Munkey

http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8652_2684251,00.html Dutch giants Ajax have confirmed the signing of Newcastle striker Albert Luque after he turned down a move to Spanish outfit Real Betis. The Spaniard, 29, failed to shine at St James' Park following his move from Deportivo La Coruna in August 2005 and has joined the Amsterdammers for an undisclosed fee on a three-year deal. An Ajax statement read: "The striker will sign his contract at Ajax, which runs until June 30, 2010." Luque featured in Magpies boss Sam Allardyce's pre-season plans but soon fell behind Michael Owen, Mark Viduka, Obafemi Martins and Alan Smith in the striker pecking order at St James' Park.

BBC Sport website's usually fairly slow to update

said 'undisclosed fee' on footy365. so at least Newcastle got somethin for him!

class!

was fairly brief, but came across well. mid- to long term plan with the club. all talk of a split between Allardyce and him is bollox, they speak regularly to talk about what's going on and what to do..came across fairly positive.

on now

just came up on the list of stuff that's on 5Live tonight. think it said it was going to be around 7.30ish...if anyone's interested..

http://www.newcastle-online.com/nufcforum/index.php?topic=42351.0 I knew i'd read it somewhere about loans now being long-term and no recall

i though Allardyce said that the new rules that were brought in for this season regarding loans stipulated that they had to be season long and the players were unabel to be recalled.

Southgate. the bloke's clueless and the squad is appalling..

quality. he comes with his own power supply. that's good spending, new LB and enough power to keep St James' going.

remember reading something online yesterday about Barca looking to offload Motta..was either on Sky Sports or Footy365. memory's getting worse...can't remember which

well going by these quotes from Allardyce, it sounds as if it is Smith. "Toon's response will be to try to sign at least three new players, of whom Alan Smith is one. "There might be an interest in Alan Smith now," Sam Allardyce confirmed. "Has there been a bid made for Alan from Newcastle? There have been many bids made." from footy365 http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8671_2636550,00.html

Answered your own question mate! And, as an add-on to that, the plan failed miserably. was supposed to have a question mark at the end of the 2nd sectance as i couldn't remember if he was trying to be changed to a definesive or an attacking midfielder.

wasn't Ferguson trying to convert him to an midfielder? or was it more of a Roy Keane type (as i think someone here mentioned) as opposed to an attacking one.

the only way i can see this making any sense if it's as a replacement for Dyer. offload him (and his massive wages) for £5mill, get in Smith on (hopefully) lower wages for £6mill.

http://home.skysports.com/list.aspx?hlid=476320&CPID=24&clid=149&lid=&title=Drame+targets+English+switch found something on the sky website..a figure of £1mill is mentioned which fits in with the limited transfer budget that's been mentioned

"TOON HERO LUQUE SINKS CELTIC" http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8652_2622292,00.html that's one headline i'd never thought i'd ever see.

aye, i'll contribute to the site. it's one of the main ways for me to ward off boredom at work, so will be happy to chip in a bit. think it should be kept anonymous and at people's discretion

Steve McClaren admits Steven Taylor is edging closer towards a call-up to the England squad. http://home.skysports.com/list.aspx?hlid=476239&CPID=219&clid=4&lid=&title=McClaren+backs+Taylor+claims while it will do grand for the lads confidence at the moment, i reckon he's a tad young to be considered for a few seasons yet...maybe for a meaningless friendly...

aye, there was something similar (albeit a smaller article) on Footy365 yesterday http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8742_2487959,00.html blind eye to the £30m-plus spent on average players on massive wages, might finally accept that you (West Ham) are the Premier League's least likeable club. This is a mantle previously held by Leeds and then Newcastle - both magnets for mercenary players with roughly 427 zillion times more money than sense, and more court appearances than medals to their names. then this reply in one of their letters...kinda sums it up: Hey, We're A Laughing Stock, Not A Hated Club I'm sorry but since when have Newcastle been anybody's most hated club? (with the obvious exception of the Mackems). I can remember a lot of people frequently saying how enjoyable we were to watch under Keegan and Robson because of our brand of attacking football. More recently Newcastle have been a laughing stock but certainly not hated. But we know that we fully deserve to be viewed as a laughing stock when our players fight each other on the pitch and when we persist with Bramble in our joke of a defence. Also with our absolute blundering fat fool of an ex-chairman. I actually agree with Sarah about West Ham and I find it funny that they have signed Bellamy as a 'senior' player. Although I would like to know why Scott Parker comes under criticism, all he ever was for us was committed. Anyway please lay of Newcastle, we can make idiots of ourselves enough without people like you adding fuel to the fire! Jack Stanley, Newcastle

http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8652_2465322,00.html wouldn't be worth making a new thread for the useless muppet, but the worrying quotes here are that Allardyce's is lookin to keep him, thankfully as a back-up though: "However, he has not given up on Nigeria left-back Babayaro, whose days at St James' Park had appeared to be numbered. Allardyce said: "We will continue to move forward in the defensive areas. David Rozehnal is a big signing, but we have got few defenders at the club because I let go one or two who were out of contract. "That has left a big hole in that area and we have got to fill it with the best quality players we can find. "The left-back spot will be one of those positions we will fill. "Obviously, Babayaro is still with us. "He did not figure that much last year, but I will be interested to see such a fine player and whether we can help him in any way to make him fitter, stronger and better so he can play and compete for Newcastle United in the last year of his contract."

would it be a case of agreeing the deal now and make the nominal payment and agreeing that the start date of the contract would be when he recovers from the injury (October time), with clauses in the contract to state that if he's not fit/ the recovery didn't go to plan, then the transfer is cancelled and the cash returned

if he does sign a contract with Newcastle would hope that there would be some caveats in there to cover the event that he doesn't recover fully from the knee injury....then again with Fat Fred probably not.

would be so happy if them too buggered off. don't want to jinx it, but this is turning into one of the happiest transfer windows....