Merrick's Marvels

Drives me crazy but today I bloody love him!

They ain't reading otib during the game, mate! (If they've any sense, they ain't reading it at all.)

Tom agrees 100% and remembers it to this day. Not impressed by the referee, shall we say. Hear, hear. Let's hope the team do him proud this afternoon. Top man.

It's because we had 12 days to rest, recuperate and prepare in detail. The minute we return to Sat-Tues-Sat I suspect it'll be the same old same old, I'm afraid. Hope I'm wrong.

Indeed. Even though neither are in any way responsible for this mess - someone else has shat the bed and they're being asked to clean up. Meanwhile, deafening silence from the man who is ultimately responsible. Would love to see Twentyman get the chance to quiz him properly but doubt our owner has the balls for that.

When have we not been?

Surprised that sh!te rag is still going. Obsolete and irrelevant.

"Yeah....." ?

I hear your frustration but it doesn't work like that.

A very Pearson response. But at least his response wasn't "we're not looking to do any business" and so, by implication, confirming we are trying to get some new faces through the door. On the other hand, he might just have double bluffed us. I bet he's good at poker.

Agree in principle but suspect we're in such a pickle that beggars can't be choosers. Perhaps we'll need to cash in the options we hold on Kelly, Webster, Brownhill too?

If it makes the football bearable, I'm game!

Whether we can stay up this season is open to debate, although the odds are in our favour. But unless more clubs get walloped with points deductions - and not us! - next season looks bleak to me. A business in this much trouble often requires a fire sale and that seems to be where we are - so who knows how long we can keep hold of Kalas, Scott, Benarous, Bentley, Massengo. As for the high-earners we really want rid of, doubtless they'll still be here, a millstone round our neck. Talk about up shit creek without a paddle.

Because we're trying to avoid a relegation battle.

I must admit, that's not the team I'd have picked with the players available today but what do I know. It was certainly a brave attacking lineup.

Exactly which of the players he signed did he say tonight aren't good enough? Name them.

Well quite, I suspect hell will have to freeze over before a millionaire footballer goes out with Nora Batty. As for Kalas, the only reason to countenance his departure is because it might loosen the purse strings at a time when we're feeling the pinch - it's nothing to do with the player himself, undoubted quality that he is, it's everything to do with the state the club is in generally and how 1 player leaving might enable improvement in the squad as a whole. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

I don’t disagree. But we don’t have De Bruyne, Salah, Kante and so on. We have a collection of misfits who week on week demonstrate an inability to pass the ball. The manager saw this in the summer and decided the most pragmatic way of grinding out results in the short term was something a little more direct and physical. It's a short term fix.

Go back to the start of the season. What style of play would you have spent pre-season drilling into us, given the resources available at that point? No-one is enjoying our current style. Pearson is simply being pragmatic, until such time he has the opportunity to make meaningful changes.

Pearson has decided on a certain style of play, one he thinks will get the most out of our limited resources. This style of play requires a physical presence up front. Martin is the only who can provide it. It ain't pretty. And it doesn't get the best out of Martin either. But he's been asked to play a certain way and he gives it 100%, even though he knows, and Pearson knows, it's not playing to his strengths. Picking Weimann and Wells together, or one of them up front on their own, would require us to play inch perfect pass and move attacking football. How do you think that would turn out??? 90 minutes on the back foot, that's how. Our style of play will improve in time, probably with very few of the current squad still here.

When was this? Was it when he heard Steve Lansdown had offered him the manager's job?

As far as cross-city rivalry in England is concerned, the North East and Midlands don't come close. Imagine you're the pre-eminent side in your city, half a dozen times crowned the best team in England, winning numerous cups, producing international footballers some of them legends of the game, never out of the top flight of English football. Your city rivals are second division also rans, an irrelevance. Then you stop winning, round about the time the other lot, the also rans, appoint some bloke called Shankly. The rest is history - the other lot exceed all your achievements - and then some - more championships, more cups, more internationals. Even worse, the other lot conquer Europe, again and again. They become pre-eminent, you are irrelevance. That's never happened in the North east or the Midlands. That's the source of their anger and bitterness. Kind of understandable, although Scousers, born with a chip on both shoulders, do anger and bitterness particularly well. The only other place in Britain to rival that strength of feeling is Glasgow, and there's a whole heap of other reasons for that obviously. Rangers weren't going mental because they won the league last season- they were going mental because they'd stopped Celtic winning 10 in a row. Similarly, Evertonians have never been happier in recent times than when Fergie's ManU ruled the roost - because it meant Liverpool weren't.

Gary Owers scored in the first minute - City 0 Sunderland 1 - can't remember exact year, might have been 87. A night game, Owers scored at the open end, sliding in at the far post. Probably the year Sunderland were champions under Denis Smith. We huffed and puffed all night but couldn't find an equaliser. The rubbish you remember, eh?

He will - but it's a long term fix not a quick one. It requires time and money, neither of which he's had. Yes it's rubbish at the moment, We just have to pray we can grind it out this season. After that, if Pearson is given sufficient time, the team will look completely different to the current bunch of misfits. AND we'll be playing better football. The clues are already there - Atkinson wasn't bought because he's 6'3", he was bought because he's 6'3" and can pass the ball. Tanner started at Man Utd, so good pedigree, and at Carlisle proved himself an excellent attacking full back. Expect more in a similar vein. What we need is time. No idea if Pearson will be given it or if relegation can be avoided but that's the answer to properly fixing this thing - time and money. Someone other than Pearson may be capable of getting better results with the current lot but not by much and we certainly wouldn't be knocking it around like Barcelona.

My reaction too. This says an awful lot about the state of us at the moment - it's November and we're already worrying about the results around us.