TravellingWanderer

Depends on the team and formation, O'Brien at right back again and I will go 0-2. If we play 4-4-2 then I am going 3-1 if Elmander starts and 2-1 if he is only on the bench.

Elmader wasn't helped by being played out of position early in the season - Hull away for example when he wasn't in the game. As soon as he reverted to the middle there was a marked improvement which I don't think was a coincidence.

I think Cahill is now worth the same as we paid for him, Sunderland just overpaid for Ferdinand.

I justy feel Everton is another team we accept that we will lose to and is not classed as important to staying up.

Sounds like it couldn't have been much worse. Steinsson is a good crosser of the ball and can see the reason for him being selected on the right of midfield and AOB played right back at Newcastle a few times, but still think Basham would have been the better option.

Depends whether we go a for dull draw or whether we go and play like we did first half at Blackburn, if we do the former we will lose 1-0 if we do the latter we will win 3-1 (Taylor Davies and Davies)

Looks like a physical game as well - just what we wanted

Apparently the prozone stats showed he wasn't contributing very much to the team this season. Megson also knew the last manager to drop Nolan was immediately sacked. I think he will do well at Newcastle, a new start and new challenge will see a return to something like the player he was

Everton v Bolton, 1 points Bolton v West Ham, 3 points Bolton v Newcastle, 1 points Stoke v Bolton 0 points Bolton v Fulham, 3 points West Brom v Bolton, 1 point Bolton v Boro 3 points Chelsea v Bolton, 1 points Portsmouth v Bolton, 1 point Bolton v Aston Villa, 0 points Wigan v Bolton, 1 point Bolton v Sunderland, 3 point Bolton v Hull, 3 points Man City v Bolton, 0 points 21 points so 48 overall I had Boro' Portsmouth and WBA to go down

We went to the Roma Lazio game a couple of years ago and got tickets the day before from a tobacconist the hotel sent us to. Most hotels should be able to tell you where the nearest one is. The ground wasn't full anyway. Those WBA prices aren't too bad, they charged Everton fans ?43 earlier in the season.

Thome beat me

Megson was apparently trying to push them forward but the players didn't respond. If we had played the second half like the first half we would have won. Would have taken a point before the game, so can't be too critical. They'll make an issue about Jussi not being sent off, but SKY said Emerton should have gone first half.

Defending too deep apparently - also stopped attacking - though sounds like Megson is not happy and trying to push them out a bit

Confirmed on SKY that we won 1-0

Sky have said that Basham and Nolan are running the midfield winning everything.

Most experienced bench for some time - Interesting Smolarek and Riga have been named ahead of Obedayi after all the media coverage.

Smolarek, Shittu to name but two - though they are in the minority, so I still back his transfer deals. Whether Megson is prepared to throw him in this season is another question.

If he had left both of the new signings out last weekend and kept to the squad he already had, everyone would have been saying what is the point of bringing in two new players if they aren't good enough to get in the team when we had so many missing and were on a poor run. It was a no win situation. Personally I think Shittu should have played instead of O'Brien and Smolarek does deserve a chance, I have largely liked what I have seen.

We possibly do have 12 million to spend, as it is about what we spent last January, I know we also sold Anelka but apparently the money was there for all the transfers before Anelka waa sold. Whether we should spend it all on one player is a different question.

In fairness when Megson gets to speak to his transfer targets they do tend to sign, Cahill, Taylor and Steinsson all had other offers last January

A lot of Basham's alleged poor passes were because no one was prepared to run onto forward passes - I felt some of them were good balls, shame the rest of the team weren't prepared / allowed to move forward. The bug guy won a fair few headers early on, but when you play up front on your own, there isn't really much point winning them if there is no one to head it on to. To be fair can't judge him on just Saturday - lets see what he is like with a bit of service.

I would leave Nolan on the bench and let Basham keep his place - the fact that you don't automatically get your place back may teach Nolan to keep his mouth shut and not get suspended in the first place.

Probably due to them always standing we had to give them mainly the lower tier - safety reasons and all that

Admittedly we do have a small squad, but would many / any (Guthrie maybe, but he was only on loan?) of those who Megson deemed surplus to requirements have improved us, Anelka and Diouf chose to leave. Taken from the 2007/8 team photo, the players inherited by Megson, the following is a list of those that have left. http://www.bwfc.premiumtv.co.uk/page/Galle...1086034,00.html Daniel Braaten Heidar Helguson Gerald Cid Abdoulaye Meite Blerim Dzemaili Abdoulaye Faye (already departed before Megson arrived) Ian Walker Lubomir Michalik Mikel Alonso Johann Smith Christian Wilhelmsson Gary Speed Ivan Campo Daniel Guthrie Andranik Stelios These have been replaced by Gary Cahill Fabrice Muamba Matthew Taylor Johan Elmander Ebi Smolarek Gretar Steinsson Mustapha Riga Sebastien Puygrenier Ariza Makukula Dan Shittu Tamir Cohen That means a loss of 7 players from the squad, but with the exception of Anelka I feel that all the new players are an improvement on those that they have replaced. Megson may have his critics on a number of issues, but I don't think his transfer activity can be included in that. Tactically maybe another thing, though I think a large part of the problem maybe related to his backroom staff. There is no problem with a manager having negative tendencies provided there is someone working alongside who is more adventurous, unfortunately Steve Wigley is even more negative than Megson and I feel a large part of the problem. The negativity is highlighted by the fact that only 6 players have scored in the league this season and the top 2 in the assist column are defenders.

If Gardner was injured then the substitution was the best one to be made, however, we should have kept the same formation and put him in midfield and not switched from a 4 5 1 to 5 3 2 formation.