Guest firetotheworks Posted May 6, 2015 Share Posted May 6, 2015 How can 'be careful what you wish for' be used with Ashley man? Those lasses that Fritzel held captive should have been careful what they wished for like, their dad could have been Fred West. Love an inappropriate analogy. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wallace Posted May 6, 2015 Share Posted May 6, 2015 http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/brian-reade-newcastle-survive-ashley-5646738? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
summerof69 Posted May 6, 2015 Share Posted May 6, 2015 http://www.themag.co.uk/2015/05/breaking-news-forbes-rank-newcastle-the-18th-most-valuable-club-in-the-world/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
number9shirt Posted May 6, 2015 Share Posted May 6, 2015 Hey look, we're the 18th richest club in the world, funny that: http://www1.skysports.com/football/news/11835/9839071/real-madrid-the-most-valuable-team-in-football-ahead-of-barcelona Yes get in, Gan on my son :frantic: :frantic: :frantic: Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/john-carver-the-fall-guy-for-mike-ashleys-grotesque-misrule-of-newcastle-10237900.html John Carver the fall guy for Mike Ashley’s grotesque misrule of Newcastle COMMENT: Newcastle’s demise typifies football’s shift from community to accountancy KEVIN GARSIDE Author Biography Friday 08 May 2015 And so another dispiriting week in the history of Newcastle United descends into grotesque parody, with a claim by the man on an eight-match losing streak that he is the best coach in the Premier League. Oh how we laughed. Up in the counting house it suited the owner, Mike Ashley, to have another’s head fielding tomatoes in the stocks. John Carver, a thoroughly decent man promoted way beyond his sphere of expertise, draws the sting of a restless crowd, at least until 5pm today. The fever may have passed by then. Carver may have done what Louis van Gaal at Manchester United could not with 80 per cent possession and 26 attempts on goal, divined a way past the defensive wall that is West Bromwich Albion on the road. Alternatively, the appalling disintegration of a great footballing institution may have barrelled further towards its grim conclusion. It will truly have come to something if by May’s end fixtures against West Bromwich, Queen’s Park Rangers and West Ham United have proved beyond the wit of Newcastle to save themselves. But this is what happens when you rip the heart from a place predicated on the passion of its supporters and run it instead as an abstraction on a balance sheet. That Ashley’s numbers game is failing in the Premier League while showing a profit on the ledger is galling for fans condemned to watch the club they love not only fail but putrefy. Newcastle are as much an idea as a club, meeting all the sociological paradigms that attach to a sporting institution at the heart of a great city. In the years of post-industrial decline the Toon have come to mean even more to supporters starved of purpose and significance elsewhere in their lives. This is not the glib restating of a tired old idea trivialising the people of Newcastle. It is the expression of a truth not easily measured but easily felt. In the same way that the slogan pinned to the seats of the Nou Camp, “Més que un club”, seeks to express the relationship between Barcelona and the region, so it applies to Newcastle: more than a club. St James’ Park is so much a repository of hope and desire because the club are such a huge part of the city’s identity. Newcastle are not the only victims of football’s ruinous shift from community project to commercial proposition, just the most obvious. Ashley is a prospector, nothing more, nothing less. He can’t be blamed for playing the market game at St James’ Park. He is not doing anything different from the Glazers at Manchester United, those moneyballers at Anfield, the Fenway Sports Group, which clothes its rapacious association with Liverpool in the language of philanthropy, Ellis Short at Sunderland, Randy Lerner at Aston Villa, and so on. Lerner it seems is about to cash in his chips with another group of venture capitalists led by Paul Smith, a bean counter with a sporting background at Chelsea and management group IMG. Smith is said to be an expert in sports rights. That new Premier League television deal is doubtless part of the equation that brought him to the table. The prospect of tapping further into Villa’s commercial potential as a “global brand” has persuaded Smith and his consortium to gamble at a price estimated at £150m. Though Lerner bought in for £62m, an overall investment of £300m in his eight years in charge represents a significant loss. Don’t worry, he was a big winner on sport’s trading floor with the Cleveland Browns, banking £620m for the sale of the American football franchise three years ago. Some estimates have Ashley £23m to the good over the same period since acquiring Newcastle from Sir John and Douglas Hall. That old family ownership model under the aegis of a local businessman appears sweetly benign when set against the calculating machinations of a speculator who cares nothing for the club’s traditions and sends his team out under the banner of a money-lending organisation that feeds on the privations of the poorest. Ashley was, prima facie, onside for a while, one of the lads drinking a pint in the stands in his Newcastle shirt. That falsehood lies ruthlessly exposed today, his rudderless team as poorly led on the pitch as it is in the boardroom. Apparently, Carver received the full backing of Ashley via a communiqué passed on by the managing director. “I haven’t had a conversation with Mike,” said Carver. “But he sent a message through Lee [Charnley] to say he was 100 per cent behind me.” Perhaps Ashley was too busy trying to hire the short-term services of Derby County employee Steve McClaren to speak to Carver direct. What might the selling point have been had a long-term offer been dangled before McClaren when first principles no longer relate to football but to business? The logical extension of a club following the money is that players stuck by contract to Newcastle in the Premier League might be free agents in the event of relegation. If the players want out of the Ashley regime, the most efficient way to secure the deal is to engineer relegation. In this desperate scenario it is easy to see how Carver might allege that one of his players would orchestrate his own dismissal at Leicester last weekend. The Sunday Times estimated Ashley’s fortune at almost £4bn a year ago. With that in the bank, he must be past caring. Assuming he ever did. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Disco Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 Reading wholly accurate shit like that man, how did it come to this? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest chopey Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 I totally agree with this article, but I still can't understand why Ashley hasn't sacked carver it's totally baffeling considering we have been relegated before Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 Reading wholly accurate shit like that man, how did it come to this? Because we let it, in a nutshell. I, and plenty others, stopped going around April 2013, but the time everyone should've refrained was the subsequent summer when our attempt to remedy finishing 16th amounted to buying no players whatsoever. Should've been blatantly obvious then, to even the thickest of the thick, where we were headed. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 Reading wholly accurate s*** like that man, how did it come to this? Because we let it, in a nutshell. I, and plenty others, stopped going around April 2013, but the time everyone should've refrained was the subsequent summer when our attempt to remedy finishing 16th amounted to buying no players whatsoever. Should've been blatantly obvious then, to even the thickest of the thick, where we were headed. We still had a fairly decent squad more than capable of top 8 imo even after that though. I harp back on about it over & over but the team & subs bench at Villa even after that summer was the strongest I've seen in 10 years here. We were a good managerial appointment and keeping Cabaye that January away from something decent. It was that January onwards where I turned. Any slight glimmer that we had a semblance of a future under Ashley was gone then, particularly when that shocking run started. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 Whether we did or didn't have a top 8 squad (we didn't), we looked certain to go down with 2 games left at HT during Wigan - Swansea. The club demonstrated in that summer window - and the following one - just how low ambitions and standards actually are. Finish 16th, job done. No need to invest. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpie1892 Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 '£23m to the good'? Try nearer £300m - half in TV cash/prize money, the rest in free advertising for his tat emporium and club merchandise. Quite possibly more. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 Whether we did or didn't have a top 8 squad (we didn't), we looked certain to go down with 2 games left at HT during Wigan - Swansea. The club demonstrated in that summer window - and the following one - just how low ambitions and standards actually are. Finish 16th, job done. No need to invest. We had a front 5 of Cabaye, Sissoko, Remy, Ben Arfa & Cisse. But for Pardew, there was no reason for that not being the side all season. A good manager would have had us around 7th-8th. I know we should be aiming higher, I'm not disputing that. But money invested in the squad at this point wasn't the main problem for me, it was the sticking with Pardew. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted May 8, 2015 Share Posted May 8, 2015 Our first choice CB pairing was Coloccini and Williamson, or Coloccini and MYM. Either way, not nearly good enough. Anyway, I'm talking about the moment it became abundantly clear beyond any doubt what we were in for. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sempuki Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 Doubt Jabba will be there today. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoveItIfWeBeatU Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 Doubt Jabba will be there today. I doubt we'll see him again at SJP this season. He's obviously not that interested in the outcome otherwise he'd have done something to stop the rot months ago. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Roger Kint Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 '£23m to the good'? Try nearer £300m - half in TV cash/prize money, the rest in free advertising for his tat emporium and club merchandise. Quite possibly more. Are you still banging this drum? Fucking hell man Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mick Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 I doubt we'll see him again at SJP this season. He's obviously not that interested in the outcome otherwise he'd have done something to stop the rot months ago. I doubt he'll be at St James' this season because he's a coward who doesn't like being called names more than because of a lack of interest from him. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Howaythelads Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 There has been no ambition for success on the field since Ashley arrived. Entirely predictable. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eddy Chibas Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 There has been no ambition for success on the field since Ashley arrived. Entirely predictable. Fletcher, Shepherd, Keegan & The Halls at least had a go. Ashley shoved it (the notion of ambition for success) back into a coffin, and nailed the lid shut from Day 1. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
HawK Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 Found this old PNG I made lol The lengths I had to go to back then to convince people (Ian? ) that Mike Ashley was bad for our club. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest neesy111 Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 There has been no ambition for success on the field since Ashley arrived. Entirely predictable. Fletcher, Shepherd, Keegan & The Halls at least had a go. Ashley shoved it (the notion of ambition for success) back into a coffin, and nailed the lid shut from Day 1. Fletcher was a marketing genius and ahead of his years in terms of merchandising. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
magpie1892 Posted May 9, 2015 Share Posted May 9, 2015 '£23m to the good'? Try nearer £300m - half in TV cash/prize money, the rest in free advertising for his tat emporium and club merchandise. Quite possibly more. Are you still banging this drum? f***ing hell man You think the £23m figure is accurate? F***ing hell man Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomson Mouse Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 There has been no ambition for success on the field since Ashley arrived. Entirely predictable. Fletcher, Shepherd, Keegan & The Halls at least had a go. Ashley shoved it (the notion of ambition for success) back into a coffin, and nailed the lid shut from Day 1. Fletcher was a marketing genius and ahead of his years in terms of merchandising. Fletcher was an evil bastard, had a few dealing with him Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueStar Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Good work Britain *slow clap* http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/billionaire-mike-ashley-adds-100m-to-fortune-as-sports-direct-shares-rise-after-election-10239390.html Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ronaldo Posted May 10, 2015 Share Posted May 10, 2015 Bit of a stretch to blame Britain when the real issue with Ashley is the fact our own fans are too spineless to stop giving him money. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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