BlueStar

So, three seperate campaigns split between Rick Astley, the Pogues and Jeff Buckley up against the marketing behemoth of X Factor. It ain't going to happen. All Christmas number ones have been shit since the dawn of time anyway and it's only rose tinted glasses which make yesteryears seem any better than todays. I'm sure in 20 years there'll be campaigns to get the 2008 X-Factor songs back to number one instead of what the general public is into then as well.

Well done Blyth Spartans, they might be a town full of smackheads but they're doing themselves proud in the cup. Sam Asdaprice new Blackburn manager.

Get in, 3-Nowt thank you very much. Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, oh what fun it is to see Newcastle win away Puts us above Spurs and Man City

My lass's brother's just been on Sky Sports cos they zoomed in on his mate for having a turkey on his head. Why do teams insist on singing that god-awful "By far the greatest team" song even if they have to mangle their name beyond all recognition to fit it in? If your team doesn't have four syllables just give it up and find another song rather than singing "And it's pooooorrr tah sum murth"

Your players seem to be playing with a lot more confidence now they know they're not going to get a tactics board to the face from some huffy bairn if they screw up

Had that as my message tone for ages. I've also got the Phoenix Wright "Cornered" theme, the Mega Man 2 title music, Lucca's theme from Chrono Trigger and Bloody Tears and Vampire Killer from Castlevania

Stayed in town to watch the Man U match, hoping that seeing a Sunderland torn apart by Ronaldo might cheer me up after Stoke's last minute equaliser (We were absolutely coasting in the first half, could have been 4 or 5 up, then once again we make some stupid changes at half time and fall apart, Stoke were the better team in the last 45 and could have even won it). But the mackems made a good showing of themselves, they looked better at Old Trafford with no manager than they have for about two months playing no-marks under Keane.

More: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/football/article2006549.ece Wonder if the chalk board had tripped him up on his way to the toilet the week before and he was waiting to get his revenge? Hack the board! I actually feel a bit sorry for the fella, he looked pretty despondent when he left the ground for the last time

He got them promoted from an utterly shite league, even Mick McCarthy did that. Money doesn't guarantee success but when you spend more money than Liverpool, Man U, Chelsea and Arsenal during the summer you can't justify your pay packet while being on a losing streak in the relegation zone at Christmas with half the fans booing you. He's left them with a team full of over-priced duds and mercenaries and it's going to take someone pretty special to come in and salvage the mess he left behind when he bottled it and walked out - and that's a view point you'll find amongst a fair amount of mackems, never mind Newcastle fans (many of whom spent the day on message boards praying that the rumours weren't true and he was going to stay)

What, at the moment or ever? A respected manager? It's his first job, he's spent an absolute fortune, had an awful run of results and made some baffling team selections (players starting one game, not even on the bench the next), a sizeable portion of the crowd turned against him and he quit. This was supposed to be his stepping stone to the Man U job when Fergie retired, do you think he's got any chance of being taken on any half decent English side now?

Aye, didn't look like a great attendance like

On the one hand, any manager in the world would like to be backed as much as he's backed Keane so that might attract a higher calibre manager to the job. On the other hand, is there any money left after Keano's spending spree (Sunderland were the sixth highest spenders in the world in the summer)? And are the players he's bought going to bring in much money if they're sold on by a new gaffer who wants to bring his own men in? Doesn't seem like the players are too sad to see him go http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/sunderland/3551680/Sunderland-players-celebrate-after-Roy-Keane-resigns-Football.html Resigning by text message and then refusing to answer his phone to Niall, classy.

A warning about Allerdyce, if you give him the job be prepared for him to drop your best players on the basis that they didn't have an optimum heartrate in training according to all his crazy computerised shit. That's how we played Alan Smith week in, week out in spite of him being worse than useless.

If anything we were too cloak and dagger, there was media speculation he'd walked and no word from the club for 3 days solid, no press releases, no mention on the official site, nowt.

Interesting to contrast with the Keegan saga - looks like Keegan's leaving, Sky Sports News grinds to a halt and reports on nothing else for 3 days. Keano looks like he's leaving and they're showing last nights carling cup goals, Kevin Pietersen and Amir Khan. Realistically I think the best you can hope for is Phil Brown, but whether he'd leave a Hull side on such a high I dunno. Mixed response on the Sunderland message board, some of the posts make the idea of Newcastle fans having unrealistic expectations a bit laughable mind - but to be fair there are also mackems who understand reality as well. http://www.readytogo.net/smb/forumdisplay.php?f=86

Deffo - who do you want in now, Rijkaard or Mourinho? Mackem on Sky Sports news has just said you should get O'Neill as he's done a good job at Villa On the other hand, Allerdyce is still available I reckon Keanurr will be off to Celtic before the season's out, that or the Irish national team.

Looks like Roy Keane's thrown his toys out the pram and left the mackems http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/s/sunderland/7764671.stm

The first team that beat Chelsea, or the first team that lost to Hull and Stoke while their bairns were tonking Wigan?

The main situation is that they acted like they won the title when they beat us and forgot about the rest of the season, losing 6 out of 7 games since then. Keane is being very non-commital about his future in the press, but he could just be trying to wheedle a better deal. Not that he's not really in much of a position to do that, having bought and sold more than 100 players during his 100 games in charge, spent about £40m and still having a team in the relegation zone being beaten 4-1 at home to Bolton.

Hmm, doesn't seem to work for me, I can run it and everything but I just get silence when I type.

What's going to happen about Drogba twatting a coin into the crowd then? If it'd been Barton he'd have been banned from football and on death row by now and there'd be tabloid pull-outs with pictures of some 9 year old girl with stitches above her eye talking about how she was too scared to go to a football match ever again. Apparently if the fan who threw it originally is found he's going to be banned from all stadiums for life, does that go for Drogba as well?

I graduated in 2001 and I've still got about £5,800 to pay off. I wouldn't worry about it too much, when I was skint and working in bars I didn't pay it because obviously I was below the earning threshold. Now I'm earning a decent wage it's just another in the long list of deductions (tax, national insurance, union fees, pension) that come off your wage before it even gets to your bank account so you don't really miss it.

Just back from the match - Good performance, deserved win in spite of some woeful officiating and a much needed 3 points taking us above the mackems and within a point of Man City. Only negative from tonight is that our second goal cost me £35 because one of my bets was a quid on 1-0 Martins first scorer

Roy Keane sent to the stands for kicking off with the officials at half time : peace: Won't be releasing a DVD of this game then. Brought Alex into my fantasy team this week, one goal, one assist, clean sheet