shurlock

From the same article: "Pardew has always appeared to like himself rather too much for some tastes but the former Reading and West Ham United manager deserves considerable credit right now".

What so you stick Hammond and Schneiderlin in midfield and play Mills who's not as attacking as some of our other options. Pretty negative for a home game where as you say rochdale will prob stick 11 men behind the ball.

Who gives a s**t - bet there are millions of other people who are quite happy that the Sun and Sky have unleashed the dogs of war and we're staring them down. Hate-peddling apart, the f**kers have an inflated sense of their own importance and dislike nothing more than being mugged off and ignored. Me, im lovin it.

Yep, that's the crux of it - if this season has shown anything, it is how dependent we are on Lambo. Do we even know what's wrong with him - Is he still playing with a groin injury - its not like he was rushed back this season and we did have a two-week break. I thought groin injuries either rule you out or they dont. And its not like he's lacking match fitness- he didnt miss much of preseason and he's had 4 and a bit games to play himself in. Concerning.

Yes but people make out that NC had this up his sleeve for ages and that it was only a matter of when not if; for somebody supposedly so ruthless, seems that NC has been caught on the backfoot.

No - played him up top in preseason at Barmet, didnt work- more lightweight than DC

Does the Five Year Plan have ambitions for us to be bigger than Villa in the Premiership - MON's frustration, as it has been reported, is that there was little progression or reward to the Villa job - they basically peaked around 6th and did nothing after that - they certainly didnt look like breaking into the Champion's League places; in turn he wasnt offered a bigger transfer kitty and while that's not a bad thing since Lerner is probably one of the more responsible owners in the game, it did make it difficult for MON to reproduce the same form over and over as rivals like City and Spuds were flashing the chequebook. Nobody can deny that there's a progression and challenge to leading a team from the lower leagues to the top - it was sufficient to induce Erikkson to move to Notts County; but I do wonder what our ambitions if we do make it to the premiership. If our ambitions are limitless, who knows. If its to hold our own a la Fulham or Blackburn, that might be a turn off to somebody who sees us as a long-term project. And selling ourselves as a long-term project is the only way we could attract somebody with the callibre of MON. A long shot anyway but if so even more of a pipedream.

He's done some controversial things but what previous form would lead you to think he would sack somebody 3 league games in and on the eve of the transfer window closing? There's an inconsistency in some of the anti-cortese arguments. Critics say that he's ruthless, cold-blooded and puts the bottom line over the fans priorities but that implies he's also rational and calculating - no rational or calculating individual would a) sack somebody now rather than the preseason when they had a ahcance or b) if they did, not have a replacement lined up. Perhaps he's mindf**king everyone and does have somebody lined up but does not want to announce it immediately lest it gives the impression that all this was premeditated. But that's just convoluted. As I say, none of this fits with form, and with what NC critics at least acknowledge to be his rational and calculating side...s

Dickson will come in and do a decent job - looked excellent after a dodgy preseason. Obviously not as skillful as AL but has a motor and is possibly the only player in the squad happy to go to the byline. Whatever happens do not play Guly on the left but do give him a decent run-out in the middle.

We're at home, so would like to know what happens if we either drop or Hammond or Schneiderlin and play the Guly in the right position, at least giving him a decent run-out before people start judging. Though he had a dodgy preseason, I think Dickson has been terrific and am hopeful that we not miss Lalllana as much as some fear. He can get to the byline in a way others, even AL cannot. Kel Butterfield Fonte Martin Harding Schneiderlin or Hammond Puncheon Guly Dickson Lambert Connolly

And in theory NC might have used that extended time -even if had just launched an investigation, to sound out potential management replacements rather than being caught on the backfoot as seems the case.

Agree - whereas he admitted to knowing practically nothing about Papa and found his own ignorance almost amusing, seemed to talk about Guly in far less evasive terms.

Still at the stage of saddo fans idol gossip but if it spreads to the point where the media pick up on it -as i say unlikely at the moment- Pards action or inaction will reveal alot.

Unlikely - can't believe that this would be put out by anyone close to NC if its spin because of the huge risks - after all, its sufficiently personal and vicious that if it spread Pards would feel inclined to fight back and report what really happened, causing even greater damage to NC.

Listening to your mate, how would account for the decent performances against Bolton and Brizzle R and the poor performance yesterday if the incident was a ticking timebomb of unrest in the club and resentment towards Pards, finally defused by mon's sacking?

Probably just ******, guilty by past association, unfounded rumour. Pards likes banging players missus, he did it at wham, so the story goes, so he must be a serial players missus banger. Fonte wife's is a well-known WAG, Pards, the silver fox, loves the ladies, so now its an irrefutable, self-willed fact that Pards banged Fonte's WAG wife and the rest is history. FFS. Logic at its f**king finest.

You people are sick-that's danny wilson.ffs

+1 couldn't agree more

As I say I thought that after Stockport we played pretty well away from home until Xmas - can't be a coincidence that DC and Papa featured heavily in those games and gave us more guile and movement. After Xmas, I dont know - apart from Norwich and BR, I just can't remember us playing with the same fluency and having to heave just to get draws. Thought MK Dons away summed up the second-half of the season perfectly, a comfortable scoreline in the end but a poor performance, marked by as route one goal as you'll ever see, a pen and a bit of individual brilliance by Lambo.

With James, it was more the fact that if he wasn't used as RB he might be used as CM or RM. Agree about Hammond - really went off the boil after his injury against Millwall but stuck to think of anyone who could have come in other than Wotton - still puzzling why AP never strengthened there.

No but results apart and I know you did alot of away games, you can't deny that our away performances after Xmas were pretty indifferent. I have less of a problem with the points haul than the way we played, especially as I never demanded the playoffs (always more hope than expectation). Instead I was more interested in seeing some proper roots being laid by AP other than hoofball and raggedly chasing games when plan A failed. Thankfully we have some top quality players that bailed us out - and thats why Im relatively confident that a new manager can take over without too much disruption.

The return is more or less equal (albeit slightly better after Xmas as you point out) but bear in mind we i) barely had a team for the openers (Huddersfield, Swindon, Stockport), ii) strengthened hugely during the Jan window and iii) played four of the top six before Xmas. Factor all that in and the second half looks much less impressive.

James is the most obvious, though his injury then kept him out. To a lesser extent, Antonio and Puncheon -good players IMO- looked distinctly ordinary towards the end of the season but AP rarely shuffled things around.

Read what i wrote - "The irony is that we looked much, much better on our travels in the first half of the season than the second. That was my big question mark over Pards, that we seemed to be going backwards away from home and not learning"- you basically prove my point: as you'll recall all those games were before Xmas.

And seeing him line up against Millwall was one of the most surreal things I saw last season - no coincidence that it followed a mid-season break in Spain where the whole squad was basically forced to spend time together. Fact remains that for better or worse, Pards team selection was one of the most predictable in years - players like Papa, Gobern, Thomas, Mellis, Gillett barely got a look-in or were used capriciously while some players seemed to walk on water in AP's eyes. Of course, things might have changed as more people came through the ranks - after all, AP never had much confidence in the infrastructure and made no bones of the fact that he thought our squad was far too big and full of dross to be stripped down and shipped out.