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What if...? Biggest Sliding Doors Moments for NUFC


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Not sure if there's been a thread on this before, but other than the obvious ones - e.g. Robson leaving Barcelona to replace Keegan in Jan 1997 - what are some of the biggest sliding doors moments that you can recall for Newcastle? One's where you look back and think... only if? 

One for me - Newcastle said no to Zidane for £1.2m in 1995/96 as our scout didn't rate him. 
I think we win the PL in 1996, and we dominate for a few years after. 


What are yours? 

 

 

Edited by kingxlnc

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I don’t think us getting Modric would have transformed Ashley’s tenure. It was always always going to be a disaster by the end but the way everything fell apart so quickly after that transfer window really fucked us as a club for years. If we’d actually had a good window and Keegan had stayed we’d have had a very successful season 

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You can debate moment, but at least in recent history I think it has to be in the 1996-98 timeframe. Whether that's a better GK, simply scoring in the first half against Man United, Cantona not existing, whatever. Does Keegan leave if Newcastle had been champions?

 

Or maybe no matter what Keegan would have been a star that burned bright and fast in which case it's appointing the right person to follow him or may not losing Ginola, Les, and Shearer (to injury) that one summer.

 

Pick the moment(s), but that was an opportunity for Newcastle to become established as one of the elite, battling with Man United and Arsenal largely unopposed for years, at the same time the Premier League was beginning to gain serious momentum. NUFC would be one of the gatekeepers had some things gone differently then.

 

 

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Yep, SBR remaining loyal to Barca after initially telling us he wanted to come home (changed his mind overnight) and then telling him a few months later he was being replaced by Van Gaal in the summer.

 

The club floating forcing KK to walk is another (and possibly a bigger one) and another SBR one, not having an adequate replacement lined up when we sacked him (looking back, it possibly should have been done in the summer and not four games into the season) and replacing him with that clown Souness. The team who finished one place above us the previous replacement sacked their manager in the summer and replaced him with a certain Senor Benitez!

 

A mention to Partizan effing Belgrade too!

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Robson after Keegan is the obvious one.

 

I think a lot of the Ashley/Man City owner stuff is bollocks. The timelines never add up. There was definitely interest from the ME that Ashley scuppered but it was from other groups after Man City had already been taken over.

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3 minutes ago, macphisto said:

Would getting approval and building the new stadium on Castle Leazes have made a difference and dramatically altered history?

Probably not. Feels like the Emirates and Wembley really changed the idea of what a modern football stadium could be but they opened more than a decade after Castle Leazes was being pushed. We’d have probably got something that was modern, practical and very nice to look at but not a driver of huge commercial revenue.

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Shearer knocking back Sven's call to play at World Cup 2002.

 

Already pretty iconic over there, we'd just qualified for the Champions League, I think England win the World Cup with him alongside Owen ahead of Heskey. Would have been massive for the club in the Far East commercially having the World Cup winning centre-forward playing for us. 

 

Just for a one-off tournament (think Larssen did it for Sweden once?), not coming out of international retirement permanently. 

 

 

Edited by Optimistic Nut

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A lot of the obvious ones have been said, but under SBR when we qualified for the Champions League, we needed at least a RB, and 2 CB’s. Getting Woodgate earlier, getting Southgate, Carr a season earlier, even could have said to get Barry and we would have been set very well.

 

 

Edited by Stifler

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