Carlito

But Staveley has had 2 and a half fucking years to put offers to him. She's had a lovely sit down curry with him, she's been called a tmewaster. She must be the most gullible woman on the planet if she keeps repeating the same actions expecting a different outcome. I don't think she is that gullible personally. I'd believe her side of the story over Ashley's, any day of the week. Who's to say the offers she talked about weren't genuine the first time? The ones that were talked about in that interview after talks ended. For all we know they could have agreed to start new talks and then Ashley is moving the goal posts again, because it's what he does. What's an extra £10m here or there to a billionaire? In all seriousness when he says £10m he probably actually means £100m.

But Staveley has had 2 and a half fucking years to put offers to him. She's had a lovely sit down curry with him, she's been called a tmewaster. She must be the most gullible woman on the planet if she keeps repeating the same actions expecting a different outcome. I don't think she is that gullible personally. I'd believe her side of the story over Ashley's, any day of the week. Who's to say the offers she talked about weren't genuine the first time? The ones that were talked about in that interview after talks ended. For all we know they could have agreed to start new talks and then Ashley is moving the goal posts again, because it's what he does.

All signs point to Ashley just taking the piss as usual. I'm sure there are offers being put to him but he just won't entertain them because he's the waster.

He clearly forgot he was playing Football Manager 2005 with a downloaded super tactic in preparation for Palace tomorrow.

Aston Villa at home, 2nd game of the season if I remember right, was quite possibly the most excruciating 90 minutes of football I think I've ever seen.

Was the legit football decision to get a disciplinarian in? Because all it did was become chaotic and break up the Bobby team. When Liverpool went to Rafa, Chelsea sacked Raineri and went to Jose Mourinho and a few months later we turned to Souness and I don't think we ever recovered. Because that to me, hiring of Souness, never felt like a sound football decision and more like a completely odd one given the previous hires were Keegan, Dalglish, Gullit. I think as nutty as Gullit as he was sacked in Feb 98 when Chelsea were 2nd or 3rd in the league. When SBR was sacked Freddie went for Souness...a man with 1 decent finish with Blackburn 2 season prior and after that not much to write about other than earlier in his career. Genuinely asking. Because after Souness it was Roeder and Fat Sam then MA bought us. In any case, I always felt FS had a plan and was trying to be successful, despite the criticism he gets for "getting rich" off the club, he still at the end of the day was a fan and wanted the club to succeed - even in his own way. So not trying to split hairs here. So do agree with you in the main.... I still cringe when I think back to us going for Souness when I think Keegan would have took the job if approached. Kind of ironic when you think about it I suppose. If we'd gotten Robson after Keegan left we could have done great things with that team. If we'd gotten Keegan when Robson left, again we could have done great things with that team.

The fact that so many clowns on Twitter are criticizing Rafa now and saying Bruce is doing a much better job just shows where we are. Depressing that one man has been able to divide and conquer the fanbase.

I think it's clear by now, the only logical explanation is that Mike Ashley turns into George Costanza towards the end of takeover talks

Less than 20% possession for us, 1 shot on target and a couple of basic defensive clangers to make Arsenal look like Brazil.

Still remembering Happy Birthday, King Kev.

Spot on. I also used to follow multiple leagues myself and be relatively up to date on everything. Over the last 10 years though my interest has declined to the point where it's even a struggle to keep up with, or even care about what our own club are doing. It's turned into a broken record. I've been on here long enough to remember what it was like during Freddie Shepherd's time in charge, but for as bad as those latter years of his reign were, at the very least there was still a hint of optimism, hope and not knowing what the following season would bring. Every time a new season rolled around, to me anyway, it always felt like a fresh start and a chance to try and get back up into the top 6 or 7 with a good cup run. Now however, we know as soon as one season ends we're going to be spending the next one, and the next one cemented in the bottom half and should be thanking which ever behind the times manager the regime chooses, just for being able to keep us above water. Steve Bruce is doing a great job, don't you know! The hope we used to have for the club trying to be the best it could be is now solely geared towards getting a new owner on board who has the right intentions. I suppose the silver lining is at least those of us over 30 are able to remember what the club once was. When Souness got the boot it felt like a dark cloud over the club was finally gone. I can't even begin to imagine what the place will be like when Ashley finally leaves. Im old now ( 57 ) so i can recall from way back in the early 70s . The unpalatable truth is that the Keegan / Robson years were merely a blip in a vast landscape of ambitionless nothing . I can remember Pop Robson ripping into the board for lack of ambition when he left the club for pastures new . The Keegan years especially were a wild ride but i think we all mistook a break in the clouds for everlasting sunshine . The one factor which both kept ambitionless owners / boards in place and made the Keegan years possible was the fans . The fans who by turning up and legitimising such low horizons kept the crap regimes in place and who by staying away helped the Hall / Keegan renaissance into place . The central lesson ive learned over the years with this club is that WE and only WE the fans have the power to remove corrupt owners . All we have to do is realise that power ... One small point aside, I totally agree with you mate. What I would say though is that the Keegan/Robson years represented growth, rather than a temporary break from the norm. Spurs, while they've always been a big club, are a great example of where ambition can take you if you look at their fortunes since the branding of the Premier League. They've grown consistently over the last 15 years while we've consistently declined. In terms of league finishes you could almost say the 2 clubs have traded places. 15 years ago, 12th would have been considered a disaster for us but now it's deemed an outstanding job. Adding to that, I also think a major problem now compared to back then is that social media plays a big part in influencing a person's decision. In 2020 a person can go on twitter, see someone saying protests/boycotts won't achieve anything and they suddenly adopt that opinion as their own, then you get the whole domino effect which is keeping the fanbase divided and ultimately at a stalemate. I've lost count of how many tweets I've read where someone responds to any suggestion of a boycott or protest with "I won't be told what to do! It's my right to go and support the team! You're not a true fan, and good riddance to you if you're not going to turn up! You're not needed" etc. In my opinion this is why any form of protest/boycott needs a popular figure leading the way. Someone to unite everybody and make those that aren't prepared to do anything at all realise that the fanbase together is stronger.

Spot on. I also used to follow multiple leagues myself and be relatively up to date on everything. Over the last 10 years though my interest has declined to the point where it's even a struggle to keep up with, or even care about what our own club are doing. It's turned into a broken record. I've been on here long enough to remember what it was like during Freddie Shepherd's time in charge, but for as bad as those latter years of his reign were, at the very least there was still a hint of optimism, hope and not knowing what the following season would bring. Every time a new season rolled around, to me anyway, it always felt like a fresh start and a chance to try and get back up into the top 6 or 7 with a good cup run. Now however, we know as soon as one season ends we're going to be spending the next one, and the next one cemented in the bottom half and should be thanking which ever behind the times manager the regime chooses, just for being able to keep us above water. Steve Bruce is doing a great job, don't you know! The hope we used to have for the club trying to be the best it could be is now solely geared towards getting a new owner on board who has the right intentions. I suppose the silver lining is at least those of us over 30 are able to remember what the club once was. When Souness got the boot it felt like a dark cloud over the club was finally gone. I can't even begin to imagine what the place will be like when Ashley finally leaves.

Same bloke who says Leeds and Notts Forest are massive clubs, which in fairness they are in my opinion. However if they're massive clubs then how are Newcastle not? The bloke needs to sort out his criteria for what a big club is.

Everyone involved in the takeover bid on their way to meet Mike Ashley for talks

Nice work. Would love to see us get Rose and Willems permanently and maybe put Ritchie at right back if we can't make the Lazaro move permanent.

I'd love to see Keegan back at the club in any capacity, especially as manager. As has been said, I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that he'd still have the enthusiasm and the ability for it. He'd get everyone believing again in a heartbeat. Unfinished business.

Our new entrance music

He's saving the wonders of science for a rainy day.

18 points. Tactical wizardry. Started Otamendi and benched Traore as 2nd sub

This.

I remember reading a Souness interview a few years ago talking about how he wanted to sign Anelka but Shepherd went over his head and got Luque instead. Didn't he also do that with Nicky Butt when Speed left, or am I just imagining that? Souness wanted Anelka and Luis Boa Morte. Shepherd got him Owen and Luque instead. Two players that ended up having injury problems, and who ended up not contributing nearly enough. Anelka and Luis Boa Morte iin 2005 would have given us far more power and pace and would have been so much more productive. So unfortunate really. Ah that's right. I totally forgot about the seemingly endless Boa Morte links in the Chronicle in 2005. They could have both been great signings for us in fairness, given what we already had. Wasn't it said we avoided Anelka because of his supposed injury record? The irony Meanwhile...

I remember reading a Souness interview a few years ago talking about how he wanted to sign Anelka but Shepherd went over his head and got Luque instead. Didn't he also do that with Nicky Butt when Speed left, or am I just imagining that?