Questions for September 1st

Some more fun questions to ponder;

If teams could simply keep their players and at the very least achieve what they did the year before, why does every club with trophies ALWAYS strengthen?

If we were supposed to offer £2.5m for Adrian Mariappa in January, why do we no longer need that centre back?

If we were offering £6m to Lille for Debuchy BEFORE any injuries, why, when a full back gets injured, do we not then need a full back anymore?

Why were we offering £9m for Luuk De Jong, but not making any other reasonable (I take £7m for Carroll out of that equation) offers for forwards?

Why did we bother to sell Leon Best? He's not great, but he's got to be a better option than thin air?

Why did we spend all of last campaign bleating on about how magnificent it would be to get into Europe, to then immediately come out and say we're not actually interested?

Why has Mike Ashley purchased a share of Rangers? (this is an easy one; answer is because he buys low to sell high...that's all he does....he may be taking his time at NUFC, he may have been shafted by Shep, but he'll do it in the end...)

 

Can you turn the "dd" for "gg" in your name??? Remind me of a certain someone with all the negger-tivity <- see what i did there. Cheer up fella we beat spurs and qualified for Europe so far...

 

Cant disagree with any of this (although not sure Ashley did actually end up buying into Rangers).
Even keeping Lovenkrands would have been better than thin air too and if we are buying no-one how is it so hard to find an extra few quid to reach a deal with Simpson, or is it "good business" to let him leave for nothing at the end of the season?

 

A day ago, I was optimistic. We'd scraped into the group stage, had indeed beaten Spurs, not done that bad at the Champs Lge winners and we still had 24 hours to get in that full back we needed, that centre back we need and of course the "young forward who can take the club forward" (quoting Pardew). However, 24 hours is long enough to blow away that sunny optimism and with our best set piece taker now done for the season and his able replacement named as James Tavernier, it don't look so rosy, do it?!

Seriously, how many goals have we sold without replacing? Best 4, Lova 3, Guthrie 2 and Raylor (albeit injured, not sold) 3. We scored 66, so 20% of our goals have gone to be replaced by two DM's, an Aussie teenage CB and a French 2nd Div player...and that's not counting the assists. And what of this "big centre back who can chip in with a few, 'cos we didnt have that last season" (quoting Pards again)?

 

Taylor, Obertan and Marveaux could all be like new signings if things go our way, Ben Arfa and Cisse for twice as long as we had them last year, don't see lack of goals being a problem.
Howay man, we're all disappointed at the lack of movement but these guys did us proud last year, lets get behind them.

 

****ing hell give you're head a wobble man, everyone around us have weakened significantly (spurs, arsenal and liverpool) and we've strengthened squad wise, no marquee signing but Amalfitano, Anita, Good and Bigi will all play their parts in the season, the youngsters with bags of potential will get a hatful more chances to improve, not to mention the very impressive looking Marveaux returning. We're in a better position than we were in this time last year so give it a rest.

 

Chill out man! People were worried last summer but look how it turned out. The club have their policy, and are sticking to it.

Compared to this stage last year we have gained : a fit Marveaux, a fit Ben Arfa, Santon ready to play, Cisse, Anita, Talyor for a whole season (hopefully), youngster's older and better, new youngsters (Amal, Bigi, good)

We've lost out: lovenkrands, best, playing extra games.

Not great, but not awful.

 

How long until the OP starts posting alien videos I wonder...

 

Fair enough, I'm obviously not jumping for joy over the Transfer window just gone but we kept the important players, dropped dead weight like McLovin, Smudger and have invested in the future.

With Raylor out the only thing i get from this is Anita is going to get alot more game time than we planned originally.

Best, might have got this injury with us and be out for the season as well (but to be fair those 4 goals he scored last season earned us 7 points... 2 vs Fulham (2-1), 1 vs Villa (1-1), 1 vs QPR (1-0).) But we didn't have Cisse for most of the games he played in last year. I also think we will see a lot more of Adam Campbell this year than most people think.

I'll give you we needed a CB because I've been harping on about that too since the end of last season. But we can see through to Jan with the squad atm without putting ourselves in to much trouble IMO. If investment is needed then hopefully we can get it for cheaper than we would have done this window.

I always been a fan of "if it aint broke, dont fix it" and we have just polished the edges of the squad in my opinion and not gone for radical change like some other clubs (i.e. what happens if liverfool lose Suarez to another 12 game ban and their other striker gets injured they dont even have Shola Ameobi, or QPR/West Ham buying totaly new squads)

This is my honest view of the season (and I'm being quite pessimistic myself here)...
Europa League - not a chance of winning it as a realist just want to have fun and enjoy the football, Athletico Madrid just outclassed Chelsea by miles and there are better teams than them in the competition as well as CL teams to come into it. Play youth players and blood them for the future
League Cup - Even if we beat ManU (possible) we will just draw City away after anyway so again I would play youth/backup players for this competition.
FA Cup - This is the only other Cup and the only one i think is worth playing for IF we are not going so strongly in the league come January when it starts.
Premiership - Not going to make top 3 but with Le Arse unable to score, Liverpol not looking so hot and AVB trying to run Tottenham into the ground we could make a push this year for that coverted 4th position. Why not concertrate on that and use our first XI in this competition and give it a go?

 

I personally think all of those questions are fair ones to ask, there's only a fine line between optimism and burying your head in the sand!

At the end of the day, it was Pardew who said he wanted a LB/RB, it was Pardew who said he wanted a CB and it was Pardew who said he wanted another ST. I don't think its being unnecessarily pessimistic to simply ask him what happened.

At the end of the day, us footie fans are a fickle bunch and a win at Villa will help to distract, but the men upstairs want to hope that our key players (Cabaye, Tiote, Ba and Cisse) improve on their recent performances 'cause we've got ****ing noone to drop them for!

 

Pardew also said that some of the players had their heads turned by other clubs, I am concerned that if we are sitting mid table come January we may lose some more players, especially if they beleive the club is not showing enough ambition in wanting to improve. Hopefully for the next 5 months we will remain injury free.

 

I bet a couple of free agents or loan deals will roll in the next few days

 

Apparently Cabaye went to see Mike Ashley to ask why we hadn't signed anyone before the season started, this worries me.

 

Source?

 

I can't remember, I read it somewhere, think it might have been Lee Ryder on twitter who i find very reliable, I'll have a look round see if I can get it for you.

 

My opinions.

 

Owen and Heskey?

 

We kept all our big players ! so we can view this as a good transfer window!

No point in panic buys !!

 

Can anyone think of any free agents worth having at the moment? Forgetting Owen of course.

 

I'm free.