Montey

Is the deal done? The article "Flog on the Tyne: Newcastle sell up to foreign owners" http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/sport/football.html?in_article_id=422801&in_page_id=1779&in_a_source=&ct=5 is certainly suggesting the deal is done.

Its like he had a late night visit from the Queer Eye crew.

(Assuming this is all accurate) The fact that they are making plans for the business of NUFC is extremely heartening. Many football club management teams have the overly simplistic view that if the club is winning matches the club will survive financially. This is very wrong, as sponsors and TV rights fees are not increased directly by the club winning games. Both are increased as the clubs popularity goes up. Increasing the popularity requires more than just the team to win games. Whilst winning games is very important it is not everything. I look to our local football variant here in Australia. Two of the most financially successful clubs in the league are Essendon and Collingwood. Essendon has been reasonably successful over the years, but Collingwood has only won one flag (league win) since 1958 (the one being 1990) and has only recently started stringing together some good performances. However, its off-field business is extremely robust with property and other investments all over Australia. It has the largest supporter base in the country, which consequently brings them in the biggest sponsorship deals and television rights fees. All this despite the fact that they stink as an on-field team (or on average have stunk over the past 30 years). It does sound like Belgravia knows what they are doing. Stabilise the team, restructure the club for growth, build the off-field investments to provide additional revenue sources and an expanded fanbase, and then once the brand of the club and consequently the business of the club is growing from off-field activities invest monies back in to the team to accelerate that growth.

To use a bit of Aussie vernacular: Come-in Spinner!!!!!

A full take over would be easy. Shepherd Offshore takes out the 37 million pound loan, as the sole owner it then transfers the debt to NUFC Plc, meaning it effectively costs Shepherd nothing and the club ends up taking a loan to take over itself. Its the same way the Glazers have taken ManU. Surely some locals have to turn his car on its roof and paint "Hands off our Toon!" on the underside!?!?!?!?

So, like, can someone on N-O start doing some research on the best pubs around Luton, Colchester, and Burnley?

15th -> 7th -> 16th (by match 9 in the new season). So he's had a net loss of 1 position since he took over and has lost 9 positions since the end of last season (on average 1 per match). I'm struggling here, how is this good again?

Its like taking a shit on the floor and then blaming the shit for getting the floor dirty.

Is that not a bad idea? To avoid litigation just have a silhouette of FF's head with the text: F-Off F.F! I'm sure if more than a handful of people started showing up to matches wearing the same shirt it'd raise some questions. Could such a t-shirt be printed up cheap and sold at cost (cost of t-shirt+printing+handling)?

Actually, If people call him a fecker, an a-hole, or anything else there may be limited scope in which he can sue. Certainly in the US such comments are considered by the legal system to be personal opinion and as such not defamatory. Its why the recent Penn & Teller series "Bullshit" can call people by those references. So if the defamatory system bares any resemblance in the UK he may not have a legal leg to stand on. Edit>> The other part of defamation law normally requires the offended party to prove their character was besmirched in some way. In a case such as a forum all the defendant (the forum operator) has to do is convince the judge that the comment was not their opinion and in any case the readership of the forum is a tiny percentage of the UK population so any such damage to character would be tiny. Also (again), these sorts of threats are normally just legal bullying. If you write a letter to his lawyers explaining that all opinions belong to their posters, that you have no intention of censoring the actions of others and reducing their freedom of speech, and that should they pursue a legal case you will merely pull down the website replacing it with a notice that "this popular community forum has been closed down due to Frederic Shepherd's legal actions. Please contact <list reporters email addresses> if you are unhappy with this," they will often go away. Remember, as long as only letters/emails are being exchanged it isn't costing the forum admin anything, its only hitting Fred's pocket.

I've got half a used Snickers Bar. I'd trade that for Titsup. My gutters need clearing.

I want him almost as much as I wanted Moore. oh, hang on! The Moore thing worked out didn't it.

I think relegation is possible but fairly unlikely. I think a top 5 finish is about as likely as relegation. Finally, I think that finishing in mid-table space is almost a certainty, but that may be well down in the bottom half should one more attacking players pick up an injury at any time during the season. Its the fact that we just can not sustain an injury to an attacking player, as there are -no- genuine attacking reserve prospects on our books that has me most worried. An early injury to Ameobi (say in the 1st third of the season) and we're in trouble, an injury to Luque as well and we're in big, big trouble.