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View from Europe:
"Magpies in coma"
Sounding like something off the set list of a Geordie Smith's tribute band, that's the title of this article published in German magazine "Kicker" and helpfully translated by NUFC.com reader @jens1893:
How Newcastle United drives its own fans into madness
Magpies in coma - a lesson from the Premier League
A Premier League club that depends on player sales?
"Everything is going wrong off the pitch" says manager Rafa Benitez one week before the start of the season.
About a club that drives its own fans into madness.
In Newcastle it seems like there's never been a record-breaking Premiership TV contract. The club made its club record signing 13 years ago and signed its second most expensive players 22 years ago. Their names are Michael Owen and Alan Shearer. And yet the club somehow valiantly keeps its place in the richest league around.
This is how far it's come: A club has for years been a symbol of just about everything that's wrong with modern football and yet the consequences somehow sound romantic.
Newcastle United can be compared to Hamburg a little: Trophy winners on the domestic and international stage years ago, both still possess a big and emotional fan base, but yet both have been a mocked sleeping giant for years. Although it should be noted that Newcastle of late haven't only been sleeping, but lying in a coma as one of their fans recently put it in the Guardian. Back in the day he and everyone else was still dreaming about the Champions or at least the Europa League, nowadays the only thing they want is to wake up and see the club in the hands of someone other than Mike Ashley.
At the beginning, the fans liked this maniac - wasn't he one of them?
Ashley, who became a billionaire with Sports Direct, has owned NUFC since June 2007, or to say it bluntly: Has had the club in a stranglehold since. And that's despite it all starting off so beautifully: The then 42 year-old met up with fans in a pub, watched games in the club shirt and even once had a pint with them in his seat, which is prohibited in England. The club back then stated the beverage was non-alcoholic and, of course, was just handed to him. Many fans liked this maniac from the West Midlands, somehow and someway he was one of them if you ignore the size of his bank account. And didn't he love NUFC like they did?
Eleven years on, and one week before the start of the new Premier League season, the manager Benitez states things like "everything" off the pitch is going wrong. He had "no idea" if he was allowed to sign another player. "The fans should be concerned, I am very concerned." Newcastle, 10th in the Premier League as a promoted side a year ago, had just lost a friendly against Braga by the score of four to nil. No new signing featured.
In order to sign Muto from Mainz, Benitez first had to sell
In an age where Huddersfield can sign a center half from Monaco for €20m or when the pure status of being in the Premier League is enough to bank nearly €150m, like Newcastle did last year, that very same Newcastle has a transfer profit of nearly €20m.
In order to sign Muto Benitez first had to sell, the other new signings, such as the ex Hoffenheim man Schär, cost next nothing or came in on free transfers. How can this possibly be the case at a Premiership club, one of the richest in the world?
Let's go back to 2008, when Ashley publicly sipped a pint.
When the beloved manager Kevin Keegan, one day after the close of the transfer window, was told that the club, with Ashley being at the forefront, had secretly offered some of his players to other clubs, he furiously resigned. The fans protested and called for Ashley to sell the club. He did try to do so, roughly one year after he'd bought it, when he allegedly only found it was indebted after he'd done so. He publicly regretted his purchase, called it a "disaster for everyone" and said his money was lost, but just like in 2009 and 2017 there was no prospective buyer willing to meet his valuation of at least €450m.
Ashley has taken from them what they love and those in charge of the English game have no objections
And as long as it stays like this, he stays. In order to somewhat save his investment, he's for years only barely invested what might be necessary to keep the club in the lucrative top flight. Finish 6th or 16th? Ashley doesn't care. In 2016 Newcastle went down because Ashley only signed off on making funds for new signings available after it was too late. Those funds would've been available at Newcastle just like at every other club in that league.
And this is how one single one man has been paralysing a club, a club which drew in excess of 50k per home game even in the Championship, for a decade. This is how one single man hasn't awoken a sleeping giant, but rather knocked it out and driven its fans into madness in the process. They see what is possible with this club and with this manager, but the only person who could make their vision a reality just refuses to do so. He's taken from them what they love and those in charge of the English game have no objections. What happens when a private investor forgets, or even on purpose neglects, the interests of the club in pursuit of his own private interests? Newcastle fans know that all too well by now.
Benitez could walk at any minute, many fans would now join him
"People need to understand that we won't sign the player at the top of our list. We won't even bring in the guy who is our Plan B or Plan C" Benitez now openly dares to criticise Ashley's transfer policy. He can afford to do so: He led Newcastle back into the Premier League and kept them there in a remarkably solid fashion despite all problems.
He could walk away from the job at any point and could undoubtedly have a new job only shortly thereafter. His current contract expires in 2019 and he only wants to sign the new five-year extension that's been offered to him when he's been guaranteed investment into the academy and the training facility. And he knows the fans are on his side.
It all seems like Newcastle is steering towards the biggest power struggle of the Ashley era. Problems loom on the pitch (their final rehearsal for the season was a 0-1 home loss v Augsburg) and especially off it - a current stand-off about the squad bonuses just seems fitting considering the generally comatose condition the club finds itself in.
"When Rafa goes, we go" many Geordie faithful now despairingly say themselves. But after a decade of Ashley they know better than anyone that he could very much live with that.
