Happy Face

so the only way we will qualify regularly for europe under Mike Ashley is if half the teams in the country go bust ? Don't know whether to laugh or cry. I think it is far more likely that in 10 years time or longer we will look back on the league positions and european qualifications since 1992 with great fondness. Does anybody in fact know what we will owe Mike Ashley if or when he sells the club ? If the club were to go into administration, he's currently owed £120m. As Chez says. Any buyer would have to pay at least that...and then anything Ashley can get to make up his other £138m or gain a profit.

When he promised to speak in the new year his exact words were.... "I am the first to accept there have been times this season when you would have liked to have heard more from me direct, particularly at certain points. There have been reasons why I have not have been able to do that, but in the new year we will look to communicate with you more about what we are doing at St.James' Park, be it through the club's official website, programme and magazine as well as the wider media.” Good of him to accept it. Shame he's yet to do anything about it.

That sentence in bold is probably one of the biggest piles of dogshit I have ever read on this forum This is the problem with anti-Ashley posters and the likes of the NUSC. Banging on about what's been done wrong without even attempting to acknowledge the point of the original post, which is about clubs going facing real financial difficulties if they spend beyond their means without any proportionate success. Does this sound like any club in particular? This is the problem about those who have bought into Ashley's propaganda and have posted on this thread without correctly interpreting what others have said - there was absolutely NOTHING in my posting which mentioned Ashley's spend - if you look again , you will see that I said he has messed up Jumbo style ; this has nothing to do with the spend but EVERYTHING to do with his decision-making...and I stand by that 100 % , as would anyone unless they think that creating a situation where KK walks out, employing a third-rater like Kinnear after making an abortive effort to sell the club(and then offering him a 2 year contract) etc etc...is good management. not arguing with any of that like, but i love the chelp that Happy Face has railed off into about spending on managers under ashley after a massive amount of the debt ashley paid off was built up by the previous owners in appointing s*** managers on big contracts, allowing them to spend a fortune on s*** players then sacking them and paying them off you couldn't make it up Ashley hasn't paid it off. He's changed the lender....to himself...so we save on the interest. Ashley has sacked managers at a rate 3 times more frequent than Shepherd did. Why do you support this course of action while deriding it from the previous chairman? But I don't see a problem in Ashley being repaid the loans he has made to the club. After all, if it was a PLC the shareholder(s) would all be entitled to dividends from the club each year. Is it really so dreadful to expect to be repaid for loans made to the club. It makes sound business sense to me, and once the loans are repaid, and providing the club is on a stable financial footing, then the club will, if run sensibly along the lines now set out by Ashley, generate ample funds for player purchases for years to come. Hopefully players will want to play for NUFC for the kudos of playing for a top well run and successful club, rather than that last big payday. I have no problem whatsoever with him loaning the club money interest free rather than a bank. It's just as beneficial for him as it is for the club. We save on interest and loan repayments until he sells. And just like the banks, he gets the full amount back, even if players he's signed decrease in value to zero and we're left with a shitty squad fighting relegation year after year. Started off brightly but you still insisted on twisting a perfectly good and reasonable post to fit your agenda How's that man? It's just as good for Ashley being the clubs moneylender as it is for the club. There's no negativity in that, no underhand, money laundering, assett stripping conspiracy theory. Just a fact that it's a common sense approach for both parties. I'd have thought my agenda would be the same as yours. We want Newcastle to do better in the league. But that's my point exactly. It does not matter to me if it's beneficial to Ashley as well. I couldn't care less what Ashley does or benefits from the club, so long as Newcastle United is better off as a result. He has made several serious errors in judgment, but one cannot ignore the massive job being done in terms of re-structuring the club's finances, and bringing on the youth policy, to ensure our survival as a football club once this whole crisis has blown over. Nail on head. Are we? Do you truly believe the under 18's and a low rate of interest on our borrowing are the things stopping our inevitable implosion?

That sentence in bold is probably one of the biggest piles of dogshit I have ever read on this forum This is the problem with anti-Ashley posters and the likes of the NUSC. Banging on about what's been done wrong without even attempting to acknowledge the point of the original post, which is about clubs going facing real financial difficulties if they spend beyond their means without any proportionate success. Does this sound like any club in particular? This is the problem about those who have bought into Ashley's propaganda and have posted on this thread without correctly interpreting what others have said - there was absolutely NOTHING in my posting which mentioned Ashley's spend - if you look again , you will see that I said he has messed up Jumbo style ; this has nothing to do with the spend but EVERYTHING to do with his decision-making...and I stand by that 100 % , as would anyone unless they think that creating a situation where KK walks out, employing a third-rater like Kinnear after making an abortive effort to sell the club(and then offering him a 2 year contract) etc etc...is good management. not arguing with any of that like, but i love the chelp that Happy Face has railed off into about spending on managers under ashley after a massive amount of the debt ashley paid off was built up by the previous owners in appointing s*** managers on big contracts, allowing them to spend a fortune on s*** players then sacking them and paying them off you couldn't make it up Ashley hasn't paid it off. He's changed the lender....to himself...so we save on the interest. Ashley has sacked managers at a rate 3 times more frequent than Shepherd did. Why do you support this course of action while deriding it from the previous chairman? But I don't see a problem in Ashley being repaid the loans he has made to the club. After all, if it was a PLC the shareholder(s) would all be entitled to dividends from the club each year. Is it really so dreadful to expect to be repaid for loans made to the club. It makes sound business sense to me, and once the loans are repaid, and providing the club is on a stable financial footing, then the club will, if run sensibly along the lines now set out by Ashley, generate ample funds for player purchases for years to come. Hopefully players will want to play for NUFC for the kudos of playing for a top well run and successful club, rather than that last big payday. I have no problem whatsoever with him loaning the club money interest free rather than a bank. It's just as beneficial for him as it is for the club. We save on interest and loan repayments until he sells. And just like the banks, he gets the full amount back, even if players he's signed decrease in value to zero and we're left with a shitty squad fighting relegation year after year. Started off brightly but you still insisted on twisting a perfectly good and reasonable post to fit your agenda How's that man? It's just as good for Ashley being the clubs moneylender as it is for the club. There's no negativity in that, no underhand, money laundering, assett stripping conspiracy theory. Just a fact that it's a common sense approach for both parties. I'd have thought my agenda would be the same as yours. We want Newcastle to do better in the league. To wrap it up, Ashley has made many mistakes, and looks like he might make a few more, but transferring the debt to himself or slowly weeding out the big-earning shit performers on mega contracts are measures which will pay off in terms of the health of the club in the next couple of years. While it's true that some big earning shit players are still here (before you bring it up again) that's hardly his fault, he was backing Fat Sam against his better judgement and got stung. This is the guy you believe should still be here btw. Where have I said Allardyce should still be here? You think the big contracts going to underperformers ended when Allardyce left? Personally I'd say Kinnear, Wise and Ameobi have all gotten contracts they haven't earned since then. Who've we managed to sell? Parker, Dyer, Solano, Luque, Rozenhal, Faye, Emre, Milner, Nzogbia and Given. I'd say only Dyer, Luque and Emre were being inordinately rewarded from that lot.

That sentence in bold is probably one of the biggest piles of dogshit I have ever read on this forum This is the problem with anti-Ashley posters and the likes of the NUSC. Banging on about what's been done wrong without even attempting to acknowledge the point of the original post, which is about clubs going facing real financial difficulties if they spend beyond their means without any proportionate success. Does this sound like any club in particular? This is the problem about those who have bought into Ashley's propaganda and have posted on this thread without correctly interpreting what others have said - there was absolutely NOTHING in my posting which mentioned Ashley's spend - if you look again , you will see that I said he has messed up Jumbo style ; this has nothing to do with the spend but EVERYTHING to do with his decision-making...and I stand by that 100 % , as would anyone unless they think that creating a situation where KK walks out, employing a third-rater like Kinnear after making an abortive effort to sell the club(and then offering him a 2 year contract) etc etc...is good management. not arguing with any of that like, but i love the chelp that Happy Face has railed off into about spending on managers under ashley after a massive amount of the debt ashley paid off was built up by the previous owners in appointing s*** managers on big contracts, allowing them to spend a fortune on s*** players then sacking them and paying them off you couldn't make it up Ashley hasn't paid it off. He's changed the lender....to himself...so we save on the interest. Ashley has sacked managers at a rate 3 times more frequent than Shepherd did. Why do you support this course of action while deriding it from the previous chairman? But I don't see a problem in Ashley being repaid the loans he has made to the club. After all, if it was a PLC the shareholder(s) would all be entitled to dividends from the club each year. Is it really so dreadful to expect to be repaid for loans made to the club. It makes sound business sense to me, and once the loans are repaid, and providing the club is on a stable financial footing, then the club will, if run sensibly along the lines now set out by Ashley, generate ample funds for player purchases for years to come. Hopefully players will want to play for NUFC for the kudos of playing for a top well run and successful club, rather than that last big payday. I have no problem whatsoever with him loaning the club money interest free rather than a bank. It's just as beneficial for him as it is for the club. We save on interest and loan repayments until he sells. And just like the banks, he gets the full amount back, even if players he's signed decrease in value to zero and we're left with a shitty squad fighting relegation year after year. Started off brightly but you still insisted on twisting a perfectly good and reasonable post to fit your agenda How's that man? It's just as good for Ashley being the clubs moneylender as it is for the club. There's no negativity in that, no underhand, money laundering, assett stripping conspiracy theory. Just a fact that it's a common sense approach for both parties. I'd have thought my agenda would be the same as yours. We want Newcastle to do better in the league.

I'll change my name to Svens Adult Books if he gives me £10m a year.

The Wacky Warehouse

That sentence in bold is probably one of the biggest piles of dogshit I have ever read on this forum This is the problem with anti-Ashley posters and the likes of the NUSC. Banging on about what's been done wrong without even attempting to acknowledge the point of the original post, which is about clubs going facing real financial difficulties if they spend beyond their means without any proportionate success. Does this sound like any club in particular? This is the problem about those who have bought into Ashley's propaganda and have posted on this thread without correctly interpreting what others have said - there was absolutely NOTHING in my posting which mentioned Ashley's spend - if you look again , you will see that I said he has messed up Jumbo style ; this has nothing to do with the spend but EVERYTHING to do with his decision-making...and I stand by that 100 % , as would anyone unless they think that creating a situation where KK walks out, employing a third-rater like Kinnear after making an abortive effort to sell the club(and then offering him a 2 year contract) etc etc...is good management. not arguing with any of that like, but i love the chelp that Happy Face has railed off into about spending on managers under ashley after a massive amount of the debt ashley paid off was built up by the previous owners in appointing s*** managers on big contracts, allowing them to spend a fortune on s*** players then sacking them and paying them off you couldn't make it up Ashley hasn't paid it off. He's changed the lender....to himself...so we save on the interest. Ashley has sacked managers at a rate 3 times more frequent than Shepherd did. Why do you support this course of action while deriding it from the previous chairman? But I don't see a problem in Ashley being repaid the loans he has made to the club. After all, if it was a PLC the shareholder(s) would all be entitled to dividends from the club each year. Is it really so dreadful to expect to be repaid for loans made to the club. It makes sound business sense to me, and once the loans are repaid, and providing the club is on a stable financial footing, then the club will, if run sensibly along the lines now set out by Ashley, generate ample funds for player purchases for years to come. Hopefully players will want to play for NUFC for the kudos of playing for a top well run and successful club, rather than that last big payday. I have no problem whatsoever with him loaning the club money interest free rather than a bank. It's just as beneficial for him as it is for the club. We save on interest and loan repayments until he sells. And just like the banks, he gets the full amount back, even if players he's signed decrease in value to zero and we're left with a shitty squad fighting relegation year after year.

bullshit "fact". he has sacked 1 manager he didnt appoint and who the vast majority of fans wanted out. I take your comment on board. Would you agree that. Ashley had 3 managers at the club in the space of one year. Ashley has made significant compensation payments to two of them (or will have soon enough) one of whom was extraordinarily popular and doing very well. manager #1 has been explained above. manager #2 quit and isnt guaranteed any payout (though it is likely he'll get something) and manager #3 took over because manager #2 quit and is still currently employed as our manager. to compare this to shepherd's hirings and sackings is insane. I don't think Shepherd made a hash of a single managerial departure as much as Ashley screwed up in letting Keegan qo. Nor do I think he screwed up any appointment as badly as Ashley screwed up when he gave the job to Kinnear. Can you give me an example? fuck me Howay then

bullshit "fact". he has sacked 1 manager he didnt appoint and who the vast majority of fans wanted out. I take your comment on board. Would you agree that. Ashley had 3 managers at the club in the space of one year. Ashley has made significant compensation payments to two of them (or will have soon enough) one of whom was extraordinarily popular and doing very well. manager #1 has been explained above. manager #2 quit and isnt guaranteed any payout (though it is likely he'll get something) and manager #3 took over because manager #2 quit and is still currently employed as our manager. to compare this to shepherd's hirings and sackings is insane. I don't think Shepherd made a hash of a single managerial departure as much as Ashley screwed up in letting Keegan qo. Nor do I think he screwed up any appointment as badly as Ashley screwed up when he gave the job to Kinnear. Can you give me an example? Robson and Souness. Did you see the walkout at the end of Robsons last full season? A lot of people thought his time had come. Whatever you think of Souness (and he is a shit massive twat) he'd won far more and managed far bigger clubs than Kinnear.

bullshit "fact". he has sacked 1 manager he didnt appoint and who the vast majority of fans wanted out. I take your comment on board. Would you agree that. Ashley had 3 managers at the club in the space of one year. Ashley has made significant compensation payments to two of them (or will have soon enough) one of whom was extraordinarily popular and doing very well. manager #1 has been explained above. manager #2 quit and isnt guaranteed any payout (though it is likely he'll get something) and manager #3 took over because manager #2 quit and is still currently employed as our manager. to compare this to shepherd's hirings and sackings is insane. I don't think Shepherd made a hash of a single managerial departure as much as Ashley screwed up in letting Keegan qo. Nor do I think he screwed up any appointment as badly as Ashley screwed up when he gave the job to Kinnear. Can you give me an example?

bullshit "fact". he has sacked 1 manager he didnt appoint and who the vast majority of fans wanted out. I take your comment on board. Would you agree that. Ashley had 3 managers at the club in the space of one year. Ashley has made significant compensation payments to two of them (or will have soon enough) one of whom was extraordinarily popular and doing very well.

Semantics.

That sentence in bold is probably one of the biggest piles of dogshit I have ever read on this forum This is the problem with anti-Ashley posters and the likes of the NUSC. Banging on about what's been done wrong without even attempting to acknowledge the point of the original post, which is about clubs going facing real financial difficulties if they spend beyond their means without any proportionate success. Does this sound like any club in particular? This is the problem about those who have bought into Ashley's propaganda and have posted on this thread without correctly interpreting what others have said - there was absolutely NOTHING in my posting which mentioned Ashley's spend - if you look again , you will see that I said he has messed up Jumbo style ; this has nothing to do with the spend but EVERYTHING to do with his decision-making...and I stand by that 100 % , as would anyone unless they think that creating a situation where KK walks out, employing a third-rater like Kinnear after making an abortive effort to sell the club(and then offering him a 2 year contract) etc etc...is good management. not arguing with any of that like, but i love the chelp that Happy Face has railed off into about spending on managers under ashley after a massive amount of the debt ashley paid off was built up by the previous owners in appointing shit managers on big contracts, allowing them to spend a fortune on shit players then sacking them and paying them off you couldn't make it up Ashley hasn't paid it off. He's changed the lender....to himself...so we save on the interest. Ashley has sacked managers at a rate 3 times more frequent than Shepherd did. Why do you support this course of action while deriding it from the previous chairman? ah, semantics, last desperate act - i'm going to assume that before ashley bought the club the money was owed by NUFC to someone who was not Mike Ashley, therefore he paid that debt did he not? as we're being pedantic about it you're referencing -2 years to +10 years which i hope you realise is fucking ridiculous & i support neither course of action There's no semantics involved. When I transfer the balance on my credit cards to a 0% card, have I "Paid off my debt"? No doubt it's a sensible course of action that saves me money. It doesn't mean I'm now the shining example of a debt free citizen. The bloke's only been here 2 years. It's difficult to judge him on anything else.

That sentence in bold is probably one of the biggest piles of dogshit I have ever read on this forum This is the problem with anti-Ashley posters and the likes of the NUSC. Banging on about what's been done wrong without even attempting to acknowledge the point of the original post, which is about clubs going facing real financial difficulties if they spend beyond their means without any proportionate success. Does this sound like any club in particular? This is the problem about those who have bought into Ashley's propaganda and have posted on this thread without correctly interpreting what others have said - there was absolutely NOTHING in my posting which mentioned Ashley's spend - if you look again , you will see that I said he has messed up Jumbo style ; this has nothing to do with the spend but EVERYTHING to do with his decision-making...and I stand by that 100 % , as would anyone unless they think that creating a situation where KK walks out, employing a third-rater like Kinnear after making an abortive effort to sell the club(and then offering him a 2 year contract) etc etc...is good management. not arguing with any of that like, but i love the chelp that Happy Face has railed off into about spending on managers under ashley after a massive amount of the debt ashley paid off was built up by the previous owners in appointing shit managers on big contracts, allowing them to spend a fortune on shit players then sacking them and paying them off you couldn't make it up Ashley hasn't paid it off. He's changed the lender....to himself...so we save on the interest. Ashley has sacked managers at a rate 3 times more frequent than Shepherd did. Why do you support this course of action while deriding it from the previous chairman?

There's so much wrong with that post it's hard to know where to start but the bolded bit...I disagree that JK is a worse manager than Allardyce, and if you are saying that it was wrong to pay out so much money to get rid of the fat faker, then obviously that negates your point about paying Keegan off as he would never have been here, we'd still have Allardyce, heading to Hull with a ten man defence and hoofing the ball 50 yards for Owen to scrap for. The point relates more to the one in the article from the OP that part of valncia's problem is the rate at which they go through managers. Ashley has gone through 3 managers in one season.....but is sticking with the worst one. If you think Allardyce is a worse manager than Kinnear then it serves to further illustrate how clueless you are. At least I'm not so clueless to totally distort the point of the OP in order to get my digs in and pretend it was praising Ashley for "running things well". "Let's all give thanks to uncle Mike...." "the titles a piss take obviously" keep going though bonny lad, doing well.... OK "things could be much, much worse imo" "things could have been very different had nobody bought the club from FS/Halls" "Mike Ashley buying this club will turn out to be a blessing in disguise"

There's so much wrong with that post it's hard to know where to start but the bolded bit...I disagree that JK is a worse manager than Allardyce, and if you are saying that it was wrong to pay out so much money to get rid of the fat faker, then obviously that negates your point about paying Keegan off as he would never have been here, we'd still have Allardyce, heading to Hull with a ten man defence and hoofing the ball 50 yards for Owen to scrap for. The point relates more to the one in the article from the OP that part of valncia's problem is the rate at which they go through managers. Ashley has gone through 3 managers in one season.....but is sticking with the worst one. If you think Allardyce is a worse manager than Kinnear then it serves to further illustrate how clueless you are. At least I'm not so clueless to totally distort the point of the OP in order to get my digs in and pretend it was praising Ashley for "running things well". "Let's all give thanks to uncle Mike...."

I mentioned a lot more than the manager pay-offs too. If anyone latched onto managers it was you when you emboldened it from my cromulent post.

There's so much wrong with that post it's hard to know where to start but the bolded bit...I disagree that JK is a worse manager than Allardyce, and if you are saying that it was wrong to pay out so much money to get rid of the fat faker, then obviously that negates your point about paying Keegan off as he would never have been here, we'd still have Allardyce, heading to Hull with a ten man defence and hoofing the ball 50 yards for Owen to scrap for. The point relates more to the one in the article from the OP that part of valncia's problem is the rate at which they go through managers. Ashley has gone through 3 managers in one season.....but is sticking with the worst one. If you think Allardyce is a worse manager than Kinnear then it serves to further illustrate how clueless you are.

Sorry, I thought I was listing the ways in which Ashley has spent needlessly. The financial difficulty he's exacerbated. Did you read the Valencia article? It lists exactly the same sort of things I have like manager pay-offs that made Valencia unsustainable...and which we all hammered Shepherd for? Ashley has gone through managers at at a rate of more than 3 a year, rather than 1 a year like Shepherd did late on.

comments on 2 points in bold: 1. clubs tend not to want to buy shit players and take their massive wages, funny that wonder why? 2. who said he was running things well? you're exposing yourself as 'boycoutter' spouting shit like that Ignore the rest though mate. In response to your first point, I agree that nobody wants to buy overpaid shite......except us when we give the likes of Ameobi a new contract. It's not just players though. If he's cutting costs so sensibly, then how can we afford the most overpaid scout in the league? And on your second, I thought the OP was suggesting we'd be thanking Ashley in the long run. Was it not?

What a ridiculous ridiculous thread. The wages are too high with people at the club being paid excessively while underperforming badly. Who does Ashley sell? Milner, Nzogbia and Given with rumours it's Bassong next. Some of the best value players at the club in terms of wages vs appearances vs performances. He's also got a hospitalised has-been manager on £1M a year who's performed worse than any manager in the history of the club bar Ozzie Ardiles. He's also got a chief scout on a £1.5M a season contract. He's made one massive payout to get rid of a far better manager than we currently have. He's due to make an even bigger payout to get rid of another even better manager than we currently have. He's got us one point from being relegated and losing millions of TV money. How can people say he's running things well? I cannot fathom the warped mindset of an Ashley fan. He's killing our club, and people are gladly watching him do it because he can afford to take the loss on his gamble and keep paying for the ever diminishing returns.......until he says "Fuck it", cuts his losses puts the club into administration and gets first dabs on the £120M of loans he's due as the clubs only creditor.

Are you kidding? You reckon this is anything other than market research? Aye, but what do you with the results of market research when you get them? Target the people who gave their details to sell them stuff. Sometimes, I'll give you that. But when you ask about things like customer service and website usability it's usually because you're planning to improve them. The club already have the contact details of 1000s of supporters anyway I imagine. Certainly of everyone who's registered at the website, which includes the likes of me even though I only ever look at it once in a blue moon as it's crap. As people have noted, it's a ridiculous survey and looks very badly designed. Questions about the media are undoubtedly aimed to find out who reads/watches what and why, for the purposes of more efficiently targeting advertising, press relations initiatives and so on. Questions related to merchandising and retail are obviously aimed at improving merchandising and retail. Not particularly inspiring but hardly some kind of sinister conspiracy to defraud the hapless supporter. But ill advised given our current plight, yeah? Why "ill advised"? You think it would be better for the club if their merchandising and retail brought in less money? "I suppose that's why they've just hoyed it up on the website rather than email or post it out to us."

That's the spirit.

I haven't You get into reserve games free on your season ticket man. No need for a stream.