sadoldgit

We won't know until the end of the season though will we?

He didn't invent it but was one of the few at the time to bring it in. He was seen by some people at the FA as a "visionary" (although compared to most of them a blind man would be too). Bringing in SCW was a bol move and it is a shame that it wasn't implemented the way it should have been. With many other managers maybe it would have worked? Who knows. Keeping the club in the Prem with gates of 15k was no mean feat either.

Pleased for him. We should never have let him go.

Yes. Although it you want to count Lallanas injury that's 4.

These rumours are looking more and more pathetic. From what Pardew has been saying it looks more likely that Cortese fell out with him over football matters and threw his toys out of the pram. But as they all have to keep their mouths shut I guess each one of us will carry on believing what we believe already.

Yes he did. One of the highest scoring teams, won a cup, would have made the play offs but for the minus 10 and started the season red hots favourites to go up. You are spot on.

Any Eskimos?

These are the main problems that managers face each week and what sorts the successful ones from the unsuccessful ones. Things obviously worked for Pardew up to a point last season. You can see how difficult it is to transfer what you ask for on the training pitch into the game proper and a gamble to change things if they are going to plan. As ever, if you win your are a hero no matter what you did, if you lose you made the wrong choices. Hats off to Adkins for having the b*lls to haul someone off for not following instructions (if that is what happened). It will send the right message. You talk about our attacking options (and it is a huge plus having Lallana back of course) but for all of his industry Barnard is not scoring regularly and Ricky has lost his touch. If you aren't scoring 2 or 3 eack week, and we are not, then the defence and midfield do have to make sure we keep clean sheets. It will be interesting to see how Adkins takes things forward.

Agree

Wouldn't you swap league positions with them right now though?

Me too but we do that a lot here (not just with managers) so what can you do? We had a decent season last year, I hope we have a better one this year. Pardew played a big part in turning the club around and any success this season will be due in part to his work last season. I just hope that Adkins can get the team scoring as freely as Pardew did. Hopefully that will come.

Not steam.

Perhaps the balder the player the less we pay for the loan?

Aha, so not just bald then?

You make some reasonable points Tony but how does it follow that if you question the CEO you are not behind your team? As you will know, we have had a succession of CEOs who haven't been widely popular for one reason or another and I guess there is a % of the fanbase who are worried about this one. In short space of time he has fallen out with the contractors at Staplewood, a manager, ex Saints legends, the media, a local football club, staff at SMS and a section of the fanbase. Not the start many of us hoped for to be honest. If he is successful of course that will fade away, but at the moment, whilst many us of still are behind our team, we are left wondering about the guy at the helm.

Why not? he had a good record with us. People still remember Strachan kindly here. Not sure if Coventy or Middlebrough fans would agree though but that's football.

There are degrees of baldness?

Eh???

Indeed. An although he may not have been technically banned, being told you are unwelcome unless you apologise for saying something you believed to be true is a bit petty. FFS stop prattting about, rise above it and just concentrate on getting us promoted.

One of the most depressing matches I have ever seen.

As you say, it is just opinions and I respect the fact that some people think he did a good job and some people don't. Whether he went cap in hand and asked for money I don't know. Perhaps Cortese offered it up? What I do know is that you can't just buy promotion. We could have done better. Many teams did worse and they will be saying the same. Should? Why? Just because we spent money? If only it were that simple SS.

What do deloitte's have t say about England performace in the World Cup?

He only failed because he was hamstrung from the start. I believe without the minus 10 we would have been promoted through the play offs. It is a tin pot cup but for a club that has ome of the smallest trophy cabinets in the country and one that has been through a dismal time, it was a very large light at the end of a very long dark tunnel. You can apply the word "should" any where you want but it means nothing. England should have done better in the World Cup. He did a decent job last year and played his part in turning this club around.

Managers/teams can only beat the teams in front of them. We have divisions which means that we have groups of teams which are deemed to be of similar standards. A high win ration has got to be better than a low win ration. A win is a win and no easier to get in Div 3 than the Premiership for teams in those divisions.

He won a cup and would have got a down and out club into the play offs if it wasn't for the minus 10 points. I would say that was an achievement, evn if it falls below your expectations. You could add that he signed some players who could easily be playing in the CCC. No mean feat either.