Mick

Carl Cort looked OK when he first came to us but was troubled by injuries, Shola just isn't good enough.

It's weird how things turn out, I'm sure we'd have beaten them with Keegan in charge and then they would probably have gone on a run of defeats.

Er............... Is Smith back from injury?

I wonder who typed it for him?

That at least confirms that you really are a mackem, thanks.

The system did something ours hasn't done since 1969, it delivered a trophy.

He wasn't class, he did well going forward but poor at the back, both goals came from the wing he defended, at least I think they did.

He's made no profit yet, how can UV be right? Ashley would have to make £ billions profit to get a £ for £ profit that Sir John Hall walked away with.

If we're going to have a go at Ashley then at least we should have a go about something which is deserved. I've had a go at him over some things but I'm not doing it for the sake of it. I think we're in a mess but I think we've been in worse recently and I think if nothing changes between now and the end of the season we'll finish higher than we did last season. I think if Keegan had of remained at the club with this squad we would have finished top 10 and if we'd invested another £20 million during the summer then we'd have played in Europe next season. I don't think we're as bad now with Kinnear as we were without a manager and I think we have enough to still make progress on the pitch, even if it's not as much as we could have made under different circumstances.

He's not saying that it's only down to you though, it clearly isn't.

No, it's not private, Dave just doesn't want to see a slagging match on the forum and I know a lot of other people feel the same way.

Allardyce has said that he had £9 million net to spend and I would think he'd have a better idea than we do, see the last bit in bold in the first post. http://www.newcastle-online.com/nufcforum/index.php?topic=56819.msg1523787#msg1523787

Out of interest, where does this £3 million net spend come from? Did we make a profit of £6 million after getting rid of Allardyce?

This doesn't give much away but other places reported that we were approached and Ashley said that he didn't want to sell, or something like that. http://www.arabianbusiness.com/529670-abu-dhabi-chiefs-set-to-meet-premier-league?ln=en

It that the same Ashley who turned down the Man City buyers? If it is, what does that do to your theory that he was trying to sell in private?

The biggest wasted opportunity was appointing this very good manager who had the unanimous support of the fans and players and not supporting him fully, preferring instead to put the entire running of the club outside of selecting and coaching the players in the hands of inexperienced, agenda driven, detached from the football team part-time employees who together operated a flawed system that has failed the requirements of the football team they were employed to serve. That is where the wasted opportunity rests, big time. And then he sacked him. I am of course talking about Sam Allardyce which your comments could well describe for a short while under Big Sam until the poor results. I mention Big Sam because structures and plans are not as important as the manager who is and always will be or should be the driving force behind any club and not this multi-layered management structure (or new age set-up brought in by Big Sam when he was appointed), as we are painfully finding out now. Thus far this "professional approach" is responsible for the following: The ST fiasco The manager resigning The lack of extra quality in the side The lack of depth to the squad The overwhelming media storm following the club The unrest of fans The drop in attendances This approach you talk of will also add the likely event of one Michael Owen leaving before his contract is up at a huge financial loss to the club and another few years of transition under new owners to their list of mistakes, failures and downright mismanagement. But hey, at least that debt is now gone though eh... That's very one sided. The ST fiasco was brought about because people like the Ultras wanted a singing section and the club wanted more kids in so they moved the away supporters and tried to give season ticket holders a choice of where to sit so they didn't feel as if they were getting thrown out in the way people did when the corporates were given the best seats. How can you hold that against the club and Ashley? Yes the manager has resigned, none of us yet know enough to form a definitive position on that although some do. The lack of extra quality in the squad is a matter of opinion and doesn't stand up when transfers in and out are looked at. Before Ashley arrived we'd already decided that certain players were not getting new contracts. Bramble, Pav, Moore, Bernard, Gooch, Babayaro and Sibierski were already going. We also got rid of first teamers in Parker, Nobby and Dyer in the first summer transfer window, we've since got rid of Rozenhal, Emre, Faye and Milner. We've brought in Viduka who is never fit enough and as I've highlighted Rozenhal so I'll have to mention that he was also brought in, Barton, Geremi, Smith (spit), Cacapa, Enrique, Faye, Beye, Gutierrez, Guthrie, Bassong, Coloccini and Gonzalez. I'd rather have the players that we brought in than the ones we let go, Nobby, Faye and Milner were worth keeping, the others were not. As for lack of squad depth, we've got rid of 14 players who could be classed as first team squad players and we had already told 7 of those 14 that they were going before Ashley arrived, we've brought in 15 players who could be classed as squad players. Even if we include the 7 who were already going we have added 1 to our squad, take out the 7 and we're 8 better off. The media storm has been going on for years. The unrest of the fans, again it's been going on for years, I remember it in the mid 70's with Joe Harvey and Westwood. The drop in attendances would probably have happened anyway due to the financial mess although not to the extent that they have dropped.

Ashley is trying to sell the club, he will have incurred expenses in doing so as he's hired Seymour Pierce and I doubt it's on a no sale no fee basis so he doesn't appear to be stringing people along. We've already had one person leave the club because he's trying to sell and we have a manager on a 10 match contract, boycotting is pointless and will possibly harm the club. I can't see what more he can do to sell the club and boycotts are not going to help by the looks of it. The reports which we've seen coming out of foreign countries appear to make us look like a poisoned chalice and that will not make the club look like a better buying option. It's time to stand back and let the sale go through without anything going on in the background.

Nice one, it's my fault for seeing the negative , I would have thought with the comments which have been made in various places that NUSC would have learned something, obviously not. The 15 days notice is much better but probably will not help me as I'll be at work on shifts.

I can't believe that they still persist with the boycott crap.

but correct.

That is just an indication of your arrogance though and not proof of fact, it's the way you are. Either everybody is seeing things the way you do or they were not around at the time because they hold a different opinion to you and you can't come to terms with that. I know for a fact that the people I was in the pub with after the Blackburn game were at the match and just about everyone thought different players had played well while others thought the opposite, that was within 20 minutes of the game ending. I didn’t assume that people who held different opinions had just been sitting around Leazes Park so they could make it look as if they had been to the game. I assumed that they had formed a different opinion to the one I formed. I was sitting next to a work mate who was arguing with his mate about the game and they had sat next to each other so should have seen exactly the same thing but they didn't.

I'm not going to, it's all been done before, millions of times.

The debt was paid off, how it was paid off makes no difference as we no longer lost money servicing the debt and it would always have been factored into a sale. Loan or gift to the club still takes it out of his bank balance and is effectively no longer available for him or the club to use.