OTF

If he's refusing to play I hope the club are refusing to pay.

Debuchy was better, but he showed again that he struggles against pace. He was frustrating with his crosses as well - seems he always whips the ball in as early as possible, but does so without checking to see whether there's anyone to get on the end of it.

He did a job of getting under Reid's skin a little, all for nothing. How off the pace did he look the couple of times he had the ball at the top of the box? With the players we have I'm wondering who could have started. Shocking that no matter how poor Cisse plays he's guaranteed to start.

Yes. Anita is a solid reliable option in the middle, I think he should be persisted with to build some consistency. Sissoko looked more dynamic alongside him.

Wonder if our leading striker being MIA for most of the pre-season has anything to do with how poor he's looking both in terms of match sharpness and cohesion.

You'd be excused for thinking we'd signed 6 or 7 new players the way out players looked like they'd never played together before.

Good cameos so far from both Sammy and Gouffran.

Which ineffectual striker will he take off for Sammy? Neither, it's Marveaux.

With a bench full of game changers it's a difficult decision Pardew is faced with...

Underwhelming.

As they would have anyone that the media makes a spectacle of.

Yes, though Neymar was priced more realistically than Bale. My point was that new players of sufficient shirt selling quality don't have to cost ridiculous amounts. I'm very interested to see how Bale does and how he fits in with the team - he should do exceptionally well seeing as many of the opposing teams in that league are weak.

Not as though they would have sold a lot less without Neymar. Glory hounds the world over will get Barca/Real Madrid shirts more or less regardless of who they buy. They'll still dominate the sales and their league with more realistically prices players.

Most definitely. The problem being that we now have some deficiencies in the squad that can't be made up for with good man management. To compound that there is a few indicators that suggest that Pardew has lost the confidence of the players, or at least the ability to unite them and have them working for each other on the pitch.

All said and done we generally have a grossly inflated perception of the quality of our players. Here' my take being critical. Tiote, had an excellent season playing a defined role, since then he's been extremely haphazard and generally poor. Cabaye is capable of the divine, but has a right attitude about him that can quickly see him lose his cool. Frequently goes missing. Ben Arfa is an exceptional talent, but hasn't really gelled with his team mates. Santon too frequently has suspect defensive positioning and can lack tenacity. As a fullback he's good at getting forward. Honestly speaking Debuchy has had a horrid start to his career here. It's too early to jut him as he has plainly not settled, but it appears he's not used to being constantly under the pump. Coloccini is an quality tackling defender who generally reads the game well and is technically excellent. Physically though he lacks presence. His set piece defending is erratic and he's poor against out and out pace. Steven Taylor is a clown. Jonas, for all the yards he covers lacks dynamism and flat out cannot effectively cross off his left foot. That's particularly troublesome as he generally plays down the left. Doesn't contribute enough to our attack, and his ability to bring the ball out of defense quickly has fast diminished over the last few seasons. Cisse is a supporting actor but we don't have a lead. His instinct is to shoot, so a lot of the hard work needs to be done before he gets the ball. Can score spectacular goals but frustratingly he is frequently offside for no apparent reason. Passing and general teamwork is poor. Krul is a great goal keeper, makes himself large when required, is athletic and generally commands his area. His kicking though is erratic, particularly when under even a modicum of pressure. Yanga-M'Biwa it's too early to make a judgement, but I'm a little worried about his ability to handle physical players. Sissoko had an amazing start to his time here but has sadly gone stale. Just how much of that is down to being played our of position remains to be seen. Gouffran is a versatile player, who is pretty good at most things, but not particularly great at anything. Still early days on the whole, but he does appear to be quite consistent. Marveaux has technical ability, but is defensively a liability. Even when he's out there for a full match he seems to come in and out of the game with much more out than in.

Bale for 93m is crazy money. Can't understand how he could be worth that much to Real Madrid. Seems even worse in the current climate of the Spanish economy. Great for Tottenham.

Started loosely following Newcastle United around 1994 when I would check the newspaper in the school library for the premier league results on a Monday (along with NBA results). The reasons behind choosing to follow Newcastle are two-fold, firstly I was drawn to the familiarity of the namesake Newcastle approximately 2 hours north of Sydney where I live, secondly they fit the bill for my requirements in that they were well placed on the table and weren't one of the popularly supported glory teams - primarily being Manchester United and Liverpool. Started watching games as much as possible at the turn of the millennium through to now - with the ability to watch just about every Newcastle game both a blessing an a curse. If I could turn back time I wouldn't change a thing, although there's been plenty of suffering on the painful winter 2am games where you wonder why you bother (and just about all of 2008/09) there's been some good times as well. It's not in my makeup to support a team that always wins (that's been cemented by Newcastle).

That's a damning table for Ashley and co. but potentially some great opportunity waiting there for a future owner. Of course if the image and reputation of the club continues to be driven into the ground the opportunity decreases as in this climate it's hard to come back. We're already not of the same interest we were 5-10 years ago. Small time thinking has lead to small time dealings.

Emre was sold for EU4.5m, roughly GBP3.8M.

You're speaking the truth mate, and you're right to be pissed off after that match.

A truer word was never spoken.

Score was ultimately what we were expecting. The way it happened though was less than flattering.

And now an embarrassing miscommunication goal. We have our full set (hopefully).

Cabaye on his way, absolute pumping, red card, injury. All in all it's a nightmare start to the season. Perhaps the worst part is that it was entirely predicatable.

Fantastic save Krul. He can hold his head high when he finishes scratching it.