Frankly, I don't think there's any amount of information will help Pardew at the moment...

Pardew looking odds on to go now they've been dumped out of the Carling Cup by Chesterfield

Interesting post. Has Pardew and West Ham been found out in the always-difficult "second season back"? Or was he doing a perfectly good job making a silk purse out of sows ears until the Hammers got ideas above their station and brought in 2 superstars, thereby destroying team spirit in one fell swoop. Stuart Pearce (remember - mooted by the idiot press as England Manager) seems to have lost his way but still commands respect from the fans I know - they blame the team. Knowing how fickle they are, that could turn anytime soon. Pardew was never up to managing Newcastle - how long before Shearer is in place?

Very good point and one I hadn't realised. Two fairly innocuous corners and two free headers. Hopefully Hughesy and the team have spotted the trend and will have that sorted out

Just back. God I hate Bolton. I hate the way they play, I hate most of their players, I hate Allardyce and I hate most of their fans (especially the n*b in the chippy before the game "IT'S NOT A CHIP BARM IF THE CHIPS AREN'T INSIDE THE BARM! ARE YOU 'KIN IRISH?!" This to the Chinese lady behind the counter). However, being objective, they are probably the most effective team in the premier league at sticking to their game plan. I thought we did very, very well for 60 minutes, despite the ref's best endeavours. We passed it, outplayed them, and should have been 2 up at half time. Once they got their goal I thought their was no way back. Fair play to Hughes - we looked dead-and-buried until the substitutions. Two penalty misses (and they were misses, not saves) Oh well, at least the crowd was half decent

The authorities will do nothing. They did nothing when it was the "mighty" England, they sure as hell will do nothing for little old Rovers. They are paper tigers. I'm sure Benni will be delighted that he has the full support of the fans of the team he plays for in this matter. Whether he has a very large income or not seems to me an irrelevance. It's a bit like saying that it doesn't matter that the Liverpool players were burgled because they're minted and can replace everything - insured or not.

Maybe I'm being racist but I think you've snapped the whitest person in the world in here (no. 22)

Similar but slightly off-topic - the old but still great stupid interview comments "If we played like that every week we wouldn't be so inconsistent" - Bryan Robson, Man U, 1990. "That's great, tell him he's Pele and get him back on." - John Lambie, Partick Thistle manager, when told a concussed striker did not know who he was. "Richard Keys : Well Roy, do you think that you'll have to finish above Manchester United to win the league ?" - Roy Evans : You have to finish above everyone to win the league Richard. "If you can't stand the heat in the dressing-room, get out of the kitchen." - TERRY VENABLES, Capital Gold "It's now 1-1, an exact reversal of the score on Saturday." - (Radio 5 Live) "Football today, it's like a game of chess. It's all about money." - (NEWCASTLE UNITED FAN, Radio 5 Live) "I'm not a believer in luck..... but I do believe you need it." - ALAN BALL "Merseyside derbies usually last 90 minutes and I'm sure today's won't be any different." - TREVOR BROOKING "Dumbarton player Steve McCahill has limped off with a badlycut forehead." - (TOM FERRIE) "And I honestly believe we can go all the way to Wembley......unless somebody knocks us out." - (DAVE BASSETT) "Strangely, in slow motion replay, the ball seemed to hang in the air for even longer." - (DAVID ACFIELD) "What I said to them at half time would be unprintable on the radio" - Gerry Francis "I can see the carrot at the end of the tunnel" - Stuart Pearce (1992)

I agree with the OP - the club can do no more with pricing for a local derby. It's not long ago that we'd get 22k home fans easily. As for Bolton, is it a coincidence that their season turned around after the Panorama bung accusations? Perhaps BFS has been in a bad mood and the players are scared of making it worse by losing

Some of the papers are doing their usual hypocritical about-turns. After sticking the knife in they are now defending McClaren. Funniest of all is Martin Samuel in the NOTW. Every week I get wound up with his idiotic diatribes and this week he is trying to argue that McClaren was right to try 3-5-2 against Croatia, because "we have won nothing in 40 years using 4-4-2". Of course, he loses sight of the small but important detail that you have to qualify for a tournament to actually win it, but hey, it's the papers so what does reality have to do with it. He also seems to conveniently forget that we had a bunch of meaningless friendlies during which time we played 4-4-2 didn't we? So why did McClaren not use those games to get us ready for his genius tactical masterplan of using a 10 year old system? Buffoons doesn't do justice!

I'm not sure you want to read it. I feel quite queasy now

Unfortunately, McClaren won't get sacked because if Rev is correct and the FA did make a mighty cock-up in the appointment then they are in no way going to heap more criticism on themselves by sacking their second choice, especially after the fuss about the appointment process. So however long his contract is, is how long we have him. Also, sense of perspective? I don't think there is anything wrong with my sense of perspective. Before McClaren, we were a quarter final team - pretty much consistently - and along the way we beat some world class opposition. I don't call that crap. The next appointment was to take us that bit further and maybe get us to a final. This is not some bandwagon - plenty of us on here said before his appointment that McClaren was not the man to do that. We weathered the "told-you-so's" after a couple of meaningless friendly wins and now the chickens are coming home to roost. I hope we qualify but I suspect we won't and it p****s me off because we ARE better than that. As for Beckham, I did suspect he would get dropped from a starting berth, and when Lennon is fit I think that may be right. But he should not be axed from the squad and anyone who thinks Richardson, P. Neville or Jenas would make more of an impact as a sub needs their head looking at

Well Colin, there's a lot I agree with in your post. I don't agree about the passion and commitment bit, or the not caring bit though. I remember the optimism we all had after Italia 90. It was great going into work, discussing the games, anticipating the next. We even got a team off the ground at work and persuaded the bosses to stump up for a kit! It seemed everyone was talking about football and it was exciting. Then Graham Taylor killed it by consistently picking a bunch of journeymen, having next to no clue about how to play at that level, and generally talking cr@p. If we did qualify for a tournament we never expected to get out of the group. Our expectation levels were reset and we settled for second best. I desperately don't want that to happen again - but I fear it will with McClaren. And that actually pains me. I am bothered. The players Taylor picked were not paid as much as the current crop, and were not over-rated by anyone. They were distinctly average, and it showed. They didn't lack for commitment - Geoff Thomas would run through a wall. Only problem was if you asked him to hit it with the ball he'd miss. So I don't think it comes down to how much this lot are paid, or whether they are over-rated. I think there are managers out there who can bring together a team and make it better than the sum of the parts, by instilling them with a passion, a goal and a gameplan. Mark Hughes for one. O'Neill seems to be doing it at Villa. God forbid, even Allardyce does that. McClaren has never done that as manager, and in my opinion he never will. He just isn't made that way. It seems to me the press has a lot to answer for, as they appear to be the reason why Scolari backed out of the England job after accepting it. The same press who were lauding McClaren after Crouch had scored against a couple of mediocre teams in meaningless games. The same press who agreed absolutely with his "ruthless" treatment of Beckham and his distaste for the WAG's, whilst ignoring the fact that all he did was speak in platitudes and sound-bites. The same press who went orgasmic over his selection of Terry as captain (which I completely disagree with but that's another story). And the same press who will absolutely crucify him when we do not qualify for this tournament. Of course, they will forget this circle of events, and most of them will insist they said it all along. And finally, I don't think he's useless, but Lampard doesn't seem to like to share the limelight with anyone. He's been cr@p this year at Chelsea since Ballack arrived, and he's always cr@p with Gerrard. Perhaps he's intimidated. It's funny - the people who use the "Beckham is past it" argument fail to notice that all of the points they apply to Beckham equally apply to Lampard. Can't beat a man, slow, doesn't track back as well as he should etc. The only difference is Lampard is younger and Beckham takes better free-kicks. Where's that bloody whisky...

According to today's Fiver, Steve McClaren in an interview with 442 mag Surely, surely, that must have been taken out of context?

Says it all here really

I don't know whether I will be working away on those two dates but frankly, at that price, I'm going to take a punt and get tickets. At the very least, even if I can't make it, the club will get my money. Well done the board - fantastic offer

I know the point you are trying to make but I don't think it works when you have McClaren as manager. He is the old regime! Anyway, it hasn't worked because he clearly can't motivate a group of players that includes plenty of premier league and champions league winners

I disagree. He is more up to it than a number of individuals in the squad. And that's where he should be - in the squad. He perhaps is no longer a first choice, but I think you would have to be completely blinkered to suggest he wouldn't do a better all round job coming on than Kieran Richardson or Phil Neville. It is pure bloody-mindedness on the part of McClaren. Instead of focussing on his big-man act of chopping Beckham and how much the WAG's distracted the players, he should have focussed on some bloody tactics. Presumably the WAG's weren't in Croatia, so what's next to blame - the players having mobile phones?

Beckham may well be history for England but he was dropped from the squad for one reason and one reason only, and it wasn't to do with football. Are you seriously saying to me that the likes of Kieran Richardson deserve a squad place more than Beckham?

Yes, I begrudge McClaren the job. I've said since he was announced that his record did nothing to justify the choice. He isn't up to it. He was a good coach at Man Utd, but so was Brian Kidd. Forget the second goal - the Croats have forced half a dozen good saves from Robinson. We don't seem to have a clue which given the players we have is unforgiveable. SGE was pilloried for not having a Plan B. Well at least we had a Plan A, which we no longer seem to have. SGE was pilloried for not getting us past the quarter finals. Well at least we qualified every time. And the last competitive time we were beaten by 2 goals was 1993 under the last turnip we had as manager. A good manager makes all the difference. Look at Rovers. The whole is greater than the sum of the parts. I don't think you can say that of England

70 minutes and it's abysmal. The only glimmer of hope was that Middlesbore's strategy under McClaren in the UEFA cup was to go 3-0 down and then basically just chuck the kitchen sink and score 4. Although somehow I don't think that's going to happen.

For now Now it's 2

Surprised? Did you ever watch Middlesbore...?

You may get the score right but at the moment it's unlikely you'll get the result right

My local tattoo artist is a Burnley fan and refuses to do anything to do with Rovers! My missus got the initial "A" on her shoulder and I had to spell it for him