As the season draws to a close.

Boyd : 16 goals including 7 penalties

Barker: 17 goals including 7 penalties

Boyd out Hartlepool, 625K in

Barker reportedly 75K

and your point is

if we'd have resigned Boydy, we would have an extra 16 goals and be in a play off spot
and a fight every time we got a penalty

The point is, the bloke who has been vilified has performed better than the messiah.

Where would you put Brown if Boyd had been signed?? Or Porter??

Or are we going back to 4-2-4??

Penalties don't count only if you are called Ritchie Barker....

PS

Did anyone else notice how fat 'Licckle Adam' is now, judging from the Championship highlights he is going to jack football in and become a Sumo

He's never got back to the player he was in 2004/2005. If he had he wouldn't be playing at this level, or he'd be doing a damn site better at it.

I think that once a players hits a height and then comes back down a division, they know themselves that they're as high as they'll get and stop trying as hard.

Also, wasn't Boydy only £550k going out?

Barker does not bring half as much to the team as Boydy did tho Kev, Boydy single handedly created a lot of goals for other players. Barker doesnt! I would much rather have a player of boydys ability, whether he is fat or not. He could well be a sumo but he would still be more mobile than Barker

precisely. I would never usually knock someone like Richie Barker but Wilson's ridiculous persistence in giving him 90 minutes every week has left me very frustrated with his continued selections.

You must surely agree that he has been overused this season PK?

He's actually 10 pounds lighter than when he left Pools. But you already knew that didn't you?.

Did he lose another bet in the bookies like

It's like comparine a sports car to a pick up truck, they both do a job, but I know what I prefer watching.

Well it must of been the camera or camera angle because he looks like dibbles twin

Boydys not fat, he is just filling out a bit like all lads in their mid to late twenties. One thing I have noticed is when players leave pools they put on the muscle. I dont think we do any weight training at Pools. Thats why we always lose out physically.

But don't strikers get judged on their stats?? And if not, what the bloody fook is an 'assist??' Does it mean a pass??

So really the bottom line here is that you'd rather have a player who scores less goals because he's fun to watch??

I don't ever remember a time when Pools fans were so discerning.

And if stats aren't important, don't ever mention gate figures again. Or bench appearances. Or England caps, or gate prices, or..............

MJ, Croydon, burn the lot!! We want fun not numbers!!

Kevin must bite the bullet and accept that he's no longer properly placed to be an HUFC match commentator. In roughly the same way as that one-legged man had insufficient credentials for the role of Tarzan........

The stats show that our home crowds have been diminishing this season and the stats also show that we are one of the highest scorers at home in the division. So why won't people flock to see this high scoring outfit?

Not that old chestnut again.......

Last season when we were knocking out 1-0's with mind numbing repetition, everyone was over the moon, Brian.

This season we're doing 4-0's, 4-1's, 4-2's, 3-0's, 3-2s 3-1's and it's bad to watch? Now it's not what we do, it's how we do it?? Even though we're among the leading scorers in the division??

Even sight unseen, that's madness.

And again, he said, with a blue face, you're looking at the wrong end of the pitch.

But seeing as the only answer you ever seem to have is that I dunno, because I don't go, then henceforth I shall hold my peace and you lot can swap razor blades, brandy and pills, OK??

So here's a non performance related question, why do you bother if it's so bad??

You can talk, you're a bird.

Apparently they score the wrong kind of goals.

Aye, a 4-3 win against the fifth placed team in the division must have been purgatory. As must a 4-0 win against Luton. Poor souls...

You are of course correct. I shall humbly accept your eye witnessed, balanced, even handed, fair assessments.

But really, what I don't like about Kev's opinions about matches he doesn't see is not so much that he hasn't seen them, but that his opinions are so parental
He reminds everyone in an uncomfortable way of times when we weren't allowed to make our own minds up. As in 'you can't want chocolate AND crisps...you'll be sick' or, 'Oh you don't want to watch that..it's a load of rubbish.' Now it's 'Oh you don't really want Joel Porter up front, it's the back line that's the problem'



(And the other problem, the real problem, is probably that poor old Kev isn't here and so he's missing matches something rotten)

I really am trying to explain what the problem is, that's why it's so hard to imagine what it's like if you're not there... it may appear good, but it's not, it's very odd, very flat.

Perhaps it's because every time we get a great spectacle like the 4-2 away win away at Orient it is followed up by a drab 1-0 defeat to an average Walsall team. Or the great 3-1 home win against Tranny which was followed by a drab 3-1 away defeat at Yeovil or the 4-3 cracker at home to Southend which was followed by an abysmal, clueless performance at Doncaster.

We have had some excellent performances this season but they have been sporadic, for every Orient(A), Tranny (H) and Gillingham (H) there has been two or three Cheltenham (H), Donny (A) and Swindon (A). We have played some great football this season but not enough, some of the matches have been the worst we have seen in years and worse than anything Martin Scott ever dragged out. The Northampton home match was one of the most nauseating games of football I have ever watched and if you'd been there you would understand people's frustration especially given that two of our better performers McCunnie and Monky were sat twiddling their thumbs on the bench while Thompson and Antwi put in yet another below par performance.

'Last season when we were knocking out 1-0's with mind numbing repetition'. There was nothing mind numbing about last season and at the height of our run we scored 3 on six different occasions in the space of nine matches and of the three games in between we even nicked a couple of well-earned 1-0 away wins. Who the hell would complain about that?

I am not depressed about this season as there have been some great games but on the whole it has been frustrating as with better management we would still have something to play for.

Richie Barker has been frustrating to watch at times but not half as frustrating as Danny Wilson's continual refusal to take him off when he is clearly goosed. He averages a goal from open play every 3 and a half games, that isn't good enough IMO and if we are serious about next season then that is an area we need to address.

Ah, well. You see in the time honoured and usual fashion it's not me who's making the point, it's you who's missing it.

This season, it hasn't really mattered who is up front. It's the fact that whoever is, and however many they score, in whatever fashion, the back five are cheerfully matching them goal for goal.

I acknowledge that that's a stat like, but they seem to make the league placings out of stats. Maybe you'd do it differently?? If your favourite player scores a goal we'll get an extra point, and if you don't like the keeper, well if he lets one in it won't count.

Oi!!! Barwick!!! C'mere....

Right, well I'm not there, as everyone continually reminds me when I try and shine a ray of light into your gloom.

I shall try and compensate by watching Barkers goals on Poolsworld and shoving bamboo splinters under my toenails as they go in OK??

I could tell you somewhere better to stick em..... but you'd probably end up enjoying it.