KaKa

Hmmmm ... What are the odds on Houghton getting this gig permanently. I might put some money down on that just in case.

Do you not think that, rather than it being that black people are in some way genetically pre-disposed to crime, that the disproportionate amount of black people in the prison system is more to do with the fact that poorer people in run down urban-centre communities are more likely to commit crimes that land them in prison and these communities have a higher percentage of black people than the general population? Maybe black people are often poorer because they are less intelligent than white people? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_intelligence [can opened, worms everywhere] I know, I'm being deliberately provocative. Seriously though, there ARE differences between the races. We're taught that everyone is equal but we're not. Look at the 100m final at the Olympics. Many whites there? No, because black people are faster runners over short distances. Look at the swimming events. Many blacks? No, because white people have lower bone density so can swim better. Look at the distance races: Lots of Africans and Asians, as genetically they're more adapted to doing well in these sort of events. This isn't all coincidence, and we're all aware of it and it's not THAT taboo to talk about it. Though people are still careful about what they say as the PC brigade's ears prick up whenever you start such a conversation. Move it a step further though and start making other comparisons between the races (Eg intelligence) and suddenly you're a racist. But perhaps if we're rational about it for a moment and talk like adults it's simply that there ARE differences between us? Is it possible that when there's these glaring physical differences that mentally (In all respects, including intelligence and predisposition to commit crime) that we're all exactly equal? Of course not. But the very act of making that suggestion gets everyone very uncomfortable in their seats. That's not to say, for example, that all black people are less intelligent than all white people or that all Asians are more intelligent than all white people. I'm sure there's millions of black people who are far more intelligent than myself for example and I'm certainly not racist in any way, shape or form. I'd like to point that out very strongly before the mongs descend, and if anything I'm posting the things I have in this thread just to give a balanced argument which is more fun than all of us just adding our own version of "Rebrov's a racist c***". I always ensure I treat everyone I meet as an individual, but that's the important thing - Treat people as individuals rather than treating everyone as equal, which they're blatantly not. Many people have descended, quite understandably, on the "Rebrov's a racist c***" side of things but I'd have to say I'm yet to read anything where anyone has attempted to show that his comments are inaccurate, rather than just have a go at the guy and say he shouldn't have said it as he's a racist. Maybe burying such conversations under the "racist" banner isn't really that helpful in the long run? Maybe what he's said is accurate, for whatever underlying reasons, and that areas with higher concentrations of black people are more likely to have higher concentrations of crime? Maybe, if we were adult enough to acknowledge comments like this rather than burying our heads in the sand and refusing to discuss the matter beyond branding the speaker as a racist and a bigot, then that's the first step to addressing what could be a very real issue? Your ignorance is quite astounding. I think it's scary that there are regular people like you walking around everyday with such thoughts in your head. Maybe black people are poorer because they are less intelligent? Yikes. Did all races start off on a level playing field? Or was a certain race's way of life forced upon another's. How much time has passed since then? How long do you figure it will take to overcome that? Especially as the one race were considered as nothing more than animals and weren't given the same opportunities as the other. If Africans had invaded europe and forced white people to return to Africa as slaves and forced them to live as Africans did prior to colonialism, how would they have fared in those circumstances? Would things be exactly as they are now?

Would you be happy with, say, Jonathan Douglas (Leeds captain under Wise) as manager first team coach? I don't have a clue what the hell you are on about with this comment? It's like half of the people on here have lost their senses in the last couple of weeks! What does Jonathan Douglas have to do with my post?

To be honest, I think the best thing ownership could have done is stay quiet and let the fans vent their anger and frustration. The best thing they can do now is focus on getting the right man in this time around. It's time for action on their part and not more words which will onyl be rubbished by the fans anyway. When the new manager is hired, then I'm sure we will hear a little more fromt hem regarding the appointment etc. People honestly need to chill out.

What the hell are you on about?

Very tired ... Apparently Keegan can do no wrong and Ashley can do no right, and it's as simple as that. No questions asked. Quite frankly, I very much doubt that myself.

Based on what? You would think Keegan was the pope the way some people on here go on about him.

In such case I have no doubt whatsoever such a dispute would have been referred immediately to Llambias. It's all speculation, but very good points are being made by the likes of KaKa, Edd, mrmojo et al - and not being adequately refuted. mrmojorisin75 suggests: So can Keegan's supporters please come up with something other than "It's all speculative bollocks" or "It's all Wise's fault"? UV asks Well, yes and no. He said (with some cheekiness I'm sure) "I didn't have a brochure this time. It came like a whirlwind it is like one of those Lastminute.com holidays! There was no brochure I just came." Secondly, Wise had yet to be appointed, though one must assume negotiations with Wise had already commenced. So no, Keegan was not explicitly told that the hierarchy was Ashley -> Llambias -> Wise -> Jimenez -> Keegan. However, if you think Ashley and Mort hired Keegan without telling him about the imminent appointment of an executive director (football), that Ashley and Mort duped Keegan into believing he would be an old-school manager with sweeping powers while secretly planning to go in exactly the opposite direction, well... I'll take Kaka's logic over yours thanks. raconteur, very few people want to hear this, instead they prefer the following word associations: cockney, lies, wise, southerner, season tickets, 3 years, fabrication, conspiracy KK, no wrong, innocent, victim, beyond criticism i'm still astounded that after years of shepherd leasing warehouses to the club, ridiculing the supporters publicly, taking massive dividends despite deteriorating results on the pitch (etc...) was affored so much time and never once was there a talk of a boycott of club products, marches, none of this s***...before anyone starts about balancing the books i'll point you to bobby robsons first 2 seasons for a parrallel on spend and manager...also to the sacking of bobby as well really is anyone gonna look me in the internet eye and tell me this doesn't just boil down to a nice bit of dirty regionalism against a southern owner and nasty dennis? anyone? really? if you want answers to that you just have to look over the board, probably hundreds of counter arguments. specifically the inaccurate "robson's first two seasons" stuff which has been responded to quite a few times. and i'm not sure what people are getting at by bringing up the Robson sacking as it is some defence of this board. are people saying "well shepherd did it so ashley is allowed to as well"? that's bloody daft if so. i criticised shepherd for his undermining of robson and handling of his departure, i'll do the same for Ashley in this equivalent situation. either you do it for both or neither, otherwise it's being blindly partisan. s**** like "KK, no wrong, innocent, victim, beyond criticism" does everyone on here a disservice. fuckof johhny that's pish to be honest i don't offer the robson book balancing as an excuse for ashley but it's the only reasonable thing i can see for people kicking off so much, the lack of spending...if it's not about the club not spending money on players then people should stop spouting the 3 years ST s*** no? otherwise what're they fucken complaining about on that score? this lies s*** is unreal - KK fucken lied to you all summer saying everything was OK didn't he? that he had a wondeful relationship with everyone at the club, there was money to spend etc... or were his lies OK 'cause he loved the club but ashleys/nasty dennis's are not OK for what reason exactly? 'fuckof johhny that's pish' are you drunk or something? the Robson thing is rubbish because he was allowed to spend more once we had a cash windfall by way of the stadium expansion. if you want to look for an equivalent development today you look at the £18m extra TV money we received at the end of last season compared to the one before, along with the £6m saved in debt repayments. considering we broke even in our last accounts that should give us over £20m net to spend, or, if we want to be ambitious and use next season's income in advance, as many other clubs do, at least £40m. Mackems have spent something like £70m since coming up, and transfer inflation in general has spiked - overall summer spending gone from something like £265m to £540m in 2 years. yet we've spent little to nothing since ashley arrived. personally i find facts like this more important than s**** like 'fuckof johhny' which you apparently find so superior. as for Keegan lying, maybe he was putting on a brave face and trying to battle through the undermining and ridiculing as Robson did before him, and thought that while the window was open there was a still a chance he could leverage his position to get what we wanted for the club. or, as many assumed earlier in the window, that he had some sort of working relationship and consensus that disintegrated - perhaps because the two sides were squabbling over limited funds, and this came to a head in the last days of the window. I think it's embarrassing how much people are caught up on how much we have spent. Comparing how much we have spent to the Mackems is laughable. I take it that you would then prefer to exchange all the players Ashley has brought in for those that Quinn has, simply because they cost more. it's a silly way of thinking about things. The fact is that we have brought in quality players under this new setup that Ashley has put in place, irrespective of the total cost of these players. I personally am also inclined to believe that these sorts of purchases would have continued to be made if Keegan was familiar with more of these types of players, and was also not so caught up in keeping the likes of Smith and Barton.

It's all down to this hatred/mistrust of anything to do with Dennis Wise and/or londoners which is quite frankly baffling. Say what you want about Wise, but the guy has tremendous contacts in the game, which are definitely beneficial to the club. Why people can't look past the player he was is beyond me. It's a great point you make regarding Owen and Luque Elliotman.

It's bloody ridiculous. I think the idea is that he will be better because he might appoint Keegan yet again, and because evil Dennis Wise will no longer be at the club, and of course because he is not an evil Londoner. Insanity.

Based on? Never managed in the PL for a start. This isn't the time for an exotic coach, the rest of this season will become backs to the wall stuff very quickly. He won;t know what to do. IMO the time to expriment with a coach like Zico is when everything else is in place and that certainly isn't the case with us. His assistant will be absolutely vital, and I believe the board will be looking to keep Houghton on board, who is very experienced in this league. We need to stop playing it safe, it's time to take a risk. I don't think our team is so poor as to be threatened with relegation, so lets go for it. There are no outstanding, prem experienced candidates out there.

So based on the number of Brazillians inhis Fenerbahce team, you have come to the conclusion that he is an outspoken coach who wants to "do" his own signings?! I think I would rather take the mans words on board myself. He has stated, having obviously heard of all the hoopla that has taken place, that he is used to working with technical directors, and it isn't an issue for him, but instead, one that he finds normal to work in.

Just posted this in the other thread ... http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/apr/06/football.comment Good article and some insight into the type of manager Zico is

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/apr/06/football.comment Good article and some insight into the type of manager Zico is

There are a lot of dodgy people out there who wouldn't mind getting into football and taking advantage of a club of ours standing. The fans could soon have something very real to cry about, and that would be a huge shame.

At the very worst this is Mike Ashley's only major mistake since taking over the football club, and I think this is a massive over reaction and is quite frankly out of order, especially as the new owner is new to all of this. You are all just taking years of frustration with Newcastle out on the current owner, who has hardly had anything to do with it all. You are allowing a dislike of one individual in the whole setup i.e. Dennis Wise, as well as some weird dislike of Londoners/southerners to convince yourselves that they must all be evil and bad and seeking to destroy Newcastle United. This is all extremely silly, especially when no one knows exactly what has gone on and has caused the current predicament. It is all rather astonishing. Keegan resigned as manager. This is the only 100% cast iron fact we have. If the new regime bring someone else in and the same thing comes about and there is still unrest within the club then I will feel there is a real problem. At the moment though, I am willing to give them a chance to move things forward, and it is a shame so many have given up on them so easily, seemingly because of this dislike for Wise and distrust of Londoners. Crazy.

Skjelbred is s****. So how come all of football Europe rates him as one of the brightest young midfield prospects? Who bought him in the end? Who bought Arshavin? And to answer your next question of him being priced out of a move ... How come no one bought Arshavin when he was quoted as £6 million last summer?

That's easy: The club's latest statements contradict their statements before the closing of the transfer window. Now we know that they lied. And we've all seen the interview with Keegan where he said the final decision to sell Milner was his. More lies? i honestly dont think the major falling out was over milner. i think it was more likely over the barton/ owen/ xisco/ gonzalez end day antics of the board We might never know for sure, but if people are accusing the board of telling lies about transfer policy then they also need to look at Keegan's part in keeping the pretense going. If the populist view is to be believed then Keegan had little or no say in transfers for 8 months, but chose to go along with it. We all know what Keegan is like and there is no way IMO that he would have stayed or stayed quiet for that length of time if he wasn't ok with the situation, and he certainly wouldn't have lied to the fans to cover for Ashley and co. if it was as bad as is being made out and he was genuinely unhappy. exactly edd - it all either points to something that wasn't cynical by the club but merely a breakdown over time between the parties involved OR keegan, as you say, was unhappy and had no say the whole time yet lied to the thousands of fans buying season tickets and let them pay 3 years in advance only to up ship and run at the last minute when it was all too late if you believe he was lied to from day one then he's equally culpable in this respect, no? Very well put.

Apart from everything they've done since they got here? Like investing a ton of money in the academy? In revamping our scouting network? Clearing all of our debt? How much have we spent on our academy and why does it mean we can't afford to spend £6m on a premiership class left back when two different managers think the current one isn't up to it? Probably because that premiership class left-back is average, and is not worth £6 million. Also, we could have landed Atouba for £2 million with his contract running out. His club stated he was set to arrive at Newcastle on Saturday for a medical. The club had probably agreed a deal as an alternative, who was also prem experienced. All fo a sudden he doesn't show up and nothing else happened. Did KK stop that move also? Very, very likely in my opinion.

If that was true, why did he not also turn down Bassong then? The club managed to bring in Bassong in on trial first, and so Keegan was able to take a good long look at him. Unfortunately, this is not always possible for every player that is identified.

I really doubt that you can We'll see soon enough won't we. If this board stays in place, I'm sure they won't make a mistake with the next guy they bring in. Then we'll see soon enough how the playing staff evolves. I'm just bringin up a point of discussion which is very, very plausible, bt because it isn't in line with the KK lovefest, you're getting frustrated. Sucks for you. You rubbish what I say then in return exclaim that it was due to the fact the board were too stingy. Well can you offer any proof of that? No you can't can you. Ridiculous. How much did we actually spend in the last transfer window? nothing! infact we made a profit. 15 teams in the PL spent a lot more than us, so yes I would say that was stingy. Now can you actually prove any of that drivel you spouted in the opening post. No you can't can you. Ridiculous. How much money, how much money, how much moeny ... First of all, a succesful window is not judged by how much money was spent, but the number of quality players that were broguht in. I have been extremely happy with every single player brought in this summer. Don't hold it against the club, because they were able to identify good players who hardly cost us anything. Secondly, I would argue that we would probably have been able to bring in more of these types of players i.e. younger, more promising types who don't cost the Earth, if there wasn't this squabbling all summer.

Apart from everything they've done since they got here? Like investing a ton of money in the academy? In revamping our scouting network? Clearing all of our debt?

He identified Warnock and we had months to sign him but they didn't. What aload of bollocks. How the hell do you know that? Do we know how much Blackburn were asking for Warnock? People on here all claimed he was average, so if it's true Blackburn were asking for £6 million, then the board probably thought, forget that! And rightly so. Maybe, like many of us, they though Enrique, who they spent £6 million on, was just as good as Warnock! Ever consider that?Maybe they thought it would be better to just get a youngster in to give him competition? Maybe Insua? Maybe Pocgnoli? See I can make assumptions too.

I really doubt that you can We'll see soon enough won't we. If this board stays in place, I'm sure they won't make a mistake with the next guy they bring in. Then we'll see soon enough how the playing staff evolves. I'm just bringin up a point of discussion which is very, very plausible, bt because it isn't in line with the KK lovefest, you're getting frustrated. Sucks for you. You rubbish what I say then in return exclaim that it was due to the fact the board were too stingy. Well can you offer any proof of that? No you can't can you. Ridiculous.

Wait ... so how come none of the anti Ashley and anti board stuff isn't "rank" specualtion? Have you all been down to Keegans for some tea and a chat? Get real. This is just as plausible as all the other stuff being discussed at the moment regarding the current state of affairs. If they have been squabbling about signings all summer, I'm pretty sure it caused us to miss out on a number of players, who fit the criteria of what the board wanted, because KK wasn't familiar with them, but then also wasn't able to identify alternatives who he knew of, that fit the criteria. When he identified Guthrie, the club brought him in.