Papa Lazaru

That could be an awsome pairing, especially as Ben Arfa would also have the freedom to drop back a bit and create as well as being off Carroll's shoulder, but we've never had the chance to see thanks to fucking De jong. I honestly think Ben Arfa would have got us 2 or 3 more wins at home because he was made for those games, the ones where we're not in good form or struglling to break down stubborn negative teams, he would provide that moment of magic, or just do something to lift the crowd and his team and get us going.

I guessed Strauss would follow Cook, he does have a tendency to get out quick the following morning after he's done well, but the aussies have bowled well this morning. Trott and KP just settling it down now though.

I couldn't believe that either.Sign of things to come tbh! Had to be Nolan off as he was way off the pace today, but i said it would be Routledge before it happened, it was predictable, though to be fair its what Hughton would likely have done too and possibly not as early!

Thanks to buses i arrived after the frist 20 mins, but from what i saw, we did ok but you can't give a top 4 team a 2 goal head start, you can't really give shit teams that. From there we were the better team and first half particularly the ref was in full give them everything mode, and our final ball wasn't quite there. Jonas was poor again and Nolan was absolutely miles off it, he wasn't ready for any passes, and didn't do anything in the box when chances came to him. Rest of them didn't do badly to be fair. And then when we get back into it at 2-1, we're completely on top of them and as usual they didn't want to know because they're just 11 mercenaries who barely give a toss at times, rather than a team like the manus and chelsea's etc. and we could easilyl have gone on to get soemthing, but they get a spawny defelection and its game over. But the real difference was Tevez, without him they did fuck all, but he was excellent and we didn't mark him well enough.

98 all out, well worth staying up for!

How annoying is that, we've got Hussy, fired up to get at them and the bloody rain comes down!

Get the fuck in, Hussy out!!!

You just know Hussy will be out plum LBW and the umpire won't give it! If we can get Hussy we can skittle this team out, he holds them together everytime theyre in the shit and Haddin usually helps, but that's it.

Wasted our final review because it was Hussy, it was always too high

Got your wish, Ponting out, failed again!

2 dropped catches and a missed runout isn't like England, we need to get it tightened up back to the usual standard as you can't waste early chances to get on top.

Finally a catch taken! Tremlett getting the wicket whilst Anderson has them dropped, he'll be annoyed they couldn't do that for him!

Fucks sake, now Pietersen drops one and might have knacked his finger!

Shit, Collingwood drops a catch first over, could have been a great start

Off we go again, England gambling with Bresnan in for Finn and choosing to bowl first. Finn's been expensive but he's the leading wicket taker for either side, they must think he's tiring and needs a match out.

The fact that he says "one of the big clubs in the world" lets him off i'd say, that means the very biggest and he's talking about the Barcas and Madrids of the world and why shouldn't any player want to be there ahead of NUFC unless they're a geordie. And as he's said many times, he is always honest if nothing else, rather than some players who'll come out with all the platitudes and kiss the badge etc then fuck off to any club that comes along offering a bit of cash.

I'm not too bad a footballer (or wasn't) but i don't think my thread needs to be in the football section on here!

Pretty much my thoughts, you can't do better than the mackem game, cracking goal by Ben Arfa, and the ref against man city wanted shooting. For most improved player i'm not sure as i've always rated Carroll and was just waiting to see how well he stepped up a level, so i'll probably go Barton. Again i've always said Barton had the ability we just hadn't seen it through injury, suspensions and jail, but i'd still give him most improved as he's gone from nonentity here to linchpin of the team and how we play. Most disappointing player would be Perch as he is a car crash of a footballer, but i wasn't expecting anything so he's not the biggest disappointment, whereas i though Routledge could do a really good job for us in the prem but so far he's struggled really badly.

He is going to have a massive dong in a few days. Reminds me of the old 'Jeremy Beadle has a massive cock, but then on the other hand it isn't very big'. The wanking claw! That and i heard somebody use, "I'm sweating like Jeremy Beadle in a glove shop!" once as a variation on the usual expressions for that!

Whats 4 inches long and goes in one direction? Louis Walsh's cock

Reading an article from ne of the aussie papers i think, and agree with them that Bell has to be moved up the order. He has immense ability and is in such great touch that he's wasted at six if he might run out of partners. Meanwhile Collingwood is struggling but specialises in rearguard actions and fighting it out, so at 6 he wouldn't be out of place at all. I'd move Bell to 5, they were saying maybe even 4, but he should certainly be higher than 6, especially if Johnson has woken up and is going to be a threat, because Bell managed him better than most.

Disappointing as you don't expect that with this England team, thought they'd cut out disasters like that. Fair play to Johnson for a day like that, but we've chucked it away there. I wasn't expecting another 500+ for 1 or 2 wickets but i thought, particularly with the openers in control that we could get a decent first innings lead of 100-150, something like that. Going to be tough now to avoid defeat as we're batting last and Johnson will be fired up, we really have to get them out for as little as possible tomorrow and with Watson/Hussy still in, Haddin to come and the lower order confident from first innings that won't be easy. What's really annoying is we've given them such a lift and brought them back from the dead when they were about to be out of it completely, but one thign about this England team is if they have a bad result they come back strongly the next game, so if it does go wrong this time, you know they'll respond.

Aussie fielding just keeps getting better! Instead of just dropping catches now have two of them leaving it for each other! Strauss got very lucky though, needs to cut out the early errors he's making every now and then.

To be fair i'm off work for the whole of this test, so may even go all the way through to 9:30 or whatever it is if i can! When i've been at work the morning after the best i managed was about 4:30 i think, not advisable!

It is a great start, but still disappointing because of how we had them when 5 wickets were down and we could have really skittled them out, but far play they fought back and England have ended the day well on top. Managed to stay up till about 7:30 but couldn't make it till the end! Even when we've got their top order completely on their knees they still manage to find a couple of partnerships to prevent an outright collapse and make a game of it and that deserves respect tbh. As Alex has said you can never write them off and that's just one reason why. I just hope our attitude remains confident (as we are the superior team) but never gets complacent, because that's the only way they'll do us. Definitley the case that they won't just roll over and give in like you say. We had them completely done basically, but they managed to fight back enough to get a score that whilst not good enough, does give you something to work with. But i agree that as long as we are confident, we are superior and will have more than enough to beat them, but crucial that the top 3 between them get us off to another big start as they have done before. I think the first two tests have provided the perfect lessons for us in that when we are firing at our best we are comfortably better than them and if we believe in ourselves we'll win, but when we aren't at our best and slip up as in our first innings/their first innings (first test) they will be ready to pounce. Just really good to see an England team that finally is better than the aussies and knows it, they're not arrogant but you can see they're super confident. Long way to go yet though!