posted Feb 16, 2007

It was an efficient performance against, lets be honest, league 2 standard opposition. I think the UEFA Cup needs shaking up a bit, it shows how poor the competition is that a part time Belgian club can be in the knockout phase.

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posted Feb 16, 2007

Did anyone hear Jo Royal last night saying that Martin’s is still yet to impress??? Has he not watched MOTD this season!

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posted Feb 16, 2007

omg any ur wrong newcastle were on fire they were brilliant and martins was great

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posted Feb 16, 2007

Roberon: youre right, they were a massive team back then, so I did not do red star much of a favour there... when I excluded the great ferencvaros side from that list I should had done the same with red star..

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posted Feb 16, 2007

Now and again an easy or easier draw than you would normally expect at this stage comes along and this is 1 of those times and as long as the players do not think ''job done''they should get through and who knows they may even go one better than Boro last season. One thing it proves though and that is the Prem clubs from England are getting closer to their Spanish counterparts(whom outside their top 4 are the strongest in Europe)........

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posted Feb 16, 2007

as a matter of fact cliftonvilleviena i watch the irish league at windsor park wer i very rarely see a bad performance from linfield, the only mathc i was dissapointe din was aginst use but use wer gr8 that day, and i wasnt refering to graeme souness it was the gr8 manager b4 that, use threw it all away no-one 2 blame but fredy shepard. well wen i have seen the toons play they have not looked convincing. face it newcastle have crumbled in the past years.

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posted Feb 16, 2007

I am a Newcastle fan but must agree largely with Andy.

On Martins - No-one can deny that he has scored some brilliant goals but his all-round play remains weak. When he goes to seek the ball (admirable) he often gets dragged far too out wide, leaving no-one at all in the centre. You could argue that we should have midfielders bursting through the middle, but that seldom happens so Martins' insistence on going walk about must be a negative. Martins is also pretty poor at holding up the ball. And whilst you might argue that Sibierski (if playing) can hold up the ball and play it through to Martins, this ignores reality. Martins barely ever sits on the last defernder waiting for a through ball or a ball over the top. I've heard it argue that he likes it into his feet, but if so, his first touch needs to be much better. Finally, when others have the ball Martins seems to have little idea of what to do in the box. So in last night's match, Duff had got past his man and was looking to play it into the box. Whilst Sibierski peeled off his man at the back post, Martins (instead of attacking the front post for Duff to play it in low) simply stood directly behind his marker where there was no chance of him receiving the ball.

On the performance last night - The commentators on 5 claimed that in the second half we were "punching holes" in their defence. Perhaps I was watching a different game, or perhaps this simply wasn't true. I didn't see much penetration from our strikers or midfielders. It is likely that were all of our players fit, Milner and Butt would not play (midfield of Dyer, Parker, Emre, Duff/N'Zogbia (latter if playing like last season); Owen and Martins up front).. and it shows because we are not playing that well. In short it was an efficient performance against low quality opposition.

An Arsenal fan said that he thought we played with a great deal of passion. Perhaps that is a reflection on the limited passion exhibited by his Arsenal team, because I fail to see much passion in the Newcastle team. This might be because some players are in their first season at the club, or because our starting XI has been so inconsistent this season.

This might seem terribly negative. But it should be more of a ralying cry. I refuse to forget that we once led the Premiership by 12 points, that we have beaten Barcelona 3 - 0 and the fantastic football that we often played under Keegan and Robson. And I do not believe that we should settle for what we are enduring at the moment - many average players playing with little spark.

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posted Feb 16, 2007

I THINK BEN COMMENTS RING VERY TRUE, BUT LETS BE GRATEFUL FOR THE POSITION WE ARE IN AT THE MOMENT.
AND HOPEFULLY IT WILL GET BETTER AND MAYBE EVEN QUALIFICATION FOR EUROPE IS POSSIBLE.
FINGERS CROSSED

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posted Feb 16, 2007

I hear where you coming from Ben, I feel Martins first touch is quite good considering some of the passes in from players are 'hit' into him...he needs to lay the ball off and hold it better..i disagree with his running wide as that is what all good forwards do..Anelka,Henry, Owen,Bellamy even Shearer ran the flanks.

Last night though there was professionalism rather than passion in the performance..we weren't full throttle. Maximum we were third gear.

By the way barcelona was 3-2 in favour to us not 3-0 under Dalglish.

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posted Feb 17, 2007

See the former Ipswich Town boys done good for you (Dyer and Bramble) our lads are good aren't they? Just see Darren Bent, Darren Ambrose, Matt Holland and all their old friends this season and last season. But I'm not going to far on Titus Bramble, he was good for us so I'm just saying that Newcastle United ruined all his potential

All joking by the way!

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