BlueStar

Joe's probably woken up from his latest bender thinking he works for us, looking at headlines and thinking "Cor, all these papers say I reign as director of football at Newcastle, that's going in the next book."

Since Ashley took over, how many times have we been past the fourth round of any domestic cup competition? How far back in Newcastle's history do you have to go to find that many consecutive seasons of not getting past that stage in those competitions? How many FA Cup games has Alan Pardew, the second longest serving Premier League manager, won with Newcastle United? Which would be encouraging for the future and imply that would be a good competition for us to try and excel in, if we hadn't since decided we don't want to compete in it. Oh our recent record is crap, but it's more the rule than the exception over our recent (40-odd years) history. Thing is though, even if you support a crap team (which we have done for long periods of our recent history) you're at least usually watching your team try and do something. Even if you're not challenging for the title or getting into cup finals, you're trying to avoid a real threat of relegation to stay in a league where you're maybe punching above your weight, or you're trying to get promoted, or trying to get into the play-offs, or trying to establish yourself in a league, or trying to have a cup run up to a round where you might not have previously expected to get to. And watching your club trying to do something is entertaining, you can succeed or fail, every game you play makes a difference to how likely you are to achieve your goal, and then you can get the wireless out and see how your rivals for that goal did, and go to the pub and argue about if you're going to do it or not. That's what we're lacking at the moment, people aren't pig sick because we've not won trophies, they're pig sick because we don't have any goals, targets or ambitions to support the club on the way to.

Since Ashley took over, how many times have we been past the fourth round of any domestic cup competition? How far back in Newcastle's history do you have to go to find that many consecutive seasons of not getting past that stage in those competitions? How many FA Cup games has Alan Pardew, the second longest serving Premier League manager, won with Newcastle United? Which would be encouraging for the future and imply that would be a good competition for us to try and excel in, if we hadn't since decided we don't want to compete in it.

Maybe I'm being harsh on him and he's being serious after all. http://i.imgur.com/jIg7Uqf.jpg

What a heap of s****, we haven't won a trophy for 45 years and it's all Pardew's fault. The issue isn't not winning trophies, it's not trying to win trophies. We try, we put 11 men on the pitch, we're just shit at it. We don't put our best 11 on the pitch in competitions where we can win trophies. The club has openly admitted we don't consider cups a priority and use them to rest first team players and give fringe players match practice. That's not trying to win a trophy. Pardew has claimed the top of the league for Newcastle is now eighth, excluding us from European competitions where we could try and win a trophy, after previously talking about how grateful he was we weren't in Europe any more. That's not trying to win a trophy either. Is that all you need to do to show ambition to win something? Field a full team of humans?

What a heap of shite, we haven't won a trophy for 45 years and it's all Pardew's fault. The issue isn't not winning trophies, it's not trying to win trophies.

http://www.themag.co.uk/the-mag-articles/alan-pardew-insults-newcastle-fans-talk-trophies/

If he's missing the Man U game that's a hell of a lengthy ban.

The equaliser turned the guy on Fergie's right into Jonathan King.

Not that it makes any difference but that happens every corner, there'd be 3 or 4 pens every game if you give them. Oh good. Gosling.

I think you know the answer to that one. I do, just I'm stupid and I might just stay up until I'm way to drunk lucky I moved to Japan so I can just hide in the snow Watch tentacle porn instead, can't be any worse.

padrew why

5-1 but a Dummet goal so we can sing "He scored a goal at Stamford Bridge, I was there - Paul Dummet" Best we can hope for.

We're 14-1 to win this game and it's still not worth it.

That's top of the league for Newcastle man, what more do you want?

Can't see any way we can get something out of this game, don't have any strengths to try and play to. Be amazed if we don't fall apart in the first 10 minutes.

OK, so the A1973 to Wembley is because it's the last time they won a cup, the A0303 is for the two 3-0s, why are they (presumably) commemorating our 1969 Fairs Cup victory with the pretend road to Newcastle? or did something else happen in 1969, like three mackems fighting off 50,0000 screaming jawdees in pink lane? Or could they not think of anything for that one and just thought "lol 69"?

If the Mirror's figure of his wage being 15k a week is correct then over 8 months we paid this cock-juggling thundercunt half a million pounds.

I honestly expected a statement along the lines of "Just in case any of you cunts were thinking Ashley had realised he'd actually made a mistake, or Joe's ego had allowed him to accept he wasn't actually good enough for the job and should step down, it was for fucking health reasons so don't go getting stupid ideas like that."

He still resigned, he was just told to do it.

Ashley just makes it so difficult to care about the team when there's no intention of bettering ourselves. Yeah, we haven't "done a Leeds" or "done a Portsmouth", we're in the top flight, we're not going to go down this season, but at least most fans are following a club that's trying to get promoted, or trying to avoid relegation, or trying to establish themselves in their division, or trying to get into a round of the cup they wouldn't normally be expected to reach. They've got the excitement of wondering if they'll do it, a reason to cheer their side on to try and win games to increase their chances. They have the highs of when they make it and the lows of when they don't. We're not even getting the highs and lows of success and failure, because we're not even attempting anything to succeed or fail at. And that's why there's not even as much anger as you might expect, it's just this constant drone of monotony. One of out most enjoyable seasons we've had under Ashley was in the Championship because we at least had an ambition and target to strive for, to win the league and get in the top flight again.

Also Although the tabloids could make up anything Joe Kinnear supposedly said and I'd believe them.

Part of me thinks if he was going to be forced out for stupidity or incompetence it would have happened ages ago (or he wouldn't have been employed in the first place) and it's probably down to him doing something either personally or professionally that's pissed Ashley off.

It's funny that a manager who has won the European Cup twice is being mentioned in the same sentence as a manager whose only piece of silverware is the Johnstone's paint trophy. Mourinho would also struggle with a midtable team...or why do you think he never managed one? Maybe Fat Sam was right, give him the Inter or Real job and he'd look like a good manager. Absolutely not my point...but thanks for listening/reading OK, why has he never managed one? Because he's scared of the challenge and would look shit, or because managers rarely choose to go manage Hull when their CV includes Real, Chelsea and Inter? For what it's worth, he earned his stripes taking the rather less glamorous Uniao de Leiria to their highest ever league finish and it was his performance there that helped him get the Porto job, with them sitting behind Leiria in the league at the time.

It's funny that a manager who has won the European Cup twice is being mentioned in the same sentence as a manager whose only piece of silverware is the Johnstone's paint trophy. Mourinho would also struggle with a midtable team...or why do you think he never managed one? Maybe Fat Sam was right, give him the Inter or Real job and he'd look like a good manager.