Ben Arfa?

I'd be very surprised if Pardew changes the team apart from RB. Norwich not going to be a walk over and we will want every man to do their job.

 

I hope not. Everytime we get above our station we come unstuck. Lets just stick to what we're good at, working hard, keeping it tight and exploiting teams on the counter attack. Obviously both the next two will probably sit deeper, and invite us on. I still don't think that means we have to over commit and get caught. Patience required from fans and players. I have a feeling Pards will see it differently though and look to get after them from minute one. Bloody idiot.

 

I expect Norwich to sit and let us come, so a counter attacking game might not be effective. I hope we press them and I see HBA as a big part of that.

 

Ideally Ben Arfa should get an hour to work Norwich. They're low on confidence and Arfa should be eager to impress.
I can see Anita getting the call at right back, which is a bit of a shame because I think we would benefit with his passing range in the middle to a more attack minded Cabaye against Norwich.
I'd like Pardew to try Santon at RB but don't think it's ever going to happen.

 

I agree with this. Santon to move over and see how he gets on. Dummett or Haidara are both more than capable at left back, and it could make a difference having a genuine left sided player to overlap with the wingers.

 

I've got no doubts at all about Santon doing a good job, and Dummett and Haidara are as you say, more than capable of playing at LB.

 

This.

 

It would be nice to have Haidara or Dummett as an option at left back but given they both departed with hammy's against Citeh, I can't see either being fit. That being the case I see the only viable options as Colo or Anita at right back. My big fear and what I think Pardew will do, is Mbiwa making way for Colo and being shunted over to right back. Personally with the winter months almost upon us, I'd like to see Colo, Dummett and Haidara given time to recover properly. We'll need them over the next two months as injuries will come, why push them now? The more I think about it, the more sense Anita at right back makes. The only slight worry being Pilkington's size up against him.

The key threat from Norwich though is undoubtedly Redmond, a lad we should have been signing, particularly at 2m, in the summer. Watched enough of them, and he always poses problems. Can be quite nomadic coming in off the wings and really ****s with the opposition shape. Do you track him across or leave it those in field? Fer is undoubtedly talented but is one who can be fettled. We need to get Tiote on him as he tries to get in the space between lines.

 

I've got Ben Arfa 10 on the last two tops that I've bought and we've won each time I've worn them.

How much is it worth to the punters to wear them at every game?

 

Hmmmmm, let me answer your question with a brief summary of events which have led us to this point, which hopefully will succinctly make the correct assertion most obvious.

Ben Arfa is the son of famous Scottish-mafia boss, Don Nae Drink Ma Arfa Glass Full Or Al Neck Ye, but sought the clean slate that growing up torturing police informants with low level thugs may never have offered, so stole away in the night to distant shores. After many travels, of which I won't bore you (including the one stop over in Iceland, where he danced a sensational latina into a trance from which she only know is recovering from. Poor thing was in a coma for weeks, survived successful heart surgery to deal with an unnatural heart arrhythmia producing the beat of YMCA, and has only thus been rehabilitated sufficiently to walk without clicking her fingers to her pace, like the people in Cats (the musical). Needless to say her yearning for smamba (mamba and samba combined... that sexy and dangerous folly) has declined significantly, and she is safely back to doing a poor impression of Peter Crouch's robot like the rest of us), he discovered a passing talent for le foot in France.

Unrelenting though his development was, a parallel theme of ravenous desire to find his son was drawing the mafia Don closer, which was aptly sinister for Frenchies free of Saville's passportless jurisdiction. Eventually Don caught up with him and a friend in a small town. He offered to share a taxi with them back to Ben's hotel, which for no apparent reason Ben agreed to. Once outside, Don made a phonecall in some weird foreign language that I'm pretty sure means (let's get them). An hour or two later, heavies show up and snatch Ben's friend, so Ben runs into the bathroom with a lockable door and phones Mum (no, not the police). Mum says to go out from that room and hide under a bed, where Ben would be taken... Just when the baddies come into the room and turn to leave, and Ben appears to have escaped despite his Mum's idiotic advice, they suddenly snatch Ben too and fill him with drugs. Ben's Mum speaks with one of the captors, and mumbles something about having a particular set of skills, to which the guy says "how's ironing going to help in this situation", so she's all like "sexist p****!", and he's all "I'm hanging up now, so I can fill your son with drugs and maybe cop a feel while he's out".

Many years later, having succumbed to his dad's wishes to become deputy of the Scottish mafia, he surfaced off the coast of Bolivia, aboard the De Maria Espaghetti Bolognese for a shady poker tournament, in which he almost won some coral pickers from a Pirate named "Esteban Princess Palms Munez", who didn't look too dissimilar from a player he once played le foot with, if he'd been in some-kind of horrible fishing accident of course.

Following this, he enrolled in MIT, studying Civil engineering and musical theatre (kid can dance). He's doing quite well.