do ok but as soon as the injuries start to hit, and they will, we'll be severely weakened. But also, if he fails to get them to tick/gel like the end of last season, we're fucked. Its hardly a side that looks like it can roll up its sleeves when we need to dig in.

Whilst I agree in general with the overall point you're making and certainly injuries to the likes of Cisse, Remy and HBA would be extremely hard to cover, some of your specific points don't really add up.

Perch played that many games before we had Sissoko, Mbiwa, Debuchy and Haidara. Without an injury list that was much worse than even last season, I really don't see that he would have played much at all.

Simpson played what two games after Debuchy arrived? He wouldn't have played this season.

Cisse's goal scoring was undoubtedly hampered by the amount of times he was played out of position to accomodate Ba. Had Ba not been here and he'd played as the main striker all season I think it's totally reasonable to think he would have scored a fair few more.

 

If you expect Remy to be on a par with Ba (admittedly that's a fairly big assumption) we definitely have a better squad than this time last year. As you say though, it's whether Pardew can get them to play and get their heads up with all of the negativity that's surrounding us now. A run of wins might be able to do that. Lets hope so because we've fucked up the oppertunity to give ourselves a lift by trying to build the team!

[Ayatollah Hermione 12767]

Bigirimana/Gosling will play the games that Perch would have done in CM but not signing another right back, even a young kid, is madness to me. If we wanted to get through with, even the bare minimum (though we managed with even less, amazingly), it should have been a RB and a striker coming in.

[luckyluke 1]

Well I doubt he'll be able to get £30m out a year for a start and without spending we'll eventually start bringing less and less so it's no longer worth his while. But ultimately I just don't believe he's at all interested. If he could leave tomorrow without losing a load of money I'm sure he would. But he can't so this is the way to claw his money back.

 

He certainly appears to enjoy owning us though.

[David Kelly 1117]

He certainly appears to enjoy owning us though.

You think? I've seen no evidence of that since what happened with Keegan.

[David Kelly 1117]

Bigirimana/Gosling will play the games that Perch would have done in CM but not signing another right back, even a young kid, is madness to me. If we wanted to get through with, even the bare minimum (though we managed with even less, amazingly), it should have been a RB and a striker coming in.

Santon (who now has cover from Haidara and Dummett), Saylor, Mbiwa and Anita can all play rightback at a level of at least as good as Simpson for me (and certainly better than Perch). I don't think rightback is a position we need to strengthen at all (unless you're jumping on the Debuchy not being good enough bandwagon because he's took a while to settle).

Strikers and both wings are where we look shockingly light to me.

[Dr Gloom 19837]

Santon (who now has cover from Haidara and Dummett), Saylor, Mbiwa and Anita can all play rightback at a level of at least as good as Simpson for me (and certainly better than Perch). I don't think rightback is a position we need to strengthen at all (unless you're jumping on the Debuchy not being good enough bandwagon because he's took a while to settle).

Strikers and both wings are where we look shockingly light to me.

not a lot of quality in the centre mid department either. a couple of injuries and we're looking at a pairing of anita and gosling

[The Fish 9010]

not a lot of quality in the centre mid department either. a couple of injuries and we're looking at a pairing of anita and gosling

 

 

I think we're all right in the centre as we've Cabaye, Sissoko, Tiote, Anita, Jonas, Vuckic & Gosling. Don't get me wrong, the drop in quality after the 1st 2 is sharp, but I think there are other positions that are worse off.

[David Kelly 1117]

not a lot of quality in the centre mid department either. a couple of injuries and we're looking at a pairing of anita and gosling

Cabaye, Tiote, Sissoko and Anita. How many can we have? The reality is that it would take three injuries before we'd really need to consider playing Gosling and Jonas is more likely to go in. There's no chance we could keep another centre midfielder happy here.

[Andrew 4226]

Depends if we're playing two or three in centre midfield.

 

If its two then we've enough, three and we're a little stretched IMO.

[PaddockLad 14626]

Cabaye, Tiote, Sissoko and Anita. How many can we have? The reality is that it would take three injuries before we'd really need to consider playing Gosling and Jonas is more likely to go in. There's no chance we could keep another centre midfielder happy here.

 

Is the correct answer, and it always has been this way. Don't really know what folks are getting at with this, the club is owned by Mike Ashley ffs. Every squad in every professional league in Britain could be stronger and there are a million reasons why they aren't, but the chief one is finance in one way or other.

 

We went to Bayer Leverkusen in the champions league with Shola and Lua Lua up front, they both scored and we won two nil. Not saying that sort of thing happens often nowadays but they were the only two strikers we had after Shearer and Bellamy. Where are they now I hear you cry?...well, according to wiki Lua's in Turkey...not sure what happened to the other bloke

[David Kelly 1117]

Depends if we're playing two or three in centre midfield.

 

If its two then we've enough, three and we're a little stretched IMO.

I'm not convinced Pardew wants to play that way anymore but even if he does we also have Marveaux to play as the furthest forward central midfielder (which for me is the only position he's worth playing in anyway). But if we do play that way and have injuries meaning that we're thin on the ground then we have to look at a different formation. Either way it's not practical to have more players for a position than we currently have for centre midfield. If we had three injuries at centreback we'd be down to Remi Streete or Curtis Good which is far from great. But how many more senior centrebacks could we expect to have. Even the top four wouldn't be able to go to more than that.

Mourinho says that 22 is the ideal squad to have, if you look at our 22, you have to get down to something like 18 before you start throwing in players like Sammy or Vuckic let alone Campbell or Good or Streete. When you look at it that way, our squad isn't nearly as weak as people make out. Of course the problem is that behind Cisse and Remy you have Shola or Goufrran, we don't really have anyone who we can be massively comfortable on the left wing and behind HBA we have Obertan!

[The Fish 9010]

I'm not convinced Pardew wants to play that way anymore but even if he does we also have Marveaux to play as the furthest forward central midfielder (which for me is the only position he's worth playing in anyway). But if we do play that way and have injuries meaning that we're thin on the ground then we have to look at a different formation. Either way it's not practical to have more players for a position than we currently have for centre midfield. If we had three injuries at centreback we'd be down to Remi Streete or Curtis Good which is far from great. But how many more senior centrebacks could we expect to have. Even the top four wouldn't be able to go to more than that.

Mourinho says that 22 is the ideal squad to have, if you look at our 22, you have to get down to something like 18 before you start throwing in players like Sammy or Vuckic let alone Campbell or Good or Streete. When you look at it that way, our squad isn't nearly as weak as people make out. Of course the problem is that behind Cisse and Remy you have Shola or Goufrran, we don't really have anyone who we can be massively comfortable on the left wing and behind HBA we have Obertan!

 

I think our forward line has a fair number of permutations. Remy, Gouffran, HBA, Marveaux can all play on both wings effectively. Gouffran, Remy, Cisse, and Shola can all play up front as part of a partnership or on their own (admittedly with varying degrees of efficacy).

[Tom 13881]

We should send him a strongly worded letter.

 

I might just do that.

 

What would you like to say?

[David Kelly 1117]

I think our forward line has a fair number of permutations. Remy, Gouffran, HBA, Marveaux can all play on both wings effectively. Gouffran, Remy, Cisse, and Shola can all play up front as part of a partnership or on their own (admittedly with varying degrees of efficacy).

I agree to an extent but I can't say I'm totally comfortable with any of them. If we play 4-4-2 then we really don't have a left winger (unless HBA plays there and then we're left to Obertan as being the only right winger). If we try again with the 4-3-3 (which I think we have players more suited to) then Pardew seems to have had trouble making it work. More often than not Cisse's being isolated. Hopefully introducing a fully fat (sorry fit) Ben Arfa and Remy into that mix can solve that problem but I'm not convinced Pardew has the ability to get them working right. Mind you it all looked good for ten minutes on Saturday when we had Cisse, Remy, Goufrran and HBA all attacking so maybe there's our hope there.

[Christmas Tree 3997]

Aye, it all boils don to Pardew no being a bit more courageous.

[Tom 13881]

Regarding boycotts - I don't really think this transfer window is worthy of one - not like the Hull game in the relegation year where the atmosphere was awful, lots of infighting and it was the perfect catalyst for us to get beat & for Guthrie's awful, awful red card.

 

If you don't like it, don't go but don't turn up and destabilize the team because you're doing more harm than good. At the end of the day the squad should be able to stay up as it is & whilst I don't want to spend money on them (apart from those two pints ) I'm not going to show up and cause bother as it'll only harm us in the long run.

 

When Keegan left and we massively kicked off we couldn't attract any manager of even basic qualities & ended up with Kinnear.

 

We shouldn't doom ourselves into repeating the past. If we can avoid throwing our face in the dirt - despite our frustrations - we should. There's not much we can do about the state of the squad now but damage it's confidence acting like dickheads.

 

Because lets face it - the January window could be worse...

[Tom 13881]

Aye, it all boils don to Pardew no being a bit more courageous.

 

Aye because football is a simple as that.

 

FML