joey_big_nose

I would imagine that it is his last appearence as captain to be honest. Nelsen has been captain in everything but name for about three months now. I would put money on the players looking to the Kiwi for guidance, rather than Todd. I hope it isn't a long term injury though, we need him!

Get a grip.

If we played like we did 2 months ago all season we would have finished second. Ups and downs, how it all goes.

More than a little disappointed. We were reasonable if not spectacular going forward but had some terrible defensive moments, more than just the first two goals. Positives? Peter's crossing was great, as were his set pieces. Not sure he can take his man though. Kuqi made the goal, and actually was decent generally for once. Nelsen was great. Very steady. The other three defenders round him weren't up to too much though. Everybody else was either average (Reid and Savage didn't really do anything too wrong per se, but hardly dominated the midfield) or poor (I'm thinking of you particular Mr Emerton)

I reckon they might be welsh, not sure why. Maybe the huge flippin' flags?

Yeah, he had a great few games at the end of the 2002/2003 season, and then completely faded. To be honest, by far the best of the prospects we have is Gallagher. He is the only player we have loaned out who has consistently excelled on a technical level (ie. looked a better footballer than the division he is in) although he has failed in terms of putting his foot in and work rate. Douglas has performed well for Leeds but seems stimied by his lack of technical attributes. And Debyshire could be good but needs more time to develop. IMO Paul is going to be the one who could seriously make the step up next season, but that will all come down to his attitude. Him and Bentley are in direct competition for places, although both players are a little flexible. My reckoning is that Sparky will bring back Gallagher, make the situation clear to him and see how he performs 'til Christmas. If he continues to arse around, then he will just sell him down the leagues in January for a few hundred thousand. If he does get his act together we could have a decent creative player.

Jesus! How much did you lose?

It would be outrageous if the manager was affected on a tactical level by sponsors, absolutely unforgivable. That said I would say that Becks is playing quite well at the moment while the heir apparent, Sean Wright Phillips, is barely getting a game. The only way our Dave could lose his place is if Gerrard plays on the right, which I think is unlikely.

as a boy raised in a catholic family i beg to differ, bored to tears just for that little bit longer than the average sunday...

It has been an incredible year. I simply can't choose between Tugay and MGP against Fulham, and Bellamy's first against Pompey. What won it last year, my memory is failing me...

I find it amusing that you demand such expertise from those who hand out opinions! I suppose in the grand scheme of things McCarthy is no Wenger, Mourinho or Ferguson but he managed the twentieth best team in the land this year, so unless the other nineteen were not available, why not? The most 'respected' pundit in the land, Alan Hansen, has little practical experience. I also rather suspect that you loathe the entire BBC team to a man, so why not watch ITV? Or perhaps you could turn the sound off and do your own commentary? I think it is the only way you could be satisfied...

After some poor performaces recently I would go for a bit of a shakeup: Sticking Bentley up front might seem a bit silly but to be honest Dickov looked poor last week and the Liverpool defenders will eat Kuqi for breakfast. As for Peter, well I suppose you could stick Emerton on the left but I would rather see the German play- can cross better and has a few tricks although he is admittedly lightweight. The problem with that scheme could be that he is up against Gerrard....

To be honest anything in the top half would have done me. We have been excellent this season and should never forget it. Onwards and upwards!

How can you say that? Portsmouth passed the ball much better than us, had better movement and more creativity. If Bellamy had been unavailable we could well of been crushed by them. Fair enough we all have our off days, but Pompey were excellent, and if I was one of their fans I would be very aggrieved that they did not win that match.

I'm not sure why 20 million is foolish... Chelsea payed that much for Wright-Phillips, and a similar amount for Duff. Rooney, admittedly a better player, was 27 million. He is better than Reyes, I would say who went for around 18. Bellamy is just as effective as those players and still relatively young. It sounds like a knee jerk reaction I suppose, but when I watch Bellamy I do not see a player who is just in form, but a player who is at his natural level. 20 million is not ridiculous, especially if he keeps his scoring rate up. In 18 starts he has scored 13 goals in the premiership. Henry has managed 21 in 25, RVN 21 in 30. He is keeping good company.

I don't know about that, if we compare against those we are up against (Spurs and Bolton) then Niell and Savage can be seen as 'good enough'. But you are right that beyond that and we start to look a little thin. You could actualy easily argue that Portsmouth had far more techinically able players out there than Rovers. Mendes, d'Allesandro, O'Niel, Taylor, Lua Lua are all players who can control the ball well and produce a good pass. We need some of that quality.

Fourth place evaporated today I think. But that is hardly a problem, Hughes has done amazingly welland is still trucking along picking up points. If we can add some guile to our steel then we can look forward to another great season next year and, hopefully, a good Boro-esque stitnt in the UEFA cup.

I have just watched the game over here on delay. the only reason we came out of that game with a point was Craig Bellamy, he was absoluely, utterly, unbelievably sensational. In an atacking sense everybody else offered very close to nothing. Bentley was the only other player who looked like coming forward much, and he lost the ball quite often, as did the Ped. Defensively Freidel was very good, Nelsen was solid, Kishi was a fault for their second but still okay, Neill more than a little dodgy, while Moko actually played better than I thought he would at RB. I don't want this to sound like a knee jerk thing, but if we are looking for a playmaker in the summer we should have a look at Mendes if Pompey go down. Clever, a good shot, a good pass, covers a lot of ground. Can't think of too many players who would suit us better and we could get for a reasonable price. Lua Lua as well should take our interest. I think with Bellers it has reached the point where all of the big clubs will start taking a serious interest. I would go so far as to say he would get a starting place at Liverpool and Arsenal. He is better than the strikers available to Chelsea, bu does not fit into their stye of play. We should brace ourselves for a summer where our door is going to be battered down. The good news is we can, if we do lose him, realistically ask for 20 million upwards. Hopefully Craig will want to stay, but it really will be up to him. Awesome player. The first goal was of Henry's level of genius. We need Pedersen and Savage to hit some form if we are going to hurt Liverpool next weekend.

He has apparently been vastly better there than as a striker (where he has been muscled out if match reports are to be believed). However in the Premiership I doubt he will be able to play out wide, he wouldn't get the room that he does in the championship, and lacks the pace to beat people. If he is going to succeed it is going to be in that role as the supporting striker 'in the hole'. However, I doubt that is really going to happen, Bentley is competing for the same spot, and I think in an ideal world Hughes will be looking for a guy to hold up the ball who Bellamy can play off. Still, I hope he does succeed. He is such an intelligent passer of the ball on his day and can finish well. We could do worse than have him as a squad striker.

This has to be, on paper, our hardest game in a while, at least since Spurs. Away from home against a side that are playing well. Conversely we have not been up to our high standards... I think this will be a draw. 1-1. The team should be the same apart from Pongolle starting, and maybe Tugay coming on for Bentley with Reid out wide. If we win we are back on track, but the odds are stacked against us.

Well for all of those who are giving Kuqi stick, in the portion of the match I saw he was the only one giving their defence problems. If he hadn't been there for the highball we had no other alternative. If a team is prepared to sit very deep and work extraordinarily hard in midfield we have no other way of hurting them, even with a strker of Bellamy's quality. Sure Kuqi is not good enough and we should be looking for an alternative in the summer, but he has his uses and is certainly not "disgustingly awful' or whatever else is being bandied around.

Because of work I only got to see the last half hour.. I reckon Hughes got it right with bringing Kuqi on instead of pong, they were defending so deep that there would of been no space for for the Frenchman. And, of course, Kuqi got the goal and wo a shedload in the air (woeful on the deck though). I was amazed at how hard Wigan worked, they managed to outstrip us in that department. Hughes will be fuming. We are still on an incredible run, but people should remember that there is absolutely no chance that we will win every game. Pompey away is suddenly looking very difficult.

Well at least you're honest about it!

Hmmm...... Is Bentley playing right or in the centre in this? I guess out right after his poor performance against Villa. Anyone know?

I am currently a smoker giving up and I can see that passive smoking is damaging to the health of others as well as being unpleasent. I don't think it is an erosion of liberties to be denied the right to damage someone elses health. I cannot see how it is possible for smokers to claim the moral high ground on this. Theoretically the only way you could make it work is if you had pubs run by smokers, staffed by smokers and frequented by smokers. Eddy made a good point in that in Britain those who take bar jobs rarely have the option of picking and choosing their place of work. If it is fairly and universally applied then there are only benefits. Smokers can take it outside and you will see less and less people smoking as it becomes drastically easier to quit. People will live longer, the health service will have resources freed up. The Tax revenue raised from cigarettes will have to be found from elsewhere, but former smokers will still save vast amounts of cash over a year.