LoveItIfWeBeatU

I'm amazed they haven't dropped the prices more. There's a big difference between Premiership and Championship football. Are they trying to say you get more home games in the Championship for your money? Surely it makes more money from a full ground buying tickets at around two thirds the current ticket price (selling more programmes, drinks, food, etc) than a half full ground buying full price tickets? Having said that, at the moment the club is stuck in limbo with no manager and an owner who wants to sell so I can't imagine a lot of people rushing to renew. I'm sure any deadline for having your renewal back will be ignored as it won't be hard to get a seat where you want in the ground.

Yes but Owen is available for free and the Martins isn't. The question is whether Moyes is looking for freebies or looking to take his team to the next level. Owen might appear to be free but sign him up and the chairman isn't getting any other striker for Moyes this summer. So when Owen gets the measles, malaria, typhoid etc and misses all of preseason and then gets his standard knee knock here, ankle knock there and hamstring strain everywhere, and the team is no better off than it was last season because even when he plays he is never match fit, I bet the fans will feel like he is costing them a hell of a lot then. Owen will hold them back if anything and he is only getting older and more pathetic physically. Waste of money. My understanding of Everton is that they don't have a lot of money for transfers. Moyes does a good job on a relatively small budget. If he buys Martins that could be well over half his transfer budget gone. As for Moyes wanting Owen, he supposedly wanted Smith not so long ago so who knows how he thinks?

Yes but Owen is available for free and the Martins isn't.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/gossip_and_transfers/8080443.stm If I was Liverpool I'd tell Gerrard to shut up.

Looks like The Chronicle have just done what I did yesterday I.e. put "Omani Group" into Google and see what comes up. I'll not hold my breath.

True. Is he gutless or just finished though? Like I said it's hard to tell what Shearer thought. The talk of a new contract for Owen may have just been smoke and mirrors.

I'm not sure. He did throw Ameobi on against Aston Villa rather than Ranger. It's hard to say at this point who Shearer does and doesn't rate. He could have been saying "give Owen chances and he'll score" to boost Owen's confidence or maybe he really thinks Owen still has 'it'. We'll see if he gets made manager who he tries to keep and who he tries to buy.

Some may say it's a small point but I think it's pretty damning. I don't care whether his contract is expiring, he should have least made some sort of statement. He's made a disgrace of the captaincy IMO. One of the very few good things about our relegation is the prospect of Shearer giving Owen a new contract is now gone. Haven't had a statement from Ameobi to the media to state he's staying with us *fingers crossed*.

Interesting thought from NUFC.com regarding NUFC being available for around £80m: -

Yes but he was also shit after he left Newcastle. Same as Viana. People say they'll be great when they leave us and they are actually just as shit elsewhere. Love the "escape route from Newcastle" line. Journalist's should know Owen doesn't need to 'escape' as his contract is about to expire. £50K a week for Owen? He's not worth it Everton.

It was common knowledge that that same man who now owns Portsmouth headed up the Abu Dhabi takeover of Man City, he said they'd tried to buy Newcastle first but Mike Ashley turned their offer down. How different things would have been for us if he'd accepted.

If Kluivert was so good how come his career died on it's arse after Barcelona got rid of him? Barcelona got rid of him when he was well passed his best. The Barcelona fans didn't like him in the last year or so of his time there.

Reminds me of something I thought the other day. How come Mackems don't boycott Greggs?

I would guess they are the Oman equivalent of the Abu Dhabi United Group for Development and Investment (Adug) (United Arab Emirates) who bought Man City. They are a private equity company. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Dhabi_United_Group It could be this: - http://www.cityscapeintelligence.com/breaking-news/omani-group-looks-for-strategic-partners http://www.simranintl.com/

Why do contracts run past the end of the season? It would make sense for them to run out a week after the end of the season. I do wonder where Owen will end up. There have been rumours of Everton. He would fit their bill in so far as he wouldn't cost a transfer fee. Owen isn't exactly is a position of strength. Poor injury record and out of form for at least half a season. I can't see clubs beating a path to his door. If they do, the wages he can command will be relatively low compared to what we wasted on him.

Depends on if/when the sale happens. If we keep our defence (Bassong, Beye, S.Taylor & Enrique) I think we'll do well in the Championship. As someone else pointed out, Kevin Phillips scores goals for fun in the Championship. Chopra also. Surely we'll have a squad that can do that?

Good news if Ashley is willing to write off his loan to NUFC. I must confess that I still want a new billionaire owner/s. We seem to be the only club who got bought by a shit billionaire (as far as investing in the actual squad goes). Better luck next time? Please be sorted out quickly!

And to think Mike Ashley supposedly turned down an offer to buy the club from the people who went on to buy Man City. He couldn't have done a better job at destroying us if he'd tried.

I'm very worried. Does this mean he won't be bothering to sort the club out while he is looking for a buyer? Does this mean new players aren't being sort? Scary stuff. Who would pay £100m for a Championship club never mind one which also owes £100m to Mike Ashley on top?

So he throws us into even more turmoil then. Club for sale again, Manager not appointed (If Shearer is appointed will the new owners want him?), Total rebuild of squad required, £100m loan to pay back to Ashley, etc. Who the hell is going to buy us now we are a Championship side?

The fact is Arsenal and Man U's reserve/kids teams can beat Premier League teams. I'll happily have NUFC borrow a few of their players to help us get promotion.

If he faked the injury why is he having an operation on it in the summer?

There's no way Shearer won't be confirmed as Manager. I'm not worried about it at all. If it doesn't happen Mike Ashley may as well sell NUFC at a massive loss to whoever wants to buy it as he'd be finished here. I'm just hoping the "Root and Branch" stuff has started while the contracts are sorted out.

We need all the help we can get to try to get promotion in our first season in the Championship. I'll take any favours going. This isn't like when we loaned Rossi off Man U (helping a competitor's player get experience). The fact is we will probably need to bring in quite a few players. Loans are probably easier to do compared to purchases. Getting promotion is all that matters. If we lose a few players who helped us get promotion it doesn't matter. We can worry about that then.

Plastic fans.