LordSepulchrave

Fancy a win here, but for the life of me can't say why. I'm going for a 2-1 for us, with Man City's strikers having a total 'mare and us scoring our only two shots on target, one from a set piece and the other from a wicked deflection or Demichilis/Kompany/Hart having a massive brainfart. Not even joking either.

RIP, such a real shame. In these times 45 is damn young age to go.

35% possession, Ancelotti out! It may have been somewhat cagey, but it was a world better than the Chelsea sludgefest.

That was one of the worst games I've seen in a long time. Still, Mourinho proves his genius (and his desire to not play 19thC football) by playing a 6-3-1.

Then what does lambert do? This is one of the things I have never understood about the manager role in English football. In Norway the manager picks the team, train the players and is always on the training ground. I hear it is different in England. When I first heard about it, it was when I heard that MON barely was at the training ground. He let Robertson and the other coaches do that. It is a weird concept. BTW, those who say that Moyes struggle because he god rid of Ferguson's coaches may be right if it is so that the manager role in England is like we have seen with MON and Lambert. Honestly varies - I know Moyes is a lot more hands on in training than Fergie was, and once Hughton took over at Norwich the players remarked that, unlike Lambert, he would often take training. I'm guessing it varies around the country really. Esp. with clubs who have a DoF.

Does look a bit like Lambert is a figurehead, doesn't it? We've still some way to go if we want to outdo the Tyneside clubs in that regard. Di Canio and Kinnear are pretty hard acts to follow, and Tan's hijinks far outstretch this. We're never gonna win anything are we?

Team - Yes, it's full of potential with some real quality in there. Performances - Yes, we've went from being terrible to inconsistent. There's been some great matches and some terrible ones and lots of mediocre ones. Quality of football - Yes, again we've went to terrible to inconsistent. At our fluent best we press very well and teams can't deal with our pace, energy and power, but we can't control matches with the ball.

Desperately sad and properly embarrassing.

Based on what? He's had 10 starts, 12 sub appearances and scored three goals and has one assist. Weimann has 3 goals, 4 assists, works harder and has more pace and contributes more to the team overall.

I'm still behind Lambert really, although we've been mediocre this season, but he's got a lot to prove next season.

Michael Owen advertises Benteke live on TV and suddenly he's "injured"? How convenient... But seriously, this is terrible news. With Kozak also injured, leaves a massive hole in our squad.

That was his post-match interview, took it from the beeb's website. Since post-mach interviews tend to pop-up across numerous media (TV, internet, radio, papers) I guess I'd assumed you had already seen it? Didn't mean to offend you, but as I said I genuinely wasn't sure what you were expecting.

What makes you think the manager hasn't? I'm pretty sure he's made his feelings known to the players. not in the mail he didn't....thats the only place I can make a judgement...Discretion CAN be a great cop out....i think the fans need to know he wasn't happy with that, is called commitment Lambert to the media: "We were second best if truth be known. We started well but it wasn't good enough. We didn't deserve to get anything from the game. The goals we lost, were really poor from our side. In a strange way when the bigger teams come you are naturally up for it anyway but when you play teams in and about you it becomes reality. These games can be more difficult because of the nature of that but that wasn't good enough." Seems clear enough that he wasn't happy with the performance - not sure what else you're expecting? Di Canio style naming and shaming?

http://bundesligafanatic.com/out-of-contract-5-hot-properties-who-can-move-for-free-in-the-summer-2/ Hope we're looking at these guys, sounds like they're definitely worth considering on a free.

Jotunheim I'm guessing.

Cameo appearences are a door to playing regularly though. In fact, it is the same for most youngsters as rarely will they just walk straight into the team. Rather, they start out with limited game-time and if they impress then that leads to more game-time. Sure, but for the other reasons I stated in that post I just don't see us as being able to accommodate youngster for anything more than brief cameos, and as such the cameos would largely be for no reason. Maybe it'd be nice to give them the odd sub appearance, but until we've got a stable team to integrate them into it wouldn't mean much.

Well they have a good enough squad overall squad that have played together long enough to allow them to let 2 or 3 youngsters appear as regular first team players without really hurting the team overall. If we uproot two first team players and replace them with youngsters we'd be in trouble. This is something that Lambert is trying to build atm, they are 6 seasons into that process whereas we are two. Cameo appearances by youngsters don't really do them that much good - we wanna be looking at at least 20+ appearance.

Well Southampton are leagues ahead of us in bringing through youngsters and playing them consistently - Lallana (25) and Schneiderlin (24) have been first team players for six years for example.

Is it not the 5th week in a row? Newcastle Norwich Chelsea Stoke Man United Seems bizarre that our games would even remotely interest the TV bigwigs. The Cardiff one was on TV too. Does seem surprising.

I think this is probably comparable to the Norwich result - we're not three goals worse than Stoke, but neither are we three goals better than Norwich. I mean, last season we gave Sunderland their worst battering in the league, but we weren't the best team they faced by a long shot. I dunno - we've been playing pretty well since the L'pool game - we even played well in the Newcastle loss and Cardiff draw - so I guess it's probably a good idea to write this game off and just focus on our recent decent form. But dammit, I'm so goddamn gutted. Just goddamit.

Well what I'd say is that if, say, someone had made a bid for Lowton during the summer for 7mil and we'd turned it down, I'd be glad we did. Obviously with hindsight it would have been a good deal, but I'd rather we gamble on players who perform well continuing to do so, and look to build a team. 18mil is clearly a bonkers assessment of Bacuna - but the fee would have to be bonkers, otherwise I don't think it would be worth it.

We've been struggling for fullbacks who can defend since Lambert got here - fullback is probably one of the hardest position to fill, especially when you consider the demands on them in the modern game. Now we've got one and people would let him go for what would amount to somewhere between 5 and half and 8 mil? I don't even begin to get it. That's ignoring his versatility and how he adds a bit of depth to a number of positions all over the park. Honestly, I'd only consider a massive overpayment on him - 18 maybe at push, but really more. Just can't see why we'd even consider selling a young player who has shown as much as Bacuna has unless the deal is too stupidly good to turn down.

He dominated Gouffran when we played Newcastle too. His defensive qualities are what have really impressed me lately.

Sure, but if he wants a move to get European football those are the main candidates really. I guess Everton have been lurking on the precipice for a while, but they don't seem to actually be getting all that closer either.

Only if we make progress. He's capable of playing in a side regularly in Europe, probably one in the CL. Eventually, he'll get itchy feet if we're not progressing Who would be after him? One of the best keepers in Europe has been loaned out by Chelsea numerous years in a row because they're persisting with Cech, Man Utd have a brilliant young goalie in De Gea, Wenger seems willing to allowing an improving Sczeny as much time as he needs, Tottenham have Lloris, City have Hart and Mignolet is rated higher than Buzan even if I believe they're of similar quality. Maybe Spurs might come sniffing around if Lloris gets itchy feet or Hart might get the trigger pulled on him if he loses form badly again, but if you'll believe the media both Krul and Begovic are more highly rated/more likely to leave their prospective clubs and there's been a big song and dance made about Forster in Celtic ever since last year's Barca performances. I don't see anyone big enough coming in for his loyalty to be tested really.