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Newcastle United - "where players come to die"


Stu

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While watching the football the other night, a Celtic-supporting friend was engaging in the usual anti-toon banter and came up with the witty phrase "Newcastle United is where players go to die" citing Duff and Owen as examples...

 

...then he continued with Geremi, Barton, Boumsong, Butt, Luque, Bramble, Carr, Babayaro, Emre, Viana, Moore, Viduka, Smith, Rozenhal....and you began to think maybe he had a point. To counter it, I could only think of N'Zogbia, Martins and Jenas who hadn't seen their careers stall/plummet since signing in black and white - which is pretty awful. It can't just be about the manager's choice of signings, as these were spread out over three or four managers, is it the 'pressure'?

 

It also can't just be that player x had a poor attitude, or was "just here to collect his wages" - this may be the case for one or two people, but surely the same mistake couldn't have been made over and over again? When was the last time someone's career really went somewhere with NUFC? Bellamy springs to mind, but even then we managed to cock that one up. The likes of Cole and Hamman are the players who have gone somewhere after leaving NUFC, while Shearer and Speed carved out respectable careers while at the club.

 

Thankfully, despite St James' being the resting place for many a career, at least we're not Wigan (purgatory).

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While watching the football the other night, a Celtic-supporting friend was engaging in the usual anti-toon banter and came up with the witty phrase "Newcastle United is where players go to die" citing Duff and Owen as examples...

 

...then he continued with Geremi, Barton, Boumsong, Butt, Luque, Bramble, Carr, Babayaro, Emre, Viana, Moore, Viduka, Smith, Rozenhal....and you began to think maybe he had a point. To counter it, I could only think of N'Zogbia, Martins and Jenas who hadn't seen their careers stall/plummet since signing in black and white - which is pretty awful. It can't just be about the manager's choice of signings, as these were spread out over three or four managers, is it the 'pressure'?

 

It also can't just be that player x had a poor attitude, or was "just here to collect his wages" - this may be the case for one or two people, but surely the same mistake couldn't have been made over and over again? When was the last time someone's career really went somewhere with NUFC? Bellamy springs to mind, but even then we managed to cock that one up. The likes of Cole and Hamman are the players who have gone somewhere after leaving NUFC, while Shearer and Speed carved out respectable careers while at the club.

 

Thankfully, despite St James' being the resting place for many a career, at least we're not Wigan (purgatory).

 

Used to be same at Villa but they've turned themselves around so there is hope...

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completely forgot about Kluivert...so there's another onto the list...maybe it could be partly explained by our "Toon Galacticos" approach under Shepherd - lets spend £££ on players with big reputations but aren't wanted by their current clubs. They were also the "established stars" of the time.

 

It's a little worrying that this is something felt over in Holland, but it would explain why foreign players don't see us in the same light as our fans do...(e.g. Modric)

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completely forgot about Kluivert...so there's another onto the list...maybe it could be partly explained by our "Toon Galacticos" approach under Shepherd - lets spend £££ on players with big reputations but aren't wanted by their current clubs. They were also the "established stars" of the time...

 

 

 

That policy has quite a lot to do with it IMO. Real Madrid had a similar policy of signing Galacticos with consideration of age and how they would actually play as a team a secondary consideration.

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How have Geremi's or Viduka's carears stalled since they got here?..  As for Duff his carear had already stalled at Chelsea, Bramble played plenty of games, he just wasn't good enough..

 

There's absolutely loads of players who have come to Newcastle and either had there best years here or played well and moved on..  Less in recent years, but that's going to happen when the clubs performing shit in the league.

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Guest elbee909

Tommy Burns worked at Newcastle.  Didn't die here though, did he?  Where?  Celtic.  Exactly.

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Celtic and Rangers are where players go when they want to make sure they finish their career with some kind of a medal to show for their efforts.

And thats not a compliment to either Celtic or Rangers

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Guest elbee909

:/ bit harsh mate

 

Well, fed up being the whipping boys for anyone who's got a vague interest in football.

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Guest optimistic nit

in the last few years, maybe, but look at the period before that, and the players we signed then had much better careers after joining the toon.

 

bramble got 4-5 years of top flight football, deserving none of them

Robert had the best years of his career

Bellamy had the best years of his career

Jenas used us as a stepping stone.

Ambrose played PL football under us, but since leaving, he's an average championship player

Speed got a lot from us, as did woodgate, and players like O'Brien, Hughes, Griffin and Bernard would have not had anything like the career they had. had they not played for the toon.

 

Going back further i'd say nearly every player who played for keegan's newcastle would say it was the best years of their career, and those that wouldn't would only say that because they wen't on to something better (the only player i can think of here is possibly ginola, but i think his best years were at the toon personally).

 

we've had a bad few seasons, but we're hopefully getting out of that now.

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Guest optimistic nit

Tommy Burns worked at Newcastle.  Didn't die here though, did he?  Where?  Celtic.  Exactly.

 

erm... what?

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Guest elbee909

The original post concerned some Celtic fan or other proclaiming Newcastle as a place where players come to die.  I was just evening things up by being technically more correct.

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completely forgot about Kluivert...so there's another onto the list...maybe it could be partly explained by our "Toon Galacticos" approach under Shepherd - lets spend £££ on players with big reputations but aren't wanted by their current clubs. They were also the "established stars" of the time.

 

It's a little worrying that this is something felt over in Holland, but it would explain why foreign players don't see us in the same light as our fans do...(e.g. Modric)

 

oh dear

 

<< sigh >>

 

Edit:

 

can't believe why anyone gets peeved by comments made by Celtic supporters, the greatest team in world football because they;ve beat Airdrie in 10025 Cup Finals . Just tell him to bugger off.

 

 

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Can't really argue that past events post-2004 may have created this reputation from the outside, whether it is us killing the player, or by us just signing players that didn't have the proper motivation.

 

Recently, we've signed the likes of Beye and Enrique who have tried to suceed here, and have a good chance of doing so. Even players like Rozehnal who didn't settle have escaped mostly undamaged.

 

We just need to progress like this for a couple of years, and people will forget about all that and remember Robson and Keegan Mk I (and hopefully Mk II)

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Can't really argue that past events post-2004 may have created this reputation from the outside, whether it is us killing the player, or by us just signing players that didn't have the proper motivation.

 

Recently, we've signed the likes of Beye and Enrique who have tried to suceed here, and have a good chance of doing so. Even players like Rozehnal who didn't settle have escaped mostly undamaged.

 

We just need to progress like this for a couple of years, and people will forget about all that and remember Robson and Keegan Mk I (and hopefully Mk II)

 

we just buy players from other clubs like anybody else ffs

 

What a bloody thread.

 

 

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