merlin

There were loads of positives today until the manager decided to change it. But he's still the manager and likely to remain that way....

Fact is, had Keegan not resigned, we would almost certainly been one of the big 4. he resigned because we didn't have the money for him to carry on the way he wanted. No - he resigned because Ashley told him one thing and then pulled the rug out from under him...the judge agreed and KK said you couldn't work with Ash/Lam because you can't talk to them. Fergie and Wenger BOTH thought he was right to walk...

It will be nothing like that this time, we'll stick down there for a while. Agree - this season has eerie memories for me of 1977-78...just as now, we had qualified for the UEFA by finishing 5th the previous season, just as now, we won our first gane at home against strong opponents(Spurs this time, Leeds in 77), just like this season, the board didn't back the manager in summer(Dinnis wanted to sign Souness from Boro but eventually he went to Liverpool despite wanting to join us) and we ended up getting relegated with the lowest 1st Div points haul we ever had. We ended up sacking Dinnis and bringing in Bill McGarry but it made no difference - we still went down and then lost most of our decent players as a result. We were in Div 2 for FIVE years and I reckon that will happen this time if we go down...last time we went down, the best players stayed bu they won't if we go this time. It took KK as captain, 2 seasons under Cox to bring us back up eventually ...... Anyone STILL think it will be 'fun' in the Championship

If ever a game showed up a manager as having no common sense or tactical awareness, this was it. We were well in charge of the game without actually hammering them, and once Pardew took off Marveaux in favour of Perch, the whole game changed. I was absolutely gob-smacked when I saw this happen because Marveaux was having a decent game and helping to keep their m/f and defence on the hop...once he went, they began to believe they could get something and we threw the game away. Once again, Pardew's cowardly and negative attitude to football has cost us dearly and this was the final insult to the fans..especially in his comments afterwards. I remember Allardyce getting the 'you don't know what you're doing' treatment and this example was possibly even worse. We are now well and truly enmeshed in a totally avoidable relegation battle and on form over the past 5 games, a favourite to go down. Both manager and board are responsible and as the board are not going anywhere, Pardew should, but the arrogant dolts in charge won't have a clue how to get a decent replacement. As to the players, their morale is obviously at rock-bottom - Cisse was somewhat unlucky that he came up against a keeper with a good slice of luck as well as skill, Debuchy gave us some examples of how useful his crosses may have been had he been signed in summer and Cabaye had a good game until he went off, at least trying to lift the side by example...the goal was excellent of course. Anita buzzed around as usual . Hard to see where the next point is coming from - Villa were unlucky not to win midlands derby at WBA and their result will have given them great heart for our encounter with them at Villa Park. The day was superbly topped-off by Remy scoring at WHU for QPR and the Mackems winning again, this time at Wigan. An old-timer I knew well, who had been to Wembley 3 times in the 50s, got so disgusted with NUFC before SJH and KK took over at the club, that he told me 'they should knock SJP down and build flats on it'...... I can now well understand his feelings....glad he's not around to see this shambles.

At the moment and assuming no decent managerial change ' 18, NUFC 19. Reading 20 Wigan Even Reading, though, are showing better form than us...Villa will improve now and only Wigan look to be in as bad a run of form as NUFC. QPR will probably JUST escape.

I honestly don't think players really give a s*** about who the manager is. Some of them have better relationships with certain managers, but in general if they're coming they're coming for the money and to play for NUFC, not because our manager is Alan Pardew or anyone else we could attract. If they are coming for the money then we are stuffed...a la Remy, although it seems they MAY have bowed to the inevitable in order to get a defender through the door...

In the vast majority of PL clubs, Pardew would be gone by tomorrow - he would probably have been gone after the Everton game.. Unfortunately, the club is not being run by people with either any knowledge of football or any sense of responsibility to its customers - the fans - so I will be very surprised if Pardew is not manager by the Villa game. Any fool can see that NUFC is in freefall ; we have just lost at home to a major relegation rival after a string of demoralizing defeats, the club captain wants to leave, our top goal scorer has bailed out, we are failing to compete properly in tne transfer market and being upstaged by relegation rivals, and the sides below and around us are picking up points. Ashley almost certainly doesn't care what the fans think and if truth be known, is happy to gamble with the club's PL status rather than admit he has been wrong about Pardew or anything else - I am convinced that this guy would be a failure in any other business than stack'em high and sell em cheap, which has been a recession-type business, because he clearly does not learn from his mistakes. I am sick of saying this, but Pardew's record tells you the tale - many of us, including myself, hoped he had profited by his past errors and would be a decent manager at NUFC but that is clearly not the case. Yes, he has had a difficult pitch with the 2 clowns pulling the rug under his feet last summer, but he still had enough quality available to keep the side from a relegation battle...IF he was a good manager. I cannot see where we go from here...the old Irish joke comes to mind about the paddy asked for directions to Dublin and replying ' Oi wouldn't starrt from here if oi were you'... Pardew is the epitome of the Hollies 60s hit ; 'KIng Midas in Reverse'....

Agreed - if you have a good asset, worth a lot of money, you are not going to sell it for a pittance especially if you have more than 1 person wanting to buy it.. The clowns running NUFC seem to think they are above all the normal laws of supply and demand...

Litmanen was an excellent forward ....KK though about signing him in the 90s but it never happened.

Yes - they don't even need to recruit Carr on a bigger salary, they just watch who we bid for, then trump it.

Aye. There's certainly something to be said for just going for it on the pitch. Most teams give the impression they would take a point before kick off, which Keegan exploited perfectly. Football has changed a lot since I first stepped into SJP, and it might just be me, but I've always thought that the one thing NUFC supporters really want is a team that has a go. Winning stuff has never been why we support our club and over time I think we ended up placing far more emphasis on how we play, as opposed to just caring about results. KK's footballing philosophy was a perfect match for NUFC. Whereas, Fat Sam (and perhaps AP's) cagey approach just doesn't fit comfortably with the character of the club. Possibly talking s****. KK would have thought so - he may have been an advocate of attacking football but he was above all else, a winner. He didn't just want NUFC to be other people's second team, he wanted us to be successful. So do the vast majority of our fans so I think you are wrong. But we're not successful. We haven't won the league in 80 years. It's 50 years since we won a domestic trophy. When it comes to winning things we have been garbage for longer than the vast majority of today's supporters have been alive. If winning stuff was what mattered most our support would have dwindled away in relative terms. Ever since the media dreamt up the we'd rather lose 4-3 than win a game rubbish the supporters who worry about what the media say have been out to prove that all we care about is winning. I just don't think it's true, or perhaps it is now but wasn't previously. KK wanted to win stuff at NUFC, but he wanted to do it playing in a way that also brought the best out of our biggest strength... our support. I don't think it was coincidence the closest we have come to winning anything in the modern era coincided with us going out and trying to win every game playing positive football. Cowardly football and boring games, it's not what NUFC is about for me. You think differently, but I'm not sure how many would agree that winning trophies is more important than how we play. Perhaps, more importantly, I think our chances of actually winning anything are reduced if we play in a fashion that bores the terraces into silence. Under this regime we have NO chance of getting what you want and are currently getting the worst of ALL worlds - awful football and a losing team which is likely to lose its best players. In such a scenario, our ONLY chance of getting better players is to win silverwre - all successful sides build from the back...Derby and Forest under Clough, Leeds under Revie, Liverpool under Shankly. In the current situation we cannot even attract top defenders apart from Debuchy and thats because his mate sold the club to him.

This - I said so the other day...

You're sympathetic towards Ashley. He gets no sympathy from me, he could have prevented the situation but didn't. Right on the nose Mick - Ashley showed that he was a useless man manager in his handling of the KK situation. Anyone with any sense would have backed Keegan until the club was back on an even keel at least. Ashley is arrogant and lacks football knowledge.

Great thread idea. Imagine I'll only be able to contribute in another 20-30 years, mind you! "Yes, yes, yes, Mike Williamson was a strange one really, he had the pace of Roberto Carlos and the strength of Jaap Stam... he could head the ball about as well as Les Ferdinand..." Somehow, I don't think ANYBODY has a memory that bad or that selective....!

We need these threads because there is precious little to be proud about nowadays - amazing to think that I used to remember the 70s and compare them VERY unfavourably to how the club was during KKs first spell as manager. They were certainly better than what we have now and we played better football for the most part. Most First Div teams had a few decent players in those days and it wasn't such a shock if the unfancied sides beat the likes of Leeds, Liverpool, Derby and Arsenal who were top dogs then.

Was a classic own goal at the Boro, no doubt about that, another classic was when we lost 4-3 at home to "Tommy who's up Mary Brown Dochertys" Man Utd just after they came back up from Division 2 and I remember McFaul rolling the ball to Nattrass who passed to John Bird who passed back to McFaul from over 30 yards out and sent the ball miles over McFaul into the net. Daft c***! I remember Graham Oates chipping McFaul in a midweek game in the first few seconds from about 30 yards without the oppo (Leeds, it says here) touching the ball. On his full home debut as well iirc. His career never recovered, unsurprisingly. First time I heard the phrase "Oh, for f***'s sake" x about 30,000 Poor Willie must have hated his defence. best own goal i've seen that, better than keeleys. Yes, Bird's thunderous 25 yard strike into his own net against Man U at SJP was the most spectacular OG I've ever seen...

Aye. There's certainly something to be said for just going for it on the pitch. Most teams give the impression they would take a point before kick off, which Keegan exploited perfectly. Football has changed a lot since I first stepped into SJP, and it might just be me, but I've always thought that the one thing NUFC supporters really want is a team that has a go. Winning stuff has never been why we support our club and over time I think we ended up placing far more emphasis on how we play, as opposed to just caring about results. KK's footballing philosophy was a perfect match for NUFC. Whereas, Fat Sam (and perhaps AP's) cagey approach just doesn't fit comfortably with the character of the club. Possibly talking s****. KK would have thought so - he may have been an advocate of attacking football but he was above all else, a winner. He didn't just want NUFC to be other people's second team, he wanted us to be successful. So do the vast majority of our fans so I think you are wrong.

Probably - if it suited them they would do it.

No chance. All he has to do is stay up to guarantee himself at least another year. And arguably rightly so. Ignoring the actual football we play (the last thing I'd imagine Ashley cares about) we've had one average half a season, one great season and one s**** season. As long as we don't go down, he deserves the right to see if the 5th was a complete fluke or if there's really something decent in there worth building on. He hasn't 'earned' the right to anything - managers are judged by results and its one thing to finish 5th one year then drop to, say, 10th, but its another when you fail to win ONE away game so far, fail to win a game in which you have gone a goal down and play dire unwatchable football which results in you getting involved in a relegation battle. Not only that, but his record at previous clubs has been almost a mirror image of his performance at NUFC so he does NOT have a good track record which would indicate that a season like this is a blip. The only reason he won't be fired if we lose to Reading is because the 2 clowns in charge know that their past history precludes them from getting a decent manager as a replacement and Pardew rolls over for them. You know that as well as anyone Dave.

French media advertise NUFC bid for player - cue other PL clubs to ting the French club involved and say 'ring us when you know what Newcastle are offering the player and we'll top it'... They can do that because they know that in most cases, they CAN top it....

That's what happens when you put all your eggs in 1 basket...in this case, the French one ; they have got Ashley weighed up and they know they can either hold NUFc to ransom for the players or hawk them around elsewhere, safe in the knowledge that NUFC will bend over and be screwed because they will always come back to the French marlet as they see it as cheap.... Problem is - so does everyone else now...

Its in Ashley and Llambias' DNA...you should be used to it by now

I think it would TBH, not many people outside of this forum are even talking about sacking Pardew. That's complete utter bollocks. Thanks for that measured response. Obviously the only Newcastle fans I really mix with on a day-to-day basis are on here, my feedback is mostly from fans of other clubs. Other clubs' fans don't give a stuff about Newcastle United.

I think it would TBH, not many people outside of this forum are even talking about sacking Pardew. That's complete utter bollocks. Agreed - ANY manager whose team has not won an away game, conceded 13 goals in 3 games and has never come from a goal down to win a match and whose captain and best player wants to leave, would be odds on for most people. Let alone Pardew, who has come to grief at 4 clubs before, all within a few years of taking over...

Nattrass was a class player - he was usually a RB, but he could play in m/f almost as well. He and Alan Kennedy were one of the best FB pairings of the 70s and had Nattrass not got badly injured(by Kenny Burns, a real ba---d during a series of bad-tempered games in league and cup against Brum), he would certainly have played for England. He was a very nice lad, but a bit deferential which meant he didn't push himself. Around 6' tall and really elegant in his play, he was one of the best prospects the club has had - never quite the same player after his ligament injury and Kennedy went on to play for Liverpool and win major trophies there despite not being as good a player as Nattrass. Nattrass was a better defender than Kennedy although the latter had a slight edge in pace coming forward. Both in the side that took us to Wembley in 76 under Gordon Lee. Suffice be it to say that we haven't had a RB as good since...not even Venison.