Howaythelads

And unlike other things almost as large (like supertankers) the fat bastard cockney-wide boy Sunday market trader manages to turn very quickly.

No. A concession might be "fat bastard cockney wide-boy" though.

There is very clearly a big chance we will be relegated again, we haven't yet seen the end of the cock-ups from "he who can't possibly be worse than fat fred," have we? If the cockney wide-boy suddenly changes his spots, grows some balls, learns a bit about football and starts to do things properly, there is a chance we can be promoted, though that's a long-shot, obviously. Any prediction is going to look more sensible if it's closer to relegation than promotion, that's the reality of the situation the club is in. Whether that's because Ashley wants to run the club down as some sort of tax write-off against his cheap shops, or whether he is the most inept person ever to own a football club doesn't matter that much, in either of those scenario's the club is pretty much doomed to failure. There's going to be plenty for the morons to boo about this coming season. I'm hoping these hangers-on ('cos that's all they are) decide to piss off and "support" another club.

Says the cretin who would boo the the players and team when they were finishing in the top 5. No doubt you're a happy boy.

Tough season ahead. Decent players leaving, dross remaining. Standby for another relegation. And to think, apparently it was impossible to do worse than Fred...

Venables won't come, but he's a far more qualified coach than the likes of O'Leary, Strachan, Coppell and other such losers mentioned so far. What did Venabls won? Nothing Starchen achivement at Celtic is better than Martin O'Neil and same moron people here were saying the same about MON few years back when I scream his appointment instead of Roeder. Learn about football ppls. venables won la liga with barca, and an fa cup with spurs, albeit a while ago. Which century and I just want to know which manager fail to win at Baraca plus thats two decade ego. Strachen won lots of titiles in the past 4 years and if any of you guys care to watch his sides play with commitment and passion all the times. Venables actually moulded clubs like QPR and was a relatively successful England coach, he's well respected by people in the game. Strachan is a little s*** who can win a two horse race in Scotland like Graeme Souness other than that I'm not sure he's done much. Strachan has actually done nowt of any note when managing an English club in an obviously far more competitive league than the scotch one. Thought as much. A disaster waiting to happen to a club like ours I reckon, much like O'Bleary who built his reputation a Leeds side he inherited. The one thing people keep forgetting is what we actually need. We don't need a top of the line, lets go out and win something manager right now, we need someone to get us out of this division. Personally I think O'Leary and Strachan as well as Curbs are more than capable of doing that, so I would be happy to settle for them right now. I wouldn't disagree, but then all of the names mentioned are an improvement on the current situation, which of course means the cockney wide-boy won't go for any of them as he doesn't want to improve the club.

Venables won't come, but he's a far more qualified coach than the likes of O'Leary, Strachan, Coppell and other such losers mentioned so far. What did Venabls won? Nothing Starchen achivement at Celtic is better than Martin O'Neil and same moron people here were saying the same about MON few years back when I scream his appointment instead of Roeder. Learn about football ppls. venables won la liga with barca, and an fa cup with spurs, albeit a while ago. Which century and I just want to know which manager fail to win at Baraca plus thats two decade ego. Strachen won lots of titiles in the past 4 years and if any of you guys care to watch his sides play with commitment and passion all the times. Venables actually moulded clubs like QPR and was a relatively successful England coach, he's well respected by people in the game. Strachan is a little shit who can win a two horse race in Scotland like Graeme Souness other than that I'm not sure he's done much. Strachan has actually done nowt of any note when managing an English club in an obviously far more competitive league than the scotch one.

wtf are you on about? "Punching above our weight for years" is the pick of the shite.

ffs, when are people going to realise that with this cockney market trader things like "it makes sense for him to do "x" because <insert logical reason here> don't apply? Plenty said there was no sense in him taking over the club and not trying to take it forward because that way he'd make no money, so naturally he had to invest in the squad. Well look at the facts of what has happened since that load of shite was being posted! The fact is, Ashley doesn't give a shit, he's also inept and a very stupid man. That means he won't do anything that makes any kind of logical sense in terms of improving the football club.

Before the inept cockney market trader entered the scene I was told that nobody could be worse than Fat Fred. I said be careful what you wish for. After the cockney wide-boy took over and people finally woke up to the fact he's a total disaster, that he has no interest in taking the club forward and is well out of his depth running a major business like a football club rather than operating a glorified market stall that sells poor quality and cheap crap, I've been saying the worst is yet to come. I'm still waiting, but I'm convinced the worst is yet to come from this period in the history of the football club. This bloke is going to destroy the football club. Very soon, there won't be a Newcastle United Football Club, it will cease to exist. When you think of how many other clubs have been taken over in recent times it is shocking that so little is happening in this supposed sale of the club. I say supposed because I don't think he's really trying to sell it. Figuring out why and what the bastard is upto is the thing. It could be the entire club is going to be used as some form of tax write off against his High Street market stall business. Yes, there is nothing special in the football club from a business perspective, it's only special to those who support the club and that applies to any particular football club, but there has been no shortage of people showing interest in taking over other clubs with far less potential than Newcastle United, yet nothing is happening. You have to wonder why. You have to wonder what Ashley is upto.

This is what I meant awhile ago when I said the worst may yet be to come.

Aye, when your mate took over he apparently paid more than that without having any clue. missed off the end of your sentence there....here, you know me,we go way back so i'll help. Aye, when your mate took over he apparently paid more than that without having any clue as to the mess the club was in. What a surprise, you read a post.

Aye, when your mate took over he apparently paid more than that without having any clue.

The quote in bold is yet another example of HTL's selective memory to suit his own agenda where he fails to remind us that Freddie Shepherd massively undermined SBR when he made it public in the summer of 2004 that 2004/05 would be Bobby's last season as manager at the club, and bearing in mind the "characters" we had at the club at that time the implications of Shepherd's decision were always going to be dyer, sorry dire. Chapter 20 of SBR's autobiography is entitled "Undermined" just to underline the point. IMO this is the most damning single example of Freddie Shepherd's mismanagement of the club, the fact is that we have never recovered from that decision, and is a major reason why I never want Shepherd in a position of authority at the club again. jimmymac Certain players are mainly at fault for the undermining of Robson. Why do you think the Board (and fans) began to question the ability of Robson to take the club any further, daft lad?

Yup. These were the only significant mistakes made by Fred. He wasn't prepared to tackle the positions of Robson and Shearer at the right moment. His management choices were the worst. Had Robson left in the summer of 2004 and replaced with a top manager, we would not have been in solid decline ever since. Instead he sacks him early season and then brings in Greame Souness It's my opinion that the bit about summer is irrelevant. Had Robson been replaced by a decent manager at the time he was replaced we'd have been ok. Surely though the problem was that the timing was badly wrong, and there were no decent managers available 4 matches into a season? Maybe at the particular moment in time you are right. However, you appear to be against the idea of appointing a new manager early into the season when in fact Robson himself was appointed very early into a season and went on to do a fabulous job. Who the person is remains the most important part of it imo.

I haven't said people liked the appointment, so can't see where you dragged that up from. However, based on later events and the reluctance of many to want to get rid, some definitely did see him as "the right man for the job." For example, those who wanted rid of the "cancers" and who wanted "proper" players. They know who they are though they deny it now. I'm not surprised some people have forgotten all about that.

Yup. These were the only significant mistakes made by Fred. He wasn't prepared to tackle the positions of Robson and Shearer at the right moment. His management choices were the worst. Had Robson left in the summer of 2004 and replaced with a top manager, we would not have been in solid decline ever since. Instead he sacks him early season and then brings in Greame Souness It's my opinion that the bit about summer is irrelevant. Had Robson been replaced by a decent manager at the time he was replaced we'd have been ok.

That's how I felt. I almost crashed my car, tbh.

According to many he was just the man for the job at that time. I'm sure you recall. That is the point I disputed. Aah, right. So in your world, "at that time" is a split second event. Fair enough. In my world, "at that time" is a general term to denote a "period in the history of the club." So, during that period it seems generally accepted the club had some problem players, Souness was appointed to sort it out and many thought he was just the man to do it. That's my point and I thought it was obvious tbh. I'll be more careful next time.

I wasn't. Why do you want to limit something to a particular second in time? Any reason?

Just checked the vote. 13 people want Ashley to stay. Shocking, tbh.

What are you on about now? Have you ever not had a proper server? Dave, once Souness was appointed most wanted to give him a chance because we all hoped for the best. Almost everyone is like that because we all want the club to do well. Souness had a decent enough track record at other clubs, better at the time than others touted such as O'Neill, so to that extent the appointment made sense when you also take into account the supposed discipline issues. What I'm on about is the support he was given after it became clear just a couple of months into the job that he really was going to rip the team apart. There were plenty of people at that time who maintained for a long time that he had to be given time to build his own team, they insisted he was the right man for the job of sorting things out and ridding the club of the cancer's. I'm amazed you can't remember.

Really? My recollection is the opposite, he certainly had plenty of support in his destruction of the team. Just thought I'd make that point.

Can't believe that like. Not so much the Shearer thing, I disagree but I can see what you're getting at, rather that you think those were the only significant mistakes he made. How the managers turned out is hindsight, mate. All any Board can be expected to do is : 1. Appoint a manager based on their track record. 2. Take a gamble on an unknown they believe (for reasons that may be know "in the game") will be a good 'un. 3. Back them. The Board went with option 1 with the exception of Roeder. For example, if Ashley appointed Wenger, backed him to the hilt and Wenger messed it up I'd be blaming Wenger, not Ashley. So why was Souness appointed? According to many he was just the man for the job at that time. I'm sure you recall. In any case, though I thought he was shite I was assured he had a decent track record of winning trophies at other clubs. If you want to look at the big picture regarding the appointment of Souness I think a number of people should take responsibility for that, even Robson to an extent, he was the manager and unfortunately he lost the respect of the players. Or at least, he seemed to from the outside. The club clearly introduced a policy of buying young players at more affordable prices (we were paying ~£6m for young players at a time when manure were paying nearly £30 for Veron, for example). I think this was a good idea so I wouldn't know it, but extreme care needs to be taken that you're getting players who are also decent and stable human beings. Newcastle as a club obviously got this very wrong as we all saw a number of players behaving like arseholes with no respect for the manager or much else really. Hence Souness. I said this at the time and I still believe it now. Had certain players not been apparently out of control I doubt we'd have seen Souness at this football club other than on the losing side as manager of other clubs. I wrote a post at the time about reactionary appointments, the Board did this with Gullit and with Souness, yes they made mistakes but don't forget that both of these managers also had winning track records. So, as much as I was distraught when Souness was appointed, believing from the beginning he would get rid of our best players (Bellamy and Robert), I can understand the reasoning behind his appointment. Can't you? It seems obvious to me.

Yup. These were the only significant mistakes made by Fred. He wasn't prepared to tackle the positions of Robson and Shearer at the right moment. Is this some sort of sick joke? Two questions for you. Would you say Newcastle United were in good shape when Shepherd a) took charge of the club, and b) left the club? Small picture, mate. Small picture, but I'll answer as always. a) Good b) Not so good Now some for you. Q. Why do you think the team was in the bottom half of the table just before Ashley stepped in? Q. Do you think the managers (other than Roeder) appointed by the previous Board had good quality track records? Q. What would be your criteria for selection of a manager? Q. If you ran the club, appointed a previously successful manager, backed him to the hilt but he messed it up, do you blame ... a) Yourself for appointing a manager, who in hindsight, wasn't able to replicate previous good work and you should have known it all along. b) The manager for performing poorly.