java2001e

yeah. i think its important that we get off to a good start after the start we had last season. still the bookies are making us 13/8 on so that should give us a bit of confidence.

yes this is a BIG season for the club and the manager.

agreed. but i think theyre gonna find it hard going. still, the first season you aim to survive, the second to consolidate and the third top 10. we'll see what they can do on saturday. the match is on live at 9pm out here, so i'm really looking forward to it.

Stressed-out football managers will be wired up this season to check for early signs of heart attacks. Monitors have been sent to every club and managers in the big Football League kick-off will have the first chance to try them out, with Premiership bosses joining in the scheme in a fortnight. In recent years, former Liverpool bosses Gerard Houllier and Graeme Souness suffered heart attacks and Kenny Dalglish became so stressed at Newcastle that he had to quit. New research shows that 44 per cent of managers are at risk. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/arti...79&in_a_source=

19 Aug 3:00PM Everton 8/13 Draw 12/5 Watford 5/1 the bookies favour us. and they dont seem to have done a lot to strengthen their squad since promotion. I'm going for us to win it by 2 - 0.

we need a certain amount of flexibility at the back as defence, (now weve gotta couple of good strikers), looks to be our weakest area. its a pity sol campbell is asking for silly wages, he's free and still good enough for england. he'd be a real asset in defence as long as he's not gone completely crazy that is!

i suspect that the bank has closed and that any new signings will be freebies, like buckley, or loans like howard.

its the standard font. its just not the standard size or colour.

and money seems to be the key to success. moyes made the point in his interview. "The top four always get about £10million from the Premier League in place money, maybe another £10million from being in the Champions League. That's around £20million each they get which the rest of the division do not, and that happens every season. "Liverpool have been in the Champions League for all but one season since I have been at Everton, and that gives them and the rest of the top four more money from the start. "We can't get that money. That's why I ask for a little bit of understanding, from the fans and from the people who write about the game, to understand what the difference is." personally i dont see why the fa should hand out so much cash to the top four. they get more cash from bigger gates anyway, fa money should be shared out more evenly among more clubs in the premiership to create a more competitive environment.

i think bt needs a good season. he's shown occassional flashes of class, but they have been far too occassional. i think he could be replaced by anichebe if the early promise he's shown turns out to be the real thing. i saw him on tv in the celtic game and thought he was really impressive. a strong, fearless, traditional english style forward. we could have a real quality striker there.

read somewhere that it was 27mill.

bt has shown flashes of quality, but thats not enough, youve gotta get the goals as well. 10 in a season isnt good enough for a teams top striker he should be on at least 14 or 15. our negative goal difference is the one statistic i would really like to get rid of. partnered with aj i think we should see a much improved and more prolific attack in the coming season. especially if the midfielders like cahill, osman and arteta score a few as well.

actually our squad isnt that small now. ive just checked out the chelski website and theyve got 30 first team players listed. weve got 28. thats not so bad.

oh yes he is.

i agree. there is a sense of genuine optimism about the club and rightly so. weve made steady progress, we are no longer relegation fodder and we are taken more seriously by the rest of the premiership.

He was here for years and he didn't do anything special. Okay - he had a fantastic half season with Carsley when he KNEW that Real were at the door knocking. to say he only started to play AFTER real madrid were interested is ridiculous. if he wasnt any good before they were interested they wouldnt have come looking in the first place! at the time he was our best player by far and we obviously struggled after he left. he still has a good 2 or 3 seasons in him and he may be worth half a mill then. if we can sign him for the right price we should, but i doubt if we will get the chance. newcastle look likely to get him and with scott parker and damien duff in the side they will have a formidable midfield.

we now seem to have a sense of direction. better training ground, progress in seeking a new stadium, money for new players and a genuine desire for real progress. we are moving in the right direction after being in the doldrums for far too long.

the income from a new stadium is important, and the ability to extend to 70,000 later, will be a nice little earner for us. whether we like it or not, (and i dont), it seems that money is the most important factor in the game today, the top four are also the top four for money. at least the board seem to be seriously interested in the developmet of the club and are making an effort to bring us into the big money league. i suppose you can't ask for much more than that from them.

theyre spending a bit of cash tho. it'll be interesting to see how they go this season without their "star striker"!

someone will get graveson. he hasnt made an impact at real and after the fracas last week he will definitely go. he did a good job for us but dont know if he could do it again. but the price seem ok. he'd be worth a punt.

midfielders are defensive or attacking, but that doesnt mean that their skills dont overlap. they do. gravvers could hold the ball until the forwards were in place and then release it. that was his job.

http://tinyurl.com/qfows "Moyes is approaching his sixth season at Goodison Park, and some would say he is no nearer cracking the big boys' cartel. He took over in March 2002, and has finished 15th, seventh, 17th, fourth and 11th." its worth a read.

You just posted the same thing in 2 threads! 2 threads on the same topic, tommy grav! i dont think carsley has the same ability to hold things up in midfield as gravvers had. he could take the ball, virtually stand still with it while holding off other players before releasing it. he's never made an impact at real and i never thought he would. its a different game over there.

i hope that the best is going to be AJ. koldrup was a non-starter and something of a mystery. now you see him, now you dont!

if chelsea have been poaching, and they have behaved questionably in the matter of ashley cole, (and so has cole, incidentally), they should be hit where it hurts, and thats not in their wallet. bates isnt the only one to gripe about chelsea. its reasonable to ask if their seemingly endless supply of cash has been a bad thing for soccer. and not just in the uk! blatter, has also made the same point, because they have had an impact worldwide, not just here. it may be time to take a fresh look at the structure of the business side of the game, to see if the situation they have created can be changed to make it a more level playing field.