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George Caulkin

Tooj

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  • 1 month later...
Guest toonlass

Guest toonlass

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Quality by Caulkin again

 

http://timesonline.typepad.com/thegame/2010/01/north-east-football-supporters-an-apology.html#more

 

North East football supporters - an apology

 

Managers_blog

 

George Caulkin

 

In this space a week ago, under a headline titled "It’s time to end the negativity in the North East", George Caulkin, football reporter for The Times, wrote an article which included phrases such as "say no to negativity", "a new year, a fresh beginning", and "2010: the year of saying yes". We would like to apologise unreservedly for any offence which these witless, uninformed comments may have caused.

 

Over the subsequent seven days, Sunderland were thrashed 7-2 at Chelsea, Middlesbrough lost 1-0 away to Sheffield United - their sixth defeat in seven matches - Newcastle United played in front of their lowest domestic crowed since 1992, lost out on their leading transfer target and saw their lead at the top of the Coca-Cola Championship whittled down to three points.

 

Hartlepool United got in on the act, losing 5-0 at home to MK Dons and while Darlington’s match with Aldershot was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch, in the context of their season - bottom of the Football League having amassed a measly eight points - that effectively represented a defeat delayed. In other words, it could scarcely have been a more unrewarding period.

 

What this column failed to appreciate is that misfortune is ingrained in the soul of North East football, where nothing positive takes place without being accompanied by a thudding kick in the teeth. In allowing optimism to infiltrate his work, Caulkin was guilty of misleading his readers, as well as encouraging them to believe that anything other than misery was their birthright. Again, we apologise for this unacceptable lapse.

 

To make matters worse, having been reprimanded for his unrepresentative views, he has refused to admit his error. He continues to insist that, no matter their pummeling at Stamford Bridge last weekend, Sunderland fans have cause to feel excitement about the future, that Niall Quinn is the best thing to happen to the club in recent times and that Steve Bruce is the right manager to lead them into the top half of the table.

 

While he reluctantly accepts that a sequence of eight matches without victory is hardly the stuff of progress, he refuses to acknowledge that this is simply the way of things. He claims that the spine of Sunderland’s team - fitness permitting - is far stronger that it was last season, that Bruce’s signings have been promising. Laughably, he maintains that growth cannot and should not be rushed.

 

Even more regrettably, he will not countenance the suggestion that Newcastle are entwined with disaster, that their bid for promotion was doomed from the outset. He has the grace to admit that, under the club’s present ownership, anything is possible, but Caulkin has fallen for the line that Chris Hughton’s team have embraced unity and responsibility.

 

In the longer-term, he has doubts about what might happen should Newcastle secure a return to the Barclays Premier League, but stubbornly believes that an important connection - based on realism and adversity - has been re-established between players and fans. Nor will he be deflected from his enthusiasm for the Newcastle United Supporters Trust, which most reasonable observers understand is well-intentioned, but hopelessly naive. 

 

Finding reasons to be cheerful at Middlesbrough is taxing even for him but, for the record, he states that every manager deserves a chance and, for better or for worse, Gordon Strachan has set about the task of remodeling his squad. He believes that Adam Johnson remaining on Teesside for the rest of the season will enhance the club’s dimming prospects of reaching the play-offs.

 

In short, after demonstrating a gross lack of judgment - judgment which the past seven days has utterly undermined - Caulkin has compounded his failure in a manner which The Times considers both negligent and futile. We have considered our options carefully and, in the circumstances, believe the only appropriate course of action is to place him on gardening leave with immediate effect and until he comes to his (limited) senses.

 

Thank you for your understanding - we hope normal service can be resumed as soon as possible.

 

(George Caulkin writes: I’ve been allowed by my bosses to make a serious, unrelated point, which I thank them for. In starting for Newcastle against West Bromwich Albion on Monday night, three days after the death of his father, Peter Lovenkrands brought a sense of perspective to football, as well as demonstrating personal bravery far above and beyond the call of duty.

 

It was his decision, and his alone, to play. Lovenkrands said afterwards that doing so was what his dad “would have wanted,” and with that statement, with his poignant, moving goal celebration, when he pointed to the sky and wept with grief, he reminded us of a salient contradiction; football’s triviality and also its power, to bring together and heal. He deserves gratitude as well as respect).

 

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  • 3 months later...
TRon

TRon

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I am a bit more wary of his articles now tbh. His public support for the NUST might have been well intended but I was surprised to see it in a national paper as well respected in the Times.

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Thespence

Thespence

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I am a bit more wary of his articles now tbh. His public support for the NUST might have been well intended but I was surprised to see it in a national paper as well respected in the Times.

 

The Times is The Sun with long words ffs. Respected by who?

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TRon

TRon

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I am a bit more wary of his articles now tbh. His public support for the NUST might have been well intended but I was surprised to see it in a national paper as well respected in the Times.

 

The Times is The Sun with long words ffs. Respected by who?

 

The buyers obviously.

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  • 2 years later...
Tooj

Tooj

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THERE is an ancient Greek saying. In fact, there are hundreds of them. But there is an ancient Greek saying which I’m about to write and which therefore differentiates itself from all the other ancient Greek sayings and it is this: from a bad crow, a bad egg.

 

It has nothing to do with football or, more specifically, Newcastle United’s presence in Athens, but I’m on a deadline here and nursing a mild hangover, so that’s one paragraph filled.

 

Ah, Europe. Europe! Europe, Europe, Europe. It’s back! Or, rather, Newcastle are back, and for the first time in five years I’m covering a North East club on the continent, getting back into the swing of airports and coach transfers, huddles around the baggage carousel and stilted press conferences.

 

And then, more pressingly, the three-mile walk to find ‘just one more bar because, hey, it’s only one in the morning back home and all I’ve got to do tomorrow morning is write that online column and, yeah, the office is saying it’s really important because they’re giving away these token things which means you can read it free for an hour but I’m not new to this stuff, I’m a veteran hack, I’ll just toss something off because I’m good, damn good, and yeah I’ll have another beer, why the hell not, I’ve earned this, we all have, come on let’s got a shot of Ouzo because we have to make the most of this it’s been a long time coming, look at her over there, she’s nice, yeah, two more beers please mate and some crisps if you’ve got them, what was I talking about, oh yes, the column, well I’ll probably just waffle on about Europe or something, but it looks like they’re closing so let’s get a few more drinks in, the night is young, is that a kebab shop, right, well, it would be rude not to, wouldn’t it, I don’t appear to be walking straight, Christ, there’s a lapdancing bar next to the hotel, no no nonoononono I’ve got a column to write, I’ve got to get up, I’ve got double-vision, no officer I’m perfectly fine, thank you, I just need to sleep and this historic national monument feels really comfortablezzzzzzzzz bleugh zzzzz bleughhhhh zzzzz oh God oh God oh God I’ve got to write a column.’ That.

 

Half a decade on since Newcastle lost 2-0 to AZ Alkmaar, a defeat so miserable it again shoved the club towards uncertainty, and the old routine kicks in. But there are differences between now and then which offer pause for reflection and perhaps some encouragement, too, because while Newcastle are hardly ingenues when it comes to the European experience, they are scarcely recognisable.

 

There are elements to the transformation which are obvious. Steven Taylor played in Holland in March 2007, Steve Harper was on the bench and Shola Ameobi was around but not involved, but for most of their players this is a new and fresh episode. The youngsters bubbling around Alan Pardew’s first-team squad and who will be called upon this season, will learn and benefit.

 

The greatest change is one of attitude. Elsewhere in the magical electronic kingdom which is Times Digital - and in the inky-paged newspaper - Taylor recalls Alkmaar and the feeling of complacency which hung about Newcastle like smog. They’d won the first leg 4-2 and expected to qualify for the next round and even when they failed to do so there was a sense of an interruption rather than an ending.

 

From top down, that Newcastle was a failing and flawed institution, bloated by high wages and hampered by deep debt. Freddy Shepherd, then the chairman, spoke about the “Rolls Royce treatment” they afforded players as if he had not been complicit in a transfer policy which placed star quality ahead of team-building or thought as to whether signings might actually engage with their environment. We all know the names.

 

Those famous European nights - against Barcelona and Feyenoord and countless others, accompanied by Sir Bobby Robson’s man-management and dignity -will linger in the memory, but by the time of Alkmaar, it felt tired and old and stale. Glenn Roeder would be sacked, Sam Allardyce appointed, Shepherd booted out by Mike Ashley and a cycle of decline which was already entrenched would be accelerated.

 

This is a perilous admission, because while the demands of a job which involves watching football are unlikely to prompt any sympathy, reporting on Newcastle would cease to be fun. There is a misconception that journalists thrive on controversy - ‘it must be great up there, because there’s always something to write about’ - but constant negativity corrodes the soul, particularly if you feel proud about your region and its clubs.

 

From the playing side, Taylor put that feeling into some sort of context, talking about a dressing-room which was so divided it “looked like a group of islands.” He said that “people would finish training and go straight home. I wouldn’t see them until the next day and you wouldn’t get much conversation out of them -sometimes you’d hardly speak to the players you were lining up with on a Saturday.”

 

Whatever happens in the Europa League, that division has been eradicated. Nobody should forget the pain and discord it took to get here, but the agony and embarrassment of Joe Kinnear and Dennis Wise and relegation and all the rest of that horrific stuff, has somehow left Newcastle cleansed. It has survived the departure of Chris Hughton, Pardew’s arrival and success last season.

 

“It is a very different club,” Harper, who has clung to the Newcastle roller-coaster for almost 20 years, said. “We have had some difficult characters in the past, people who dominated the dressing-room, whereas now you have a very level playing field where everyone gives and takes, no matter how young they are, and I think that is reflected on the pitch. It is a good place to be.”

 

For as long as the European adventure endures, Pardew will be required to protect and prioritise but not, as it felt against against Alkmaar, because the games are already won or beneath him. “Maybe if you have been in the Champions League for two or three years and you come in to the Europa League then it is kind of derided or looked on as not so glamorous,” the manager said. “But for us it is glamorous. A lot of this group have not played in Europe. For some, it is like a rebirth.”

 

A small thing. Without mentioning individuals, I can recall sitting on an aeroplane to European matches watching footballers playing cards, surrounded by bundles of banknotes, as if meant nothing.

 

On Wednesday morning, Jonas Gutierrez, Ryan Taylor and James Perch clambered into the back row of seats, not caring they were surrounded by journalists, and spent the next three hours engrossed in a game of Uno.

 

In spite of my daftness at the start, a return to Europe did not actually entail a lurch into debauchery. I’m getting too old for that (I’m not) and I want to take these trips in, enjoy and relish them.

 

Press conference over and work down, the hacks accompanying Newcastle to Athens were invited to the team hotel for a quick drink with the coaching staff, not to blur the boundaries of impartiality, but just to share, briefly, a landmark moment, for them, for us. It felt different. It felt good.

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AlanSkÃrare

AlanSkÃrare

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Must admit I've missed reading his articles since The Times went subscription based.

 

Same here. Can't get the paper in Sweden either.

 

I remember when he wrote "the letter that Mike Ashley should have written" after the relegation or promotion or whatever it was. Really refreshing a journalist who concetrates on offering a voice of reason and common sense with his analyses and use of language instead of controversy and sensational headlines.

 

Definately my favourite journalist.

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