TicTacWoe

Exactly. Poor team performance, as we should have had enough quality to beat Blackpool. The coming weeks will be interesting to see how Hughton handles being forced to leave players out. I started a thread last week (I think it was) in which I stated he hadn't been really forced to make any decisions due to the team virtually picking itself. Things are different now with more senior players becoming available for too few places. If Hughton can look past the seniority and start picking balanced sides it will be a help. He had Lovenkrands and Ranger available yesterday so he wasn't exactly forced to pick four central midfielders. Yeah, I think that's they key, seniority shouldn't really come into it. Yes experience is useful but it's not the be all and end all. I'd sooner have an inexperienced specialist winger than a makeshift one. imo our managers are guilty of picking players on reputation/seniority rather than form/potential, and also play people out of position to fit players in, to the detriment of the team. They all have their favourites and Nicky Butt seems to be one of them. He must suck a mean cock. I do hope Hughton doesn't bottle it. Completely agree and this has been the case for years now. It took a very long time for the likes of N'Zogbia and Milner to get to the point where they could be considered regulars and even then, whenever Duff came back from injury, N'Zogbia went back to the bench despite the former's lack of fitness or form. Milner meanwhile had the whole loan to Villa fiasco to deal with. This season too, after Kruls fantastic performence in the first game we all knew there was absolutely no chance of him keeping his place if Harper was fit (I'm not saying he definately should have but the fact that it was so unlikely highlights the issue). It must be quite demoralizing for younger players to see has-beens like Butt and Geremi who can barely run never mind play a good ball, who also earn between ten to twenty times their wage, constantly getting a game ahead of them.

He's not great, my Blackburn supporting mate has never rated him but I can't see him being too shit at this level. He's the sort that gets completely raped (to quote Pardew) by technically good wingers/strikers.

No more Geremi please, time for Lua Lua to get a proper run or at least to be called upon ahead of this has been.

If you're mainly dealing with gig managerment maybe just go for something fairly generic if you don't have a company name or whatever. watsongigs.com is available for instance.

Supposed to be very promising and has a decent amount of experience for a very young player. Wouldn't get many games this year with Ebanks-Blake and Doyle ahead of him, would be a good signing.

does anyone know when Shola's back? (still can't believe I'm looking forward to that prospect)

Not wanting to overreact based on recent performences or anything but I really think you lot could go all the way in South Africa and I hope you do for what it's worth, sick of the shite from the press about the national team underachieving and the rest. A great deal of luck is required to win a world cup too though so who knows, but I can't think of another country apart from Spain who has a better first 11 overall. The likes of Brazil, Italy etc all have weak parts of their team. You could argue England's goalkeeping situation is a big weakness but the likes of Green and Robinson are reliable enough if unspectacular and James can be great on his day.

Christ Veron, I thought he was dead (or retired). Nontheless, people are over reacting to Argentinas poor form, they're still in an automatic spot for qualification never mind the playoff spot which will be against the mighty New Zealand so they will qualify, no doubt about that if you ask me.

Although Enrique is an exception the point is accurate and brings back something I said on here months ago that we've signed far too many mediterranian and south american players over the years. Usually, the only reason for them to come here in the first place is the ridiculous wages we offered and they rarely adjust to the weather or living in the UK in general (it doesn't help when the club is a complete shambles mind you). For me, if we had any decent scouts at all over the last few years they should have been looking at scandinavia and eastern europe for the likes of Hangeland, Marcus Berg etc. Nordic players in particular rarely cause trouble or have difficulty adjusting and the better players are usually at least reliable if unspectacular.

Have I missed something http://www.4thegame.com/club/newcastle-united-fc/ Nice one, they've fast tracked our promotion! Accadacca was right, we did piss the league!!!

I don't think that ever materialised but there's definately a couple of scouts on the books. To be fair they probably still do scout for players, in the event that we should one day decide to buy one again.

He was never very prolific even in his supposed heyday, I think his record at Leeds was something like 1 goal in every 7 games Was always hugely overrated, doing a reasonable job at this level however.

Michael Ball is without a club too since leaving Man City I've just realised, would be a great short term signing imo.

On the free transfer front there's always former serie A star Stephen Appiah is without a club, I know it's possible for championship teams to buy him in FM so who knows Former Arsenal and Portsmouth defender Lauren is also still without a club, might be worth a go on a pay as you play. Then there's Dietmar Hamman who recently turned down Notts County, but as much as I liked him in his heyday I think we have enough aging, slow as fuck central midfielders as it is. Olivier Bernard anyone? Third time lucky etc

I know I should be thankful for small mercies, but I'm finding it quite difficult to get excited about re-signing Peter Lovenkrands....

I think we still can. Can't believe we signed Peter on a 3 yr deal......no imagination. Exactly, a player of his age, position and injury record should never have been offered such a long deal. Maybe he wouldn't sign for a shorter duration but I really hope he's not on much at the very least. I simply cannot imagine him still being of much use to us in 2 years time, especially if we're back in the EPL.

Ugh and a 3 year contract, if we get back to the prem within the next two seasons I wouldn't be mad about having him around then, 2 year contract max would have made more sense. He'll do a job at this level however and I'm very glad he's signed.

Why were we rushing til the last second of the transfer window witho sign Lovenkrands when we could sign him at any time considering he's without a club?

I had the pleasure of seeing the legend that is Samba in the flesh last season playing in the Finnish league, he didn't live up to the 300 goals he scored for the Toon between 2003 and 2015 in an old CM03/04 save game

Contracts up in 2010... Simpson Geremi Butt Baheng Godsmark Thank fuck we can finally rid ourselves of Geremi (and Butt for that matter) soon enough...who thought it was a good idea offering these guys such long contracts in the first place

Well its been menioned several times in this thread and was on the bbc's rumour bollocks, would be great if true. You'd think he'd get a similar pay as you play deal with a premier league club or abroad though. I remember reading a while back that his goal was to re-establish himself in the Aussie squad, so playing in the championship wouldnt exactly boost his chances.

IIRC Catchart was the Man U young player of the year or something like that about two years ago

Is anyone else even a little afraid that if Shearer was to get the job in the coming weeks with us sitting pretty top of the league that it might all go tits up after he takes over? I was all for Shearer, and still am I suppose but I'd hate to see it all come crashing down if gets the job with the media and other fans mocking his supposed incompetence...The better we're doing the harder it will be for Shearer to live up to expectations is what I'm saying. In other news, I was reading John Carvers wiki earlier and something doesn't seem quite right about the last sentance In recent times John was last spotted walking down the Big Market in Newcastle after a heavy night on the booze during the bank holiday weekend. Rumour has it that he is part of the Chris Moat takeover and will be a head coach if he takes control alongside Olivier Bernard and the legendary Des Hamilton.

Could have been a lot worse, obviously!

I propose a terracotta army of players, interspersed with the last remaining has beens and youngsters who aren't injured/couldn't be sold, Xisco will continue in his role as an unused substitute.