It's the big one

Tomorrow sees us come up against our rivals, Arsenal, in their own backyard. Let's not beat around the bush with this one either; this is our biggest match to-date this season.

I don't think Robbie Keane has made the situation easier. Saying that we've got a better squad than them makes Wenger's job a whole lot simpler. Both sets of players are hyped up for this one as it is, pinning Keane's comments to the dressing room door could give them some extra impetus.

How do you think Harry will get the lads to play? It's a given that Crouch will partner Keano up top, so will Harry ask them to pump long balls up? Bentley will also start, which I personally think is great. Scoring that goal he did against them last season should be ringing around in his head and to be honest, I believe Bentley will make the difference tomorrow.

All that said, I still think we'll do well to come away with a point.

THBN Prediction: Arsenal 2-2 Spurs

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What Academy?

I read Mihir Bose's article on Harry's comments relating to the players Arsenal are bringing on.

Harry made a few interesting comments that I never knew were not in fruition at Spurs. For example, he said that Arsenal "have got full-time scouts all around the world and they have invested heavily". So does that mean we don't?

I'm not too sure of what to make of this? I would have thought that a club of our stature was surely employing a network of scouts from around the world? If we are to take Harry's word for it, then we do not.

Now, I find this interesting on two fronts. Firstly, because this means players are being offered to us either via sporting agents, or via word-of-mouth. Secondly, this must leave Harry with little time. He should have enough on his plate and with the added incentive of being a psychologist to Pavlova, his time must be extremely limited.

We all know how Harry works. He can be a bit of a craft so and so now and again, and it's fairly obvious that he plans to talk to Daniel Levy about us employing a network of scouts. Or, he's already spoken to Daniel, and our Chairman has said that he'll think about it; so out comes Harry with his media rendition, so as to hurry up the decision making process.

If Harry and Danny have had a chat about matters such as these, then surely we shouldn't be thinking about making these kinds of moves, but rather, doing them.

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White Kop Lane

What did you make of the Kop-style stand? To be honest, I was fairly annoyed with it at first, but it's definitely begun to grow on me.

I'm no architect, so I can't really comment on the acoustics that the new ground will create, but it looks as though KSS (the projects architects) and Levy are pretty adamant that the noise circulating around the stadium will be ferocious.

Taking a look at the above image, it looks as though they've stuck to their guns and made the stands incredibly close to the pitch, which, as we all know, new stadium designers aren't too fond of.

Does anyone have have the slightest inkling on how long it will take for planning permission of this magnitude to be given? I've heard rumours that it could be anywhere from 3-15 months, which really does narrow it down.

Whatever happens, it looks as though Daniel Levy & Joe Lewis are confident that the new Lane will be finalised by the 2015/2016 season. Let's hope they've counted their pennies, as stadia projects like this one don't come cheap.

Arsenal have never recovered from the £390 million investment in the Emirates stadium. The two clowns that run Liverpool thought about building a new stadium, but then realised the cost and pulled out.

I sort of have faith in Levy though. The guy has proved that he's a shrewd businessman and when the chips are down, he has the nack of turning things around.

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Sacked!

Just read that CSKA Moscow have sacked Juande Ramos!

He was only there for about 2 months or so.

Anyway, do you fancy leaving any messages for poor old Juande?

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Don't blame Lennon

Right then, where do I start? I was at the game and those following my tweets could see that bent frustration I and all those around me felt.

I thought the long walk back to the car after seeing us lose was bad enough; how mistaken I was. We had to endure Harry telling us that he was a bit miffed with Aaron Lennon because he came off without telling anyone.

Firstly, that's not true. I was in the Paxton end and could see very clearly that Lennon went down and then came off just a few metres from the dugout. Danny Murphy (our physio) quickly ran out to Lennon. Danny, explained to Harry that Aaron could not carry on.

Now that we've cleared that up, let's talk about the match. Firstly, when you're playing sides like Stoke, it's fairly obvious that you shouldn't be lobbing long balls up to your strikers. In my opinion, you shouldn't be doing that anyway, no matter what side you're facing, but against Stoke, it's a big no-no. Why? Because their centre-backs can lap balls like that up until the cows come home. We didn't do this a lot in the first half, but during the second half, it became plan A, B & C. Secondly, you don't play two defensive-midfielder's in Palacios and Huddlestone.

Stoke had set out their stool. They decided to go for it and so deployed a 4-4-2 formation. Harry may as well have played a 4-5-1. I'm not sure why, but Robbie, for large portions of the match, was coming so deep. Huddlestone did nothing, and I mean nothing. This game was crying out for Jenas, or another attack-minded midfielder to play alongside Palacios, yet we decided to not go all-out. Can someone explain why? I would ask Harry, but he just wants to rant about Lennon going off.

The truth is that we did have chances and quite of lot of them. It was just one of those days, but if Harry had opted for a more adventurous line-up, you may have been reading a different sort of article.

Fulham and West Ham did us a favour and we're still in the top four, but if we continue to deploy tactics like the one 36,000+ of us witnessed on Saturday, that top four will be a distant dream.

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Spurs vs. Stoke - Your Predictions

This will be an interesting one. Harry's been in our minds and hearts for a year now and what a year it's been! I remember his first game in charge. We beat Bolton 2-0 and he was out on the touchline, full of enthusiasm. It really was such a change from the lost looks Juande used to pull.

Not much has changed to be honest. The man worked miracles in his first season. Okay, so he continually told us that we only had 2 points from 8 games when he came in, but that's some achievement.

Stoke, unfortunately, are no Bolton. I wish I could see us getting a 2-0 result, but I have my reservations. Pulis will tell his team to go out and batter us. It's up to the lads wearing the Lilywhite to try and overcome the barrage of physical power that will be swung our way.

We may end up seeing this one finishing in a 0-0 or 1-1 draw.

THBN's Prediction 2-1

Follow us on Twitter. We'll be at the game and will tweet throughout it. Last Coke I had was terrible, find out if tomorrow's one is any better, by reading our tweets!

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First January Signing?

All and sundry are reporting that Harry is close to agreeing a deal to bring in Sandro Ranieri Guimarães Cordeiro, or just Sandro to you and me.

This story popped up just before the summer transfer window closed and guess what, the same guys that stated we were about to sign him then, have gone all out on yet another exclusive and told us that now we're near to agreeing a deal to bring this lad in during the January sales.

During the summer, it certainly looked like Harry was scouring the market for a defensive midfielder. Our very own East-Ender admitted that he wanted to bring in Vieira and the media added Muntari, Sandro, Cattermole, Sissoko and Gattuso to that list.

Now, I've only seen around 20 minutes of Sandro in action. He came on as a sub for Brazil when they played Chile last month. He didn't stand out, but then again, he was on for only 20 minutes, so that's not enough to judge him by.

I've got a feeling that the media are reading too much into this new association we have with his club, Internacional. Seeing that Harry was in for a defensive midfielder and the fact that he's their best player, the media could have conjured this out of their arse.

I'll be looking out for this lad when I get a chance to watch highlights of the Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (now that's a mouthful).

If there's any truth in this deal, then we'll just have to trust Harry's judgement. We know that he's got a great eye for a deal and has introduced us to some superb footballing figures. It's also interesting to know that Harry is on the lookout for a defensive midfielder. Sgt. Wilson really can't do it all on his own.

To be honest though, if I was Harry, I would make a cheeky bid for Michael Carrick. He's had a bust-up with Sir Alex and it looks like Carrick could be made available. If the rumours of a £14 million bid for Sandro are true, I'd use that to entice Carrick back to us, after all, I feel that we've never properly replaced him.

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