ZZ next - trouble at mill

Following the Pardew and Chappell revelations yesterday on the club and managers' views of the current plight of our club, Zherng Zhi is being linked with a £2m move to West Brom. In view of the comments expressed by both this is no surprise, so expect it to happen.

The mood at the Bilbao game will be interesting, both on and off the field and I am pleased I made the long drive south yesterday to be here (5 million motorway maintenance cones later - the southbound M6 and M1 is largely a single track road and should be relabelled as an A road until the work is finished).

Whilst it is very easy to be taken out of context or simply mis-quoted, the statements from plc Chairman Derek Chappell and Manager Alan Pardew yesterday were obviously not the result of a harmonious and well-managed communications exercise. Chappell has defended the "reconfiguration" in the squad's size and has hinted that all was not well within the enlarged camp last year. He spoke of not wanting any distractions and only players who want to be here etc. Marcus Bent aside (possibly Thomas too), I never got that impression, however, we didn't have the fight we needed in many games last year and the loan signings and end-of-season slump might support his view. He has also said one or more may yet go (read ZZ) but that we are looking to bring players in. Pardew on the other hand was equally forthright - "the agenda that I was given this year was a bit of a shock to me, especially the financial situation we're in which wasn't made clear to me." He also talks about having to manage to the Board's agenda, which is more of an accommodating statement, but my read here is that he probably feels most disappointed by the Bougherra sale, and to be fair to him, it probably is the biggest loss so far.

All-in-all, not the sort of contratemp you want with a week before the season kicks off. There will be added pressure on both the Board and the Manager for a good start which is unfortunate as it looks hard enough as things stand. I don't think eithers comments are necessarily wrong - we have needed something from the Board for a number of weeks and Pards is entitled to express his disappointment with the need to sell his better players - let's face it, none of us was expecting such a dramatic cut-back and the parachute money is obviously not being used to strengthen the squad. It would be good to see some evidence of squad togetherness this afternoon in what is much more likley to represent a Championship game than the tame friendlies so far. I would also like to see a united front from Chappell and Pards before next Saturday.