I'm not against Smith. I thought he's done what was asked for him when it was obvious Bruce was a busted flush. He deserved this season I think on merit. The whole summer rebuild was madness and hampered him but he had no option. Wrong players bought - certainly. More premier experience needed, definetely. Covid compounded it to my mind - four months off when half the team was new. Rotten luck. Not so sure we give him next season though if we go down. On the one hand i think we would be up there next season in the championship if he stayed. On the other hand, i've got increasingly worried about his judgement since we returned. The liverpool game has really bugged me if im honest and the forward situation. If you haven't got a forward worthy of the name then play a midfielder there, or a youth player who knows where the net is.. Anything. Don't just stick a guy with the attacking threat of a rubber sword up front and hope. And then witter on about how many chances we created afterwards. We know. We could be still playing now, have chances in 3 figures and we still wouldn't have scored. I've got nothing against Davis and i think a lot of his play is rather good, but he's utterly pointless as a forward and the longer Smith plays him, the more doubts i have about him staying next season.
Quote from: sickbeggar on July 07, 2020, 12:17:52 AMI'm not against Smith. I thought he's done what was asked for him when it was obvious Bruce was a busted flush. He deserved this season I think on merit. The whole summer rebuild was madness and hampered him but he had no option. Wrong players bought - certainly. More premier experience needed, definetely. Covid compounded it to my mind - four months off when half the team was new. Rotten luck. Not so sure we give him next season though if we go down. On the one hand i think we would be up there next season in the championship if he stayed. On the other hand, i've got increasingly worried about his judgement since we returned. The liverpool game has really bugged me if im honest and the forward situation. If you haven't got a forward worthy of the name then play a midfielder there, or a youth player who knows where the net is.. Anything. Don't just stick a guy with the attacking threat of a rubber sword up front and hope. And then witter on about how many chances we created afterwards. We know. We could be still playing now, have chances in 3 figures and we still wouldn't have scored. I've got nothing against Davis and i think a lot of his play is rather good, but he's utterly pointless as a forward and the longer Smith plays him, the more doubts i have about him staying next season.Steve Bruce ‘the busted flush’ has Newcastle in a league position I’d love us to be in,He didn’t quite manage to get us up but he steadied the ship and got us going in the right direction to be fair to him. I don’t think he deserved all the flak he got to be honest.
Unfortunately not. Training is for the first team only. No academy provision unless chosen to train with the main squad. Think Vassilev is the only one.
The start of last season was atrocious. The defence we began the season with was an absolute disgrace.
Quote from: Legion on July 07, 2020, 11:50:09 AMUnfortunately not. Training is for the first team only. No academy provision unless chosen to train with the main squad. Think Vassilev is the only one.I'm not going to comment on Vassilev's performances as he's hardly had any time, but what are his strengths? Quick, strong, eye for goal, tricky, good in the air? Any of those?