bealios

Cole was a good player, and will always hold him in high regard for what he achieved at NUFC, but he wouldn't have made half the impact without Beardsley arguably playing the best football of his career.

Buzza, it was a penalty shoot out. Get realistic.

Picture the scene. It is May 2009. The club haven't been bought by a crazy Far Eastern billionaire, but we are now owned by a reasonably well off but sensible north eastern consortium, advised by, lets just say Bobby Robson (I've put up about 51% of the funds by the way). Newcastle have reached the FA Cup Final.

 

Joe Kinnear negotiated some tricky early rounds, including a morale boosting victory at Anfield, and a draw at Stamford Bridge, which was followed up by a penalty victory at St. James's. Joe was replaced in March by Kevin Keegan, who kept Joe on as coach because of the job he did. Joe was really cunting pleased as fuck, rejecting many job offers to stay on and finish the fucking cunting job he started and to stick it up the fuckers. Who are all cunts by the way, if it helps set the background to this story.

 

Alan Shearer has accepted the job as head coach, deciding if he didn't get involved now it was never going to happen. He decides creosote isn't that great. Alan Smith starts to shoot on target as a result of this. Chopra buys out his own contract seeing the signs of good things ahead, and is picked up by King Kev on a free transfer. Contractual irregularities mean that the mackem scum have to reimburse us for £10m. They have to release a statemrent to the press as a result of the settlement confirming that they are indeed mackem scum. Peter Beardsley is now assistant manager, and David Kelly and Les Ferdinand are now on the scouting team. Alex Mathie makes the tea. Pretty fucking spectacularly I might add. Gavin Peacock is spiritual adviser, and Phllipe Albert is our defensive coach.

 

Anyway, FA Cup final, Keegan's team have gone down to ten men after a man was sent off (lets just assume in a similar manner to when Drogba got sent of in the CL Final i.e. being a bit of a twat). Pulled it back to 1 - 1, and then put on a defensive display which leaves Mark Lawrenson marvelling at the tactical astuteness of King Kev, and apologising for any doubt he may have cast over both Newcastle and Keegan's tactical nous in general.

 

So it goes to penalties, and its 4-4, and the opposition have just taken their last penalty and missed. Our last penalty taker steps up, and rifles it in the net. Geordies go wild, and I'm in tears.

 

So the question is,

 

1. He scores, giving Newcastle the trophy they have strived after for so long, which current player would you like it to be?

 

2. In the circumstances above, which non-current player would you like it to be, assuming we signed them in January (and you're allowed to choose old players if you can give me a good reason as to why they're playing for us in May - time travel not allowed, but David McCreery coming out of retirement after discovering a wonder drug is allowed).

 

 

3. Who would it be against?

 

4. Who was sent off?

 

Assuming you have been bothered to read this far, winner gets a free ticket for whatever away match they can't get because of their Loyalty Point rating - I've just given up my ticket for tomorrow by the way on the basis I can't get to the game tomorrow and absolutely I'm gutted, I will have to watch it on Sky with my missus. Rest assured I will be sitting with my Stella at 10 am tomorrow, with you in spirit.

 

EDIT: NE5 - You are not allowed to nominate anyone from the old board 

 

 

which non-current player

 

Huh?

 

A player who does not currently play for us

Thank you Duff for clarifying that, I didn't think it was too difficult.

By the way I would go for:

1. Ameobi

2. Beardsley.

3. Man Utd. Always.

4. Can't say that yet. This is the key to winning the game. Get this one right and you're in with a chance.

Picture the scene. It is May 2009. The club haven't been bought by a crazy Far Eastern billionaire, but we are now owned by a reasonably well off but sensible north eastern consortium, advised by, lets just say Bobby Robson (I've put up about 51% of the funds by the way). Newcastle have reached the FA Cup Final.

Joe Kinnear negotiated some tricky early rounds, including a morale boosting victory at Anfield, and a draw at Stamford Bridge, which was followed up by a penalty victory at St. James's. Joe was replaced in March by Kevin Keegan, who kept Joe on as coach because of the job he did. Joe was really cunting pleased as fuck, rejecting many job offers to stay on and finish the fucking cunting job he started and to stick it up the fuckers. Who are all cunts by the way, if it helps set the background to this story.

Alan Shearer has accepted the job as head coach, deciding if he didn't get involved now it was never going to happen. He decides creosote isn't that great. Alan Smith starts to shoot on target as a result of this. Chopra buys out his own contract seeing the signs of good things ahead, and is picked up by King Kev on a free transfer. Contractual irregularities mean that the mackem scum have to reimburse us for £10m. They have to release a statemrent to the press as a result of the settlement confirming that they are indeed mackem scum. Peter Beardsley is now assistant manager, and David Kelly and Les Ferdinand are now on the scouting team. Alex Mathie makes the tea. Pretty fucking spectacularly I might add. Gavin Peacock is spiritual adviser, and Phllipe Albert is our defensive coach.

Anyway, FA Cup final, Keegan's team have gone down to ten men after a man was sent off (lets just assume in a similar manner to when Drogba got sent of in the CL Final i.e. being a bit of a twat). Pulled it back to 1 - 1, and then put on a defensive display which leaves Mark Lawrenson marvelling at the tactical astuteness of King Kev, and apologising for any doubt he may have cast over both Newcastle and Keegan's tactical nous in general.

So it goes to penalties, and its 4-4, and the opposition have just taken their last penalty and missed. Our last penalty taker steps up, and rifles it in the net. Geordies go wild, and I'm in tears.

So the question is,

1. He scores, giving Newcastle the trophy they have strived after for so long, which current player would you like it to be?

2. In the circumstances above, which non-current player would you like it to be, assuming we signed them in January (and you're allowed to choose old players if you can give me a good reason as to why they're playing for us in May - time travel not allowed, but David McCreery coming out of retirement after discovering a wonder drug is allowed).

3. Who would it be against?

4. Who was sent off?

Assuming you have been bothered to read this far, winner gets a free ticket for whatever away match they can't get because of their Loyalty Point rating - I've just given up my ticket for tomorrow by the way on the basis I can't get to the game tomorrow and absolutely I'm gutted, I will have to watch it on Sky with my missus. Rest assured I will be sitting with my Stella at 10 am tomorrow, with you in spirit.

 

 

you are absolutely wrong.

 

Most supporters didn't think Ashley wasn't killing the club, but they do now.

 

 

How can you possibly say that most supporters thought Ashley was "killing the club"?! Fair enough, people can disagree about the level of personal investment that he was prepared to put in in the medium to long term, but killing the club is a ridiculous statement.

If we can assume that by "killing the club" we mean do a Leeds so that we are financially fucked and a division or two lower down, then I would have thought we were more in danger of doing that under the old board than under the new board.

Most of your opinions seems to be expressed in an intelligent manner so I assume you are aware of the current economic climate, particularly involving the availability of finance? If the club were still carrying £100m plus worth of debt, one can assume that the annual interest figure on that would be £8m - £10m a year. However, these facilities tend to need to be repaid, or more realistically refinanced. What would have happened if the banks were not prepared to fund a £100m refinancing package, and instead for example would only refinance for £50m? The club would have needed to find £50m from somewhere, and the old board were clearly not interested in envesting personal wealth. The obvious choice would have been the sale of players, or perhaps the ground (with a leaseback). Look what is happening at West Ham for fuck sake.

We don't have that problem now - that is why the whole "free of debt" point is being shouted by the team selling the club - in this financial market it is a massive plus.

Highbury, London. Cockney Mafia in!

Suits me, I have 30 loyalty points, but if I don't want to travel up by myself then I need it to drop to 28 pretty sharpish!

Anyone with 25 or so loyalty points manage to get away tickets last year?

Am I the only person a bit worried about this?

Ashley was prepared to put in £20m of his own money every year on top of what the club generated itself, and everyone said that was not enough.

The Nigerian spokesman said they still needed to find £100m, but were hopeful of getting it. But it sounds as though after that the club has to be self sustaining i.e. no more money coming in net from outside.

Whilst the ultimate aim is for the club to be self sustaining, it needs considerable investment over a number of years to get anywhere close to that - look at Liverpool and Chelsea - CL fixtures and winners/finalists and still nowhere near self sustaining.

Whelan can't stand Ashley, rumours of Ashley failing to abide by JJB's price fixing shennanigans with football strips, and not wanting to join in with the corporate golf playing prawn sandwich eating club etc - wouldn't be surprised if that whole Whelan statement was not complete and utter bollocks.

Why can't people understand the £20m statement? This is a good thing, more than most other club owners have invested.

If Ashley owned the club for 10 years, he would have personally lost £200m pounds. How can anybody say that was not enough?

This doesn't mean that we only have a transfer budget of £20m, it means that this is the net spend for the club as a whole. A club like Newcastle United with its high tunrover/gates etc. should at least be able to break even every year, however that may just be a dream until we get back into Europe.

The Glaziers put significantly less into Man Utd every year i.e. none. There are only two other clubs in the league that could possibly match that level of sustained losses.

Nice sentiment, but the only way this sort of thing could ever work in the current climate is if a very very rich benefactor and owner allowed it to happen very slowly (as said above) i.e. put 10% over to a fans trust, and then over a very long period of time build this up to the magical 25.1% to veto special resolutions, and then to 50.1%.

Looking at this might be a more productive way than the idea stated above. The one stated at the start of the thread would not work because of various company law requirements (presumably you have already dealt with statutory requirements of advertising a collective investment scheme etc.?). And that is before you consider the costs associated with set up. Due to the large shareholder base (i.e. many holders few shares) the administrative costs would be astronomical - and you would need somebody to foot the bill for this even if the whole scheme failed.

Before people start mentioning Barcelona etc. - these clubs were constituted before TV money meant clubs were more expensive to buy i.e. NUFC for £10m as opposed to £300m.

Another option to the fans trust above might be a new club like Man Utd did - I think getting into Division 2 is achievable - I don't think it takes a great leap of imagination to see Ebbsfleet achieving it for example.

It was just a gamble the old board took, pay the big wages, get the better players, and hope they took you into the CL places where you could recoup that. Its exactly what Liverpool did, and look what they have achieved - albeit that they now have similar financial problems as NUFC had.

The problem with the gamble was that they didn't forsee the arrival of Abramovich. This meant one less CL space available (Chelsea were definitely falling away before he arrived). We instead fell away due to the appointment of Souness, just at the wrong time i.e. just before the TV deal changed and the same top 4 became established. The TV deal also mean that more owners wanted a piece of the income - which lead to teams like Portsmouth, West Ham, Man City etc having spending power to match NUFC.

I don't think Shepherd wanted anything else other than to have made NUFC successful, it just that for partly reasons beyond his control (Ambramovich), and one shocking series of decisions (the timing of replacing Sir Bobby and the chosen successor), it didn't work out.

Is how easily this can be avoided.

I know a couple of people who know Mike Ashley quite well. And whatever people might think, he's not trying to run the club into the ground. But he's trying to run the club in the same way that he ran his sports business', and he's fucked up in a bad way, by thinking that his "managers" behave in the same way that his retail managers behave.

I'm probably by myself on this one, but I thought the direction the club was heading was something I was proud of, until early September. It's one bad decision. All it takes is a re organisation where the "Cockney Mafia" can continue their scouting missions, and find guys like Guiterrez for next to nothing, but give Keegan ultimate sign off on players out. At full time at the Coventry game were we all complaining about little Dennis's signings were we?

Bollocks were we, "The Structure" had given us the best value/quality transfer window we have had for a while, and if Keegan had stayed, and signed 1 full back and 1 attacking midfielder more than we have now, this window would have been considered an absolute success.

So what I fail to see, is why the board cant see, that an easy solution to this fucking mess, is to keep the Wise scouting team, bring Keegan back, and give him control of the transfer budget for 2 years. We all laughed at the £12m Chronicle reported budget........ [need to finish this rant later...]

Just finished watching that on Football First, given the press that it will get, so fucking embarrassing.

 

 

 

I'm embarrassed for you.

Thank you. But I will manage on my own.

I appreciate that I didn't make it to game today, and Sky/BBC can edit things, but do you think that carrying banners slagging the "Cockney Mafia" does our club any favours. If we're fucked off with Ashley, he's from Buckinghamshire.

Fair enough, we've got a board who have proved themselves to have been remarkably incompenent, but its not because they were born closer to the Thames than we were, its because they are shit.

Just finished watching that on Football First, given the press that it will get, so fucking embarrassing.

This is a bit of a ridiculous thread. If you think the clubs currently managed by Bruce, Megson, Zola and about half of the teams in the league wouldn't take Keegan over current managers than you need your head examined.

Keegan has only really failed at one job, the England job. And even then, he took England to a major tournament, narrowly went out in the group stages. I wouldn't have minded that this summer in the circumstances.

Its fucking annoying how the press tend to rewrite history about Keegan's career - i.e. unstable, poor defence, only succeeds where he has loads of money etc - its all complete bollocks. And the fact that some of our fans are now starting to spout the same shite is disgraceful.

Of the realistic choices who would come now and are available, I think it has to be Didier Deschamps. Certainly has a better track record than Poyet so far, and because of the fact he's not obviously "Wisey's mate" (although he actually is!) he might not get the full backlash as being Keegan's successor.

It is because the reason NUFC were ever in a position to sign Shearer is (largely) because of Kevin Keegan.

Don't kid yourself that if Keegan hadn't did what he did in the 90's Shearer would have signed for us. Legendary player no doubt, but no way he would have came to Newcastle if he didn't think we could have challenged for the title.

If it is the case that Ashley didn't want Keegan choosing players then it says everything about his knowledge of the game really. Keegan has generally been very good in the transfer market throughout his entire career as a manager, buying flair players that excite the fans. He also has the ability to persuade players to sign on the dotted line.

 

Of course everyone knows this except the cunt that hired him.

 

Aye, his £50 million spent at Man City brought in some amazing players.

It's strange how a lot of the media and certain individuals like to rewrite history about KK's managerial career. I can't be arsed to do it, but if somebody could prepare a table that shows the position each club was in when Keegan took over, the position they were in when he left, and then the NET transfer fees paid out, it would be useful reading for a lot of the doubters.

I'm pretty sure that he left Fulham, Man City and Newcastle (first time) in better positions than when he took over. Most of the ealry progress at all clubs seems to me to have been achieved at modest cost. Its when you try to push to the next level i.e. mid table Premier to top 6 that it takes a lot of cash, law of diminishing returns and all that....

Only the mug punters will be at this game.

You complete gimp. By mug punters of course you mean true supporters?

Whilst I disagree with any boycott, at least those that talk about not going to the Hull game are standing by their principles.

Talking about not going to this game is a bit "Well I probably couldn't be arsed to go anyway so lets just call it my boycott". Why go to Hull where we have no realistic chance of winning the league (or qualifying for Europe), and then boycott a game which is in fact our most realistic chance of a trophy and hence European qualification?

I have to agree that I get a lot of stick for supporting NUFC and living outside of the north east.

Part of it is justified, although most of it is a combination of jealousy and knowing that it winds me up because I care about it. Its difficult to wind up an irish Chelsea fan who's only supported Chelsea for 5 years, because the bottom line is they don't really give a shit to what actually happens at Chelsea.

Back on topic, if the owners and managers have brought chaos on the club again, then it is left to the other parts of the club to try and bring it back again i.e. the fans and the players.

How do we do that? With a half arsed boycott? By parading for the Sky cameras? Bollocks. Go to the game, and create an atmosphere that raises the players to a performance, and hammer Hull. Part of that can be singing all of the Keegan songs in unison during the game, part can be chanting sack the board before the game, at half time and at full time etc. 

Agree with everything the Mag and TF say. Boycott is not an option.

I know its difficult for many to miss a game, but surely if you care for the club you can manage not to buy a pie or beer in the ground, just get tanked up before you get in! This will hit the owners where it hurts. If this goes on all season, they will be shitting themsevles when renewal time comes up.

This won't of course give a public display, which can damage the owners in a different way. I think the most effective public display would be for 55,000 fans to turn up (not buying merchandise or beer or pies of course), all dressed in clothes other than the strips (I would suggest black if it could be organised and publicised properly), and then sing for 90 minutes in support of the team.

I don't agree with the abusing Ashley part though - as a businessman he has put running the club in the hands of others - it would be weak management to sack those just because the majority are not in favour with their decisions. He shouldn't warrant personal abuse, and should be allowed to attend the away games with his family if he wants to. If the other actions above end up damaging the club, we will as fans have proved to him that those running the club are incompetent as they have damaged the public perception and financial performance of the club by their actions.

Too many angry views being expressed without knowledge of what has gone on.

Obviously if Keegan goes it is a ridiculous decision for many, many different reasons, even if you ignore his “Messiah” status. But turning on Ashley seems to make no sense at the moment. Nobody knows if he was even directly involved on Tuesday, it could quite easily (and actually quite likely) be a falling out between Keegan and Wise/Llambias/Jiminez over attempted player sales. Fair enough Ashley put that structure in place, but that structure is operated successfully on the continent and many clubs in this country.

Where Ashley needs to show his worth is to get back in the UK and sort this mess out. It’s not beyond saving, all that needs is a joint statement that they have clarified issues regarding responsibilities, and that Keegan has been given final authority over all first team players sales, and all first team player acquisitions. Obviously the recruitment team can make suggestions, and sign young prospects, but the man who picks the team must be the same man who controls the players from which he can pick.

Regardless of outcome, we need to support NUFC in whatever state it continues, with or without Keegan.

Not sure if its been answered elsewhere, but isn't KK supposed to be attending Joey Barton's FA hearing on his behalf tomorrow morning?