Paully

Didn’t Luke Edwards point score for Bruce by saying that he unearthed these two?! “I remember Stan’s (Ternant) first calls to me about both Andy and Harry,” Bruce tells The Athletic. “He had spotted Andy playing for Dundee United and said he had found Billy Whizz. “I said, ‘Isn’t Billy Whizz in a comic book?’ But Stan was adamant we had to sign him. He was the same over Harry. Stan was relentless over Harry. The thing with Harry is he had been playing for Sheffield United since he was 18 and had something like 150 games under his belt (at age 21). He had also been their Player of the Year three years running. “But people looked at him and asked, ‘Is he slow on the turn?’ I’ll admit, I asked the same of Stan when he first came to me about Harry. Stan’s reply was priceless, ‘Well, you were slow on the turn and you did OK.'”

https://nufctrust.co.uk/news-story/nust-board-election-2019-your-candidates/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-7585207/How-Newcastle-brothers-Sean-Matty-Longstaff-talk-Toon.html

Just the five out of nine........ TV changes Almost a week late, here are the December 2019 and January 2020 fixture alterations. Games in red are changed, games in black are unaltered: Thu 05.12.2019 Sheffield United (a) 7.30pm Sun 08.12.2019 Southampton (h) 2pm Sat 14.12.2019 Burnley (a) 3pm Sat 21.12.2019 Crystal Palace (h) 3pm Thu 26.12.2019 Manchester United (a) 5.30pm Sat 28.12.2019 Everton (h) 3pm Wed 01.01.2020 Leicester City (h) 3pm Sat 11.01.2020 Wolves (a) Sat 18.01.2020 Chelsea (h) 5.30pm Tue 21.01.2020 Everton (a) 7.30pm

10 years ago today since the beach ball goal and there is an article about it in the Athletic “Sunderland boss Steve Bruce was unapologetic about the gift. “Listen, I thought it was a deflection off a player. If anybody knew that rule — that it is supposed to be a drop ball — then you are a saddo,” he said.“

Another good article from Rafa in the Athletic - travesty he's still not here Few NUFC snippets; In fact, in the summer of last year, Stevie (Gerrard) called me about Sean Longstaff. Rangers were interested and he asked whether they could sign him on loan, but I told him “no” — he’d be staying at Newcastle United. Some people have said, “Oh, Rafa was lucky because of Longstaff” but we’d been watching him and we were happy with him, we played him in the first-team, supported him and gave him confidence. Turning Rangers down is proof of what we thought of Sean. I’m speculating now, but that’s why I think Martin Dubravka, who was our goalkeeper at St James’ Park, could become a coach. That’s my feeling. He understands the game. People rightly will point out that not too many keepers become managers but I wonder if that’s because in the past they tended to train separately from the rest of the team, so they would have less involvement in terms of the sessions, tactics, positions and things like that.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/english-footballs-best-grounds-pint-20636002.amp?__twitter_impression=true 3.5 times more than 2nd!

Should be worth a listen

Leicester vs Liverpool rumoured for 8pm - more shit for the travelling fan

Big club, marra

What a strange appointment by those super, mega new rich owners We told them about THE DON from day one! No wonder he’s deleted Twitter again as they’re FEWMIN

Ha ha aye awful few days - I was one goal away on four different anytime trebles FFS! On to the weekend!

https://theathletic.co.uk/1291861/2019/10/16/kevin-mirallas-exclusive-i-spoke-to-levy-and-pochettino-spurs-was-a-good-opportunity-so-i-pushed-to-leave/ “Martinez and Koeman wanted to play football but after, there was Allardyce,” Mirallas adds. “I don’t know if he even knew football because he only spent five minutes on the pitch in training. Nobody knows this, but it’s true. That’s difficult. You have to pick players at the weekend but you don’t watch training.

Canny article by Daniel Taylor about Man Utd today in the Athletic - they did no homework when they signed Rojo and didn't realize he had to go court for bottling two people..............conveniently settled out of court of course!

Mike Ashley, the owner of Newcastle United, had his hand outstretched and a grin on his face. Manchester United were in town and Ed Woodward, the club’s executive vice-chairman, had just appeared in the boardroom of St James’ Park. Ashley went over to greet him and his opening line was probably an accurate reflection of the state of the two clubs. “The most unpopular man in football meets the second most unpopular man in football,” he said. At least Woodward could see the funny side. Ashley then introduced him to one of his associates, who turned out to be a Manchester United supporter and wanted to know why the club kept announcing “all these noodle deals” rather than player signings. Woodward’s explanation was that the two could go hand-in-hand and, without the “noodle deals”, it would be a lot harder to make the signings. Which sounded fair enough — and a line, almost certainly, he has had to trot out many times in his encounters with supporters.

Not sure if Chris Waugh is pally with Bruce but reading his article in the Athletic about Miggy, it sounds like he's getting benched on Saturday

Portugal apparently denied a blatant pen at 0-0 FFS

Anyone have Harold goal assisted by Sterling 9/1 Skybet boost?!

Harold and Ronny - 10/1 365

Absolutely disgusting if this happens

Bless - Martin Samuel sticking up for his wanker mate again; https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-7560219/MARTIN-SAMUEL-COLUMN-No-England-player-safe-Gareth-gambler.html Why Corbyn got Ashley all wrong If he was any good, Jeremy Corbyn would be where Jurgen Klopp is now. A whopping eight points clear, his followers feverishly imagining the triumph ahead. In fact, Klopp has it a lot harder than Corbyn.He has to see off Manchester City, who are rather good. Corbyn, meanwhile, is up against politics’ equivalent of Manchester United under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. The Conservatives used to be winners, they regard the big prizes as theirs by right but they are a shambles. Senior players have quit, what is left is mediocre, and the leaders have failed to deliver a coherent, workable strategy on a problem entirely of their making. Yet still Corbyn trails them in the polls. It’s a two-horse race, the other jockey is facing backwards, and he’s coming third. That’s why he travels the country trying out populist tropes. He hasn’t managed to formulate an opinion on the most important political issue since appeasement, but he’ll head to Newcastle and preach to the converted He’ll meet a pressure group called Ashley Out and then have a pop at Mike Ashley. Not exactly taking chances, is he? And he’s hardly smart enough to get that right. Corbyn’s attack on Ashley showed only the shallowest intellect or economic understanding. He targeted the Newcastle owner’s point of greatest strength, his sole trump card. It would be like ignoring Brexit and meeting Boris Johnson on the battleground of classical philosophy. After the usual entry-level cliches about football and community that could have been sketched on the back of a fag packet by the lowest-grade policy wonk, Corbyn accused Ashley of putting Newcastle’s financial security at risk. Actually, that’s the one thing he hasn’t done. Marginalised the fans, yes. Placed business interests first, certainly. Yet Newcastle are financially stable under Ashley’s stewardship. He runs a tight ship. It had been going so well, too. Corbyn had singled out Ashley as a bad owner before an appreciative audience. So far, so tame. But when it became necessary to know something of his subject, to have bothered with detail beyond populist banalities, his argument fell apart. Far from risking Newcastle’s financial security, the club under Ashley has made a profit before tax in seven of the last eight financial years. In 2017-18 total staff costs as a percentage of turnover were 52 per cent when the Premier League average is 60 per cent. At the end of 2017-18 Newcastle had net assets of £8.3m and a £34m surplus in the bank. Non-interest bearing loans owed to Ashley totalled £144m, mostly dating from the beginning of his ownership. Although £33m was repaid in 2018-19 — making £111m the current balance — those loans mean Newcastle have rarely relied on external interest bearing debt, due to Ashley’s cashflow. In other words, he might be unpopular, he might have Sports Direct branding everywhere, he might have lost good players and better managers, but Newcastle are financially secure. Labour’s problem has always been convincing the public the budget is safe in their hands and by failing to understand simple facts — such as wage-to-turnover ratio being a key financial health indicator in the assessment of football clubs — Corbyn came across as something of an economic ignoramus. It’s probably why he isn’t where Klopp is now.