Bad Mongo

Utter bollocks.

Confirmed on the beeb site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/tyne/8081039.stm Hm, it's been denied by the club.

Luque? Boumsong? Coloccini? Nolan? Ryan Taylor? Smith? All of these have been worse than Barton on the pitch. It's no wonder we're down.

Yeah, but he'd only buy attacking players while claiming they're all for defence. Then he'd have them drilled in formation all year, refuse to let them go to away games, and Middlesbrough and Sunderland fans would start to mysteriously(?) disappear only to show up years later declaring their loyalty to the Toon. It might work, but I prefer a more traditional approach.

Why can't we get the bloke with the biggest yacht; it's always second-best for us... We will. He's obviously buying the club to set St. James' Park afloat. Then he'll notice he bought a club with Nicky Butt being the main engine in midfield.

My own pet theory (which is most likely wrong, I admit) has always been that Mike Ashley's plan from the beginning was to turn Newcastle into a profit-making enterprise modelled after Spurs, due to a bet with Levy. The dialogue went like this: DL: "Only Spurs fans are thick enough to accept the same nonsense every fucking year: We buy some exciting foreign prospect for good money to create some buzz and make those idiots think we're going to challenge for fourth, then sell our best players at a massive profit after the season ticket sale is over. Then, when it doesn't work out, we sack our 'long term' manager and get in a new one. Always new optimism, and nothing ever happens. The only really profitable club in the country, and safe mid-table mediocrity." MA: "Nah, I bet that could work everywhere. Football fans are all idiots, and so are the chairmen at every football club. I bet I can make any club as successful as Spurs. Even Newcastle!" DL: "I bet a million quid against." MA: "It's a bet. I also bet a million quid I can down a pint of lager in less than five seconds." DL: "That's how you made your fortune, wasn't it?"

He hasn't fixed anything. English Definition according to Stupeedo,. Fix: take something that was going well but went a bit off the rails, and fucking destroy it, beyond all recognition. Perhaps he meant 'fix' as in 'neuter'.

He hasn't fixed anything.

In my opinion: none of them. The team isn't put together as a team, it's a bunch of decent players who both individually and, more importantly, in combination lack some vital qualities needed to play good Premiership football. Most importantly, we lack pace and movement. So did Shearer in his later seasons, but he did well as long as he had Bellamy, Robert and Solano.

Still think Messi is a better footballer than Ronaldo.

And Jonas? Bassong? Viduka? Løvenkrands?

If Xisco is on £50K/week, we can't possibly get rid of him. There's no way he'll get more than half as much anywhere else.

Actually, he did get a couple of assists vs Middlesbrough.

I'll never admit to ungrammatical statements.

The "system" was bollocks, Ian. What he did was he turned Newcastle into a selling club. He said it was the "Arsenal model", but he really meant Spurs: taking the piss out of the fans by selling the best players. Of course, the difference is that Spurs are also willing to buy good players.

And to add to that, Ashley made sure the squad was weakened in both numbers and quality during the summer transfer window.

The players we have almost got relegated last season, Ian.

And why do you think Keegan quit? He had harped on for ages that he needed full backs, he then needed a replacement for Milner (who was obviously sold against his wishes), and the only players he got that he wanted were cheap youngsters; the squad was weakened and even less balanced than it was at the end of last season. Yet Keegan's departure was somehow morally wrong, he should have struggled on. After being undermined by the owner and the 'system'. Problem is: Keegan wasn't allowed to do his job. Ashley is a fucking fraud, man, why should Keegan support him? This relegation is 100% Ashley's fault.

Ooh, yes, such a horrible timing. Like when Curbishley left West Ham, and look where they are now.

The thing is, he creates problems for the defenders. Martin does, to an extent. Viduka, too. Owen? Only when he scores. And he rarely does.

He just did, man. A championship club isn't worth nearly as much as a premier league club. He'll be lucky if his loss is only £100M.

Bollocks. Ameobi actually tried. Who else did that in the second half? Apart from the Villa players, I mean.

Shameful lack of effort from the players in most of the second half.

We've been much worse after the break.

The team just isn't good enough to stay up. That's the sad fact.