Nohairdontcare

Ritchie - for goals and assists and class.

I don't believe that the club is going to make any progress under Penney no matter how long he stays in charge. And the longer we slide further into oblivion, the harder it will be to regain the ground we've lost under someone else. For that reason, I think it's time for the axe to fall now. As for a successor, I'd be an Andy Ritchie fan... but over all I'd want anyone but Penney - even if we have to go through more managers over the next few seasons to find the right one for us. Well, anyone except Stephen Staunton.

I'm certainly no expert but I think if you have a crappy looking stadium it has to make you play, well, a bit more crappily...

Apologies if this has come up before, but over a pint last night I was thinking about the psychological factor of having a three sided stadium... I was wondering how it would affect Latics, the opposition, and home and away fans. As far as I see it, if someone knocked down a quarter of the building where I worked I'd feel like a bit of a loser compared to any rival companies. It must be the same for footballers, seeing their ground crumble can't be doing any favours for how they play. Then from the point of view of opposition, if you walk out of the tunnel and the first thing you see is an abandoned building site you'd have to be thinking "we can take this lot..." I'm sure it inspires visiting fans to take the pi** out of us too. So how many points has the knocked stand cost us? Or am I totally blowing it out of proportion and we're just playing rubbish anyway. Over to any budding psychologists out there...

I'm with Shefflatic on this one... All that's printed in the Chron report - as quotes - is "paper talk"... It could be that Hardy didn't want to give credence to the rumour by commenting on it in the first place. There's always a chance that an outright backing of Penney would - in the club's eyes - put more pressure on him etc etc etc. BUT... Two words aren't exactly going to deflect attention from the rumour very far. If the club was going to put it to bed totally, they could have given some other inane quotes "Dave's focussed on six big games up ahead, team performing well despite bad run of results etc etc etc blah" - but they didn't. Which leads me to the conclusion that there's something afoot.

The race to fill this job is as exciting as any soap opera... (groan)

Sounds to me like they're trying to put their own spin on this job opportunity....

Sure, stepping up the loan search... sure, he's going to "put things right"... It's getting a bit late in the season - and a bit desperate - to be talking about putting things right now. It's been on the slide for too long. I just hope we get lucky and stay up - and can put this pretty rotten season behind us.

Ha! I think the photo I sent to the Chron confirms that we're a very different bunch to the American girls... I don't think any of us could honestly be described as pretty - though my mate Noel does fancy himself a bit!

Heh heh heh ... AndyRichieshairgel is a pretty cool name... might change it by deed poll one of the days...

That's me folks... I'm the unlucky one who planned a whole trip only to be foiled by the frost... Still had a blast though - apologies for anybody we gave a headache to with our loud singing and bad pool playing in the pubs of Oldham on Saturday... The parts we remember were great fun. Hopefully I'll get to see a match next time.

The gloom around the club is bad enough at the moment without a half-hearted unfocused protest. It would achieve nothing, other than make the gloom worse.

Well I'm doing my (small) part in boosting crowd numbers anyway - I'm flying over from Dublin for the Brentford game on Jan 30th, and this time I'm dragging 6 mates along with me. I hope the pubs stock up on beer - and the snow better have gone by then!

I'm a Royle Army fan too. His writing style is certainly unique, and it's amusing trying to work out what's being said. Unless you've been on the bozze, in which case it's impossible.

I don't get to a lot of games, but I was at the Leeds match on Tuesday and it looked from where I was sitting that Penney was smiling and joking when we were a goal down. I'm no expert on management, but when we're losing to big rivals I don't reckon there's much to smile about - if you're losing and you see your manager beaming it's not exactly going to put the fear of God into you and inspire passion is it? I might be overreacting on this one - but it just didn't look right to me.

Heh heh heh... If I run into you tomorrow night I'll buy you a pint then - as long as someone can mind my pig while I'm at the bar (to be sure, to be sure).

That's a deal then. So, big Celtic fan are you? There's paddys, then there's plastic paddys.

No Shamrock Rovers supporters amongst us Diego... None that will admit to it anyway. And Leeslover - what's wrong with having a few paddys around Boundary Park? We can pave the carpark after the game if you like...

Well lads, there'll be guaranteed four extra supporters in Boundary Park tomorrow night... I'm travelling over from Dublin in the morning with three mates and looking forward to having a few pints before what will hopfully be a good match. If you hear a bunch of lads with Irish accents who sound like they've been enjoying a few beers then that's us!

Could never follow another club - I was born a Latics supporter and don't reckon I'm going to be born again...

Great thread - I'm going to try to do one up now... My boss will see the concentration on my face and think I'm working very hard...

RIP fellow Latics fan.

The only way I reckon a name change could boost the club would be if we were known as 'Championship side Oldham Athletic' - or even better 'Premier League outfit Oldham Athletic'... 'League Two strugglers Oldham Athletic' would be a disaster though.

According to a newswire which my mate has access to, Notts County's bid to sign Lee Hughes has 'stalled' as they've failed to agree terms... apparently they are still 'on-going' in a bid to 'thrash out a deal' though... I wonder how much he thinks he's worth? (sorry about putting subject in CAPITALS...)

Players seem to like him, he seems to target decent players - and get them signed - it looks good so far... I just hope we're not in for three losses in the first three games followed by season-long calls for his head.