1-0 chelski sad to say, but clearly, matteo's fault. what's new.

unhappy chelski players are starting. parker and glen johnson. duff upfront alongside gudjohnson apparently. come'on rovers!

trying hard not to be cynical, but can't see anything other than a chelsea win though i hope dearly for the opposite to happen. prediction: at least 2-0 chelski. scorers: no idea who else, but kezman is bound to score (he hasn't scored for chelski yet, has he?) therefore he will like everyone else break a dire run against us. and i don't see how we're gonna find a way past petr cech. and just two seasons ago, we won there 2-1.

i didnt watch the match (it wasn't on tv here, only got the goals) but from what i've read, did we really play that badly? i thought the red card cost us though. with our lot, playing against anybody with 10 men for an hour will be hard... chelski lost today, so they can be beaten. however, we'll be up against a wounded chelski next week... signs are not looking good. sigh.

with you there T4E. if we get 10m cash, 5m (rumoured price) for parker, another 5m to play with for a defender. come to think of it, almost anyone will do actually... well certainly can't do worst than what we already have.

a short term deal will do nicely for me. he surely can't be any worse than whatever we have already got. but one point of concern is the fact that everton, fulham and bolton all had their chance and did not get him, and by all accounts, he was asking for too much money. given our famous lack of dosh, lets hope we're not breaking the bank for him out of desperation. besides this, if he can keep his fitness levels up, he could be a useful signing.

clear penalty. denied yet again. same old.

maybe a bit of a knee jerk reaction now.. but i never ever wanna see that donkey of a player matteo in a rovers shirt ever again. for someone's who's supposed to be a brute of a defender, he can't head, he can't control the ball, he can't even clear the ball upfield properly. urgh. come'on rovers!!! an equaliser is still possible!

rejected all kinds of media access to today's results till half an hour after the match ended, so that i could watch the delayed telecast ala 'live' telecast, and boy am i so so glad that i did this! thought we started really well, but seemed to lose our way towards the end of the first half. in all honesty, portsmouth should have scored, but we got our slice of luck today. in the second, we almost camped in their half. again, they missed a glit-edged chance, so good luck for us again. matty's strike was superb - receiving the ball with his back to goal, the close control, then digging the ball out from under his foot to make the angle for the shot, and then finally drilling it into the corner was all too much for me. let out a huge scream and had tears in my eyes! that was like the matty of old. but yes, gotta come back to reality, as matty did well but also made his fair share of 'mistakes'. ie: just after coming on, i thought he was trying to do too much by himself, holding onto the ball for too long, as well as trying to pass his way out in our box when a hoof upfield would suffice. but he did improve, and after the goal, looked totally comfortable. hope he builds on this and improves. then again, i thought the same after his wonder goal against liverpool last year... so come'on matty, don't let it happen again. bothroyd: big, strong, and actually skillful and pacy too! looked good, asserted himself, and looks very confident. good home debut. hope for more from him. emerton: had a good game. actually took people on and got past them. passing was okie, and made himself available for the ball well. chased and harried well too, but crossing still needs working. our defence: is it me or did it really look more 'solid' than usual? short clearly had trouble dealing with yakubu's pace but used his positional sense and strength well. matteo still looks suspect, but was fairly solid today, certainly much better than his performances all season. according to the commentator, today's clean sheet was also his first of 2004, including his leeds days. amoruso, today he was supreme. thought he won everything expected of him, and he looks like our only defender capable of picking someone out with a long ball. also our best outlet of hoofing the ball 60 yards upfield when required. freekick was good too. agree with the earlier comment that despite all his defensive frailities, he does add something different to the team. the referee: he looked a decent bloke to me. called everything pretty much correctly, although brad's barge on fuller looked like a penalty to me. am i the only one thinking that if it was souness' team, that would have been a dead-cert pen? hughes: although he started last week's team, they looked more assured than last week at st james. inspired substitution of matty - don't think its due to injury, as commentator had already mentioned matty being warmed up prior to the horror tackle on pedersen. pedersen: abysmal. he looked really really lost... i'm not writing him off as yet, hope he comes good, but he really needs to knuckle down. hope this is just due to him settling in, but he gave away almost everything he could today. mishit crosses, mishit passes. but his long throws look a useful weapon. all in all, very very satisfied, and a smile still on my face. i was totally convinced we'd be murdered tioday if souness was still in charge. but its turned out to be a wonderful start for a new era, so come'on hughes' blue and white army! up the table we go!

reports that hughes' contract is for 2 years and 12 months rolling thereafter. what does this mean? he does 2 years and if the board decide he's doing fine, he gets another 12 months and the cycle repeats itself? personally, i thought that 2 years is a tad short. would have preferred him to be on 3 years plus an option of a year's extension...

definitely my first choice! lets roll pompey over on sat!

Extract from The Sun - Shepherd, pictured below with Souness, said: “It was Graeme’s obvious determination to get the job right from the first minute that convinced us he was what we were looking for — a winner. hmm... did he actually apply for the newcastle job? was glad he's gone... now i'm feeling betrayed...

he wants reinforcements? how about matteo? come on graeme. you wanted him. be a 'proper' man and take him with you.

its early in the week, and a win is imperative. however, having watched both rovers and pompey's matches this weekend, i am not optimistic. any 2 of amo, short, matteo and nils vs any 2 of yakubu, fuller and lua lua. no contest in terms of pace. here's hoping that my pessimism is untold. 1-3 pompey. rovers please prove me wrong!

not for the faint hearted. http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/sport/tm_obj...-name_page.html

finally seen some 'highlights' of the game. made for sad watching really. with regards to matteo - we buy relegated stuff, we get relegated. am i alone in thinking that he should be on the bench at best?? i'd really rather have nils in there instead of him. remember matt elliot of leicester (o'neill period)? he wasnt skilful either, was ugly too and supposedly a hard hard man. see the parallels with matteo? the difference - elliot actually did his job of being the defensive brute and rallying his troops. matteo does neither.

hi there... appreciate your good intentions. but if there is one occasion that your source is wrong, please god, let it be this time. i'll be gutted too if its true. dowie is up and coming, has shown lots of promise. but definitely not what we need now...

we won't need dragging if its reid. we'd be down quite easily.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/headlinenews?id=309596&cc=4716 interesting article regarding sam allardyce, who i belief has earned the respect of many. however, are we big enough to make him 'great'? there's even a mention of uncle jack in the article... i personally wouldnt mind if we got him even with his bolton ties...

i'm a ferguson fan but if souness comes waving the woodgate cash (8-10m) at us for him, i'd take it. whoever the new man is must fancy bringing in some of his own players, and of course, if he fancies fergie as his main man, perhaps we'll hang on to him. if he doesnt, such a sale would allow him the chance to bring in some new blood. that said, i have a sneaky feeling that some money will mysteriously appear anyway for the new man to spend in january here... hope i'm right!

lechuck, superb.

now that he has taken saunders, boersma and co (his usual lackeys) with him, all that's left is for him to let us have bellamy on the cheap! come'on graeme, go kick him! my original choice was mark hughes... but after 6 hours or so of thought, i suppose i wouldnt mind houllier or venables... but please, no hoddle.

in a morbid kind of way, i'm glad that he's gone. and he's resigned, so that means we do not have to pay him off. however, i'm also stunned. he never came across as such a character. resigning because of his family or his health etc, i can take. but not resigning to go to another premier league club. here's hoping he destroys them... and this continues newcastle's plundering of our ranks through the years...

come'on back Mark Hughes!

kamy, coming from you, (with your uncannily accurate transfer news i might add) my heart skipped a beat when i read it! sigh. if only this one's true... if anything, the smiling sod's departure will mean matty has one less competitor for a shot in the first team. maybe souness' decision was in part due to matty's insistence on staying and rejecting the move to spain?