El-Reacho

With the exception of Arsenal and Utd (purely because of CR7), all of the top clubs have recouped a fraction of what they've splashed out on players. Liverpool are ready to write off the £20m they spent on Downing. When you take into account what we got for Milner/Barry/Young/Downing we're no worse than the other top clubs. Lerner knew what he was getting into and knew what he was gambling with. Spurs do alright mind you - exception rather than the rule though IMHO.

Mellberg's a good shout. He's 35 now.

Surely we have such a character in Richard Dunne. Could turn out to be a vital player for us this season strangely enough. Scott Parker would be a good call.

He was let go because he had no tactical acumen whatsoever. He inherited and subsequently assembled a superb squad which was as good as Arsenal's and maybe Utd's, but he couldn't compete with them without spending more and more money. We've been down this road with O'Neill and it's quite clear that Lerner wants the club to grow again sustainably - and rightly so; he's had is fingers badly burned. Sustainable growth and Harry Redknapp do not go hand in hand. Throw money at a roll of the dice, high risk CL challenge and Harry - perfect match. He'll be long gone when we have to pick up the pieces again.

I have been in agreement with pretty much all of Lambert's starting line ups to date - his substitutions do seem a little odd though. Bent coming on for Benteke in the Norwich game finally killed any chance we had in that game for us IMHO.

Reminds me of that episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm - where Larry's divorce lawyer loses his mate the Dodgers.

It's been on a downward spiral because it's been so unsettled. Houllier tried to change everything from top to bottom overnight and it was a disaster to begin with. Where do you think we'd be halfway through his third season though? He'd have probably sold or released pretty much every player he took over but he'd have his players and a way of playing in place. Now Mcleish was a different story as we were just utterly wretched under him. If a manager could stay for more than a season we'll snap out of it and climb up the table again. PL is the right guy. He's said we're a million miles away from where he wants us to be, but he knows that trying to change it overnight would be daft. If we stay up, and I'm sure we will we'll only get better with the stability.

Jesus - we're still suffering from the hangover of the O'Neill spending spree and some people think we should be inviting Redknapp's trail of destruction to VP, that would set us back another five years. He'd come here if he was paid a clean fortune, spend a clean fortune, and then clear off just in time for us to be relegated and stuck in debt, in the Championship for God knows how long. Give Lambert a season FFS, then make up your mind. We've been on an upward trajectory in terms of performance. Today was a big set back, but no bigger than Fulham was.

Frimpong's looked a really dominant midfielder whenever I've seen him - think we would really benefit from him. Robbie Keane seems to be doing well in MLS, being touted as the best player in US apparently - he would probably do well as a back up to Weimann or Gaby; he's always thrived on the big man small man thing so could do well with Benteke. Would take him for three months as an impact sub. I'd like Bent to stay to have on the bench - for no other reason than if we let him go Gaby, Weimann, and Benteke will inevitably lose form.

Lack of continuity was the biggest issue rather than actually losing the players for our fall in the last two years, closely followed by McLeish buying rubbish. O'Neill showed he could replace Barry - we went on to have our best season under him after he left. He could have done it again with Young and Downing. Likewise I'd have had faith in Houllier to spend the money that McLeish ultimately got to replace Downing and Young, if the rumours are true we had agreements with the likes of Cabaye and Demba Ba for little or nothing. If we lose our best players - the trick is to keep Lambert, as he is the key to replacing them.

The last time I was at VP actual boiling water came out of the tap - that alone was enough to sterilise your hands.

Both of our goals came from crosses from the wings on Saturday. I think O'Neill is currently demonstrating that two fixed wingers hugging their touchlines and trying to whip crosses into a big front man is getting redundant these days. It's easy for teams to stop it. 433 gives much more flexibility and is far harder for teams to defend against as our second goal proved. Their back four had to keep on changing who they marking and AW got free.

Fair point - but he's less convincing at LB. It's odd that the first player PL brought in was Lowton when we had both Herd and Lichaj who were two or our best players from last season and are best suited to RB IMHO.

You guys are always pigeon holing players - where's you're sense of total football ;-) Clark has played more games at LB than anyone else at the club I reckon - certainly anyone who's available. I stuck Herd back in at CB because there's no one else to take Clark's place and I thought he did alright against Norwich.

What about Herd at CB and Clark at LB?

I don't remember anyone having any difficulty with Randy splashing the cash at the time.

Of the new signings we made from the lower leagues this summer, that is Lowton, Westwood, Bowery, and Bennett - It was Bennett who had played football at the highest level, and from what I can recall there were Middlesborough fans/journalists who were tipping him to go on and play for England. So on that basis (flimsy though it might be), given the potential that Lowton and Westwood have shown, I reckon PL has spotted something similar that Bennett has to offer. Likewise Bowery; hopefully PL has spotted something in him similar to what he saw in Benteke.

Ashley Westwood got a 'one to watch' mention in the Guardian today. Also pointed out the 4-2-3-1 formation working for us.

Interesting action from Kimmage to counter attack Pat and Hein. Pat and Paul's relationship is like something out of a DC comic - buddies and training partners in amateur Irish cycling back in the late 70's early 80's - now both sworn enemies essentially battling for control of the sport. Good versus evil and all that. Got me thinking that Lance is probably watching carefully! Does he plan his confession and then turn around an become the key witness to Pat and Hein's demise?? The way this story has run to date it wouldn't surprise me one bit. The story that keeps on giving.....

That's our ideal midfield at the moment IMHO.

Hopefully Clark fit to partner Vlaar, with Herd, Ireland and Bannan in midfield three for Saturday. Herd will do more for our midfield than either Delph or KEA in our current position IMHO, he's better at stopping the opposition playing than the other two.

David Brailsford should have typed Sean Yates into google and looked at the third auto-complete option that comes up. Hardly thorough due diligence is it?

I drove up it - much easier. It was pretty exhilarating driving back down and being overtaken on both sides by riders descending like bullets.

It certainly does. I'm so disillusioned with this sport that I've booked flights to Paris for the Champs Elysee finish - a night time sprint. Should be spectacular. I'd say the organisers were delighted that Brad turned up to tell them he was going to ride the Giro instead! I wonder has Froome given Sky an ultimatum - I lead at the tour or else I'm gone?

That sounds right to me but makes you wonder what happened between the 2010 Tour when Sky were useless, and then 2011-12 when they became utterly dominant. I think the comments from Contador today show that the Armstrong mess is absolutely part of today's peloton - likewise Valverde, Sanchez etc. Nico Roche is the same - they all are furious about the people who confess and tell all, whereas if you get caught and deny deny deny you're fine. Roche is supposed to be one of the clean guys, has signed up to Bikepure etc etc, but then signs for Riis to be Contador's right hand man, and bitches about the Garmin guys confessing against Lance. Despite the big PR drive I don't think anything has changed one bit in cycling - why would it? It's just as easy to get away with it now as it was five years ago. Why would Riis or Bruyneel or any of the other DS's change their ways? No one did after Festina or OP - perhaps one or two of the french teams and they simply haven't been able to compete since then. The USADA report proved that the biological passport means nothing as when it flagged up LA's suspicious values in '09 and '10 they did nothing about it, so there's nothing to stop a rider transfusing his own blood today. As long as they can get away with it they will do it.