PineBarrens

Seeing as how Ashley's model of running a football club is so radical and visionary, makes you wonder how the likes of Barcelona, Madrid, Milan, Man City, Chelsea and Man United struggle by with their archaic method of paying good wages for top players and, you know, winning stuff. The dirty, cheating gets.

Course not, but agents can be prone to exaggerating in the media to achieve what they want. No idea whether £40k a week is what he's worth, what he should be paid, too much or too little. All football wages are mental. But I wouldn't go as far as to say that means we should pay every player whatever it takes to get them. Do you? Would we be having this debate if we'd offered him 50k, or 60k? Just seems like a discussion that's purely subjective. Say we've offered him the same as Cabaye is on, that seems fair to me. If we genuinely want a player then we have to pay what is necessary, both to satisfy his club and the player (plus his agent I guess). What that figure actually is, and what other players like Cabaye are on is totally irrelevant; each is its own case. If we want him, we'll have to pay what it takes. If it's too much for us, the transfer simply isn't happening. This is apparently the player's agent, how often do you hear agents come out with reactions like this? It's not common to deride an offer like this. He claims we've known what he's on for some time. Perhaps foolishly I assume Llambias can operate Google and knows his current club is in the Champions League and has far better prospects than us. To therefore not offer somewhere near what it takes to get him is just stupid. Like we did for Owen, Duff, Geremi etc etc. Don't get me wrong - offering less than someone is on is stupid. But we shouldn't pay whatever a player asks for and should be within our wage structure. Ignoring the debate over whether a wage cap is a good thing or not, if our structure is that rigid then we should know within one or two phonecalls whether players are going to be attainable or not. We shouldn't even be wasting time and resources scouting them. Again, there's simply no excuse after all this time. Oh, and that's an interesting set of names you mention considering one was signed by Ashley and one was supposedly offered the biggest contract in NUFC history... by Ashley. Once again, if we have so much trust in our scouting team to deliver value for money, we should be willing to back his judgement. Yeah, that's a fair point. If we know our wage structure it's stupid to pursue players who are well outside it. That said though, it could be that Barnetta is only on £25k now and we're actually offering a decent deal. It could just be that he (or this pseudo-agent bloke) think he should be getting more. That sort of thing is difficult to know until you're actually in contact I reckon. He's on 60 grand a week according to Graeme Bailey.

Who is in this camp? More than there should be. Well name them then, it should be easy for you If you can't see for yourself, then I can't help you.

Who is in this camp? More than there should be.

Nobody, but that wouldn't suit the 'board can do no wrong' camp.

I'm just hoping it isn't already over. Trust me it's over (in the sense of bringing in decent players, anyway).

Obertan is worse than Alan Smith - no punchline.

Was it not Keegan who accused the board of deliberately bidding low/offering low wages for players safe in the knowledge that the bids would be knocked back?

Good post. I don't think he's an evil genius out to destroy the club either, more that he's a short-sighted corpulent berk who rarely seems to learn from his mistakes.

Platinum attack dogs at Mike's (aka Snake Mountain) and gold- plated masks with Keegan's and Shearer's face on them which Derek and Mike force Pardew to wear whilst being anally pierced every time he mentions the £35 million in press interviews.

Following relegation, it could have been a lot, lot worse than that. And the person most responsible for our relegation being...

Have you read anything by Lee Ryder?

So the five year model turned out to be based on Wigan Athletic? Class.

'welcome to your new manager, Mr Joseph Kinerre'

Yes, but how does that fit it with the 'can't say a bad word about rubenesque Mike' camp?

What will it take for certain posters to realise how precarious a position the football club are in - two heavy defeats to Arsenal and Sunderland? End of the transfer window with Enrique, Barton and Tiote gone with no replacements or any sign of that elusive striker? Derek Llambias bumming Lady Mae on the pitch at St James' at half-time?

There seems to be an ever dwindling band of people in denial at how shit things are at NUFC, admirably sticking to their deluded guns a la Lloyd Christmas in 'Dumb and Dumber'. *fingers in ears* 'la,la,la,la,la,la,la,la...'

Just for those in denial about how fucked up this situation is and how much of a shitehawk our owner is, here's some comments from an Everton message board:- 'he (Ashley) is frighteningly inept. god knows how he made his money. Who knows whats going on at Newcastle and i'd have Barton in a heartbeat.' 'The nolan thing is strange..why sell your club captain and highest goalscorer especially if he keep the talented barton under control... as for your point about throwing money away..Ashley is saving on bartons wages and knows he could of walked next season anyway for buttons .. ashley sounds like a cunt...but hey lets hope the blue union can find someone like him eh.' 'Sound like a winner to me and i'd have said all newcastle fans and players alike would have wanted him as captain..as for set pieces hes mustard at them..if pardew cant see that then #### him...how about pardew was told not to give him the armband by his puppeteer to make barton go nuts ...' 'Sour grapes from Newcastle, leaking all kinds of stories to placate the fans, don't ya think ' 'I would say their PR activities are on hyper-drive.' 'despite all the hyperbole in those sources all that boils down to is that, essentially, he wasn't best pleased that a clown was captain and that they got beat by Leeds.'

Does Thom Yorke have a lazy eye?

Carl Serrant.

Good transfer window still?

What's Malcolm Allen up to these days?

That came out wrong I hope... Unfortunately not, Mike's now resorted to attacking wild pigs for lascivious thrills, the rotten get.

Judge us in September, judge us in September, judge us in September, bore holes, bore holes, boar holes...

Golfmag did warn us all, no?