Darren Eales

[Comegetasample]

 

 

 

 

[Menace]

This place is funny at times. Public forum where people are allowed to express your thoughts

 

Pessimistic = bed wetter

Optimistic = happy clapper

 

I think people take this place way too seriously at times

[bowlingcrofty]

9 minutes ago, Newcastle Fan said:

 

They are not PIF and the others who have bought us and have done incredible work turning the club around, they are employees who are expected by both the owners and the fans to deliver and take us to the very top and they've let us down massively this transfer window, an explaination is the least we deserve.

If an apology is the "least we deserve" then what the fuck is the most we deserve?!

[toon25]

2 minutes ago, Comegetasample said:

 

 

 

 

[Colos Short and Curlies]

3 minutes ago, bowlingcrofty said:

If an apology is the "least we deserve" then what the fuck is the most we deserve?!

Half time jelly wrestling and pillow fights

[bowlingcrofty]

Just now, Colos Short and Curlies said:

Half time jelly wrestling and pillow fights

Aye fair enough - I'm in.

[Holloway]

I've always thought he'd make a canny Fagin in a remake of Oliver !

[Ste]

Made my peace with the window now. PSR has royally fucked us for both selling and buying. Before all this nonsense, a PL club easily takes a punt on Wilson for a decent fee, Targett, Almiron… 

 

Get this team firing again and grow the club commercially and see where we stand next time around. We’ve punched above our weight before, we’ll have to do it again. 

[gbandit]

Would make a good penguin in Tim Burton’s Batman Returns 

[Kimbo]

An apology is unnecessary because I have no reason to think there hasn’t been genuine effort. I think it would be good to get clarification over the PSR panic and the decision making process, and if there will be any changes going forward. It would also be good to get more communication generally about the plans for the club over the next 5 years (new training ground, stadium plans etc). The club feels a bit mysterious these days.

 

 

Edited August 30 by Kimbo

[Newcastle Fan]

16 minutes ago, bowlingcrofty said:

If an apology is the "least we deserve" then what the fuck is the most we deserve?!

 

No one is talking about an apology but for them to explain what the fuck happend.

[TheBrownBottle]

[Infatuation Junkie]

1 hour ago, Ste said:

Made my peace with the window now. PSR has royally fucked us for both selling and buying. Before all this nonsense, a PL club easily takes a punt on Wilson for a decent fee, Targett, Almiron… 

 

Get this team firing again and grow the club commercially and see where we stand next time around. We’ve punched above our weight before, we’ll have to do it again. 

We shouldn’t have to punch above our weight.

 

We scraped the fuck out of the forest match who were total shit last season. Stringing hardly any decent play and on the back foot often.

 

We shouldn’t be scraping barrels man. Ashley is not here any longer. 
 

For owners who want to put us on the map. They have a funny fucking way of showing it.

 

Seriously think spurs are going to rip our arses open Sunday

[Barnes23]

Craig Hope (I know..) suggesting very strongly in his latest piece that the exit of Amanda and Mehrdad was essentially at the behest of Eales. 

[Kid Icarus]

If the articles by Caulkin, Waugh, Hope, Edwards, and their claimed multiple sources are true, then he's on notice in my book.

[r0cafella]

Just now, Kid Icarus said:

If the articles by Caulkin, Waugh, Hope, Edwards, and their claimed multiple sources are true, then he's on notice in my book.

He certainly is, that being said they hired him to do the ceo job, and you can’t have too many chefs. 
 

Also I doubt mad Daz has an allies in the press pack. 

[Miggys First Goal]

Get this cunt out and Amanda back in. 

[Theregulars]

Suspicious and currently unwelcome. Concerned that he’s just another suit seeing NUFC as a payday and its fans as gullible wallet-bearers. I anticipate complete and total silence from him over coming months, which in my view paints him as a coward. 
 

 

[SUPERTOON]

On 26/08/2024 at 18:48, SUPERTOON said:

Won’t criticise him for the transfer window, not sure what his actual job involves tbh. He has always come across as a bit of a prick though.

Stand by what I said last week.

[TheBrownBottle]

6 minutes ago, r0cafella said:

He certainly is, that being said they hired him to do the ceo job, and you can’t have too many chefs. 
 

Also I doubt mad Daz has an allies in the press pack. 

Said it on another thread, but I agree.  My suspicion at this point is that:

 

1) there is truth in those articles

2) Staveley has been on the blower to her favourite journos to get a bit of revenge (how exactly would Hope know what the European head of PIF and Eales discussed?)

 

Unimpressed by pretty much all of them at this point, tired of the club being a basketcase

[mighty__mag]

Hope's Article 

 

Spoiler

  1 hour ago, Paully said:

Can someone post Craig Hope's article please?!

 

REVEALED: The truth behind Newcastle's turbulent transfer window, why Amanda Staveley was forced out and uncertainty over Eddie Howe's future, writes CRAIG HOPE
---
By Craig Hope

Published: 21:00 EDT, 30 August 2024 | Updated: 21:00 EDT, 30 August 2024

This is all starting to feel a bit Mike Ashley. Now there is a statement you never thought you’d make when, 12 months ago, Newcastle United were about to play in the Champions League for the first time in 20 years and were signing £52million Italy internationals.

It was, in reality, something of an illusion, the notion of a Saudi-backed super club ready to become No 1 in the world, the intention as declared by chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan.

The truth was that Eddie Howe’s brilliant management, their equally remarkable recruitment and force-of-nature personalities such as Amanda Staveley and husband Mehrdad Ghodoussi had taken them on a magic carpet ride, fuelled by optimism and renewed ambition. Not to mention the relief of no more Ashley.

In just 18 months, the team went from 19th to fourth and barely a misstep was made. Yet, in terms of infrastructure —training ground, stadium, sponsorship and commercial revenues — it remained a work in progress. As chief executive Darren Eales said: ‘It’s like building a plane whilst in the air.’

Well, this summer, that plane — and the carpet — have come crashing back down to earth. For the first time, we can reveal the truth behind a boardroom fallout that has shaped what Howe describes as the most difficult summer of his managerial career, in which only £10m was spent on one back-up player, new sporting director Paul Mitchell was unable to deliver the manager’s top target, Marc Guehi, and stars such as Anthony Gordon were nearly sold to satisfy a £70m deficit in meeting the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules. It is Howe who will be left to pick up the pieces amid the turbulence.

Newcastle endured a difficult summer transfer window where they didn't achieve their aims

They failed to sign their major target Marc Guehi, despite a lengthy pursuit of the defender

There was also a boardroom fallout that led to Amanda Staveley and husband Mehrdad Ghodoussi selling their six per cent share and leaving the club (pictured earlier this year)

 

But the plane had started to come apart towards the end of last season, when tension at boardroom level would lead to Staveley and Ghodoussi leaving the club in July. However, as multiple sources have now confirmed, the co-owners were forced out.

We have learnt that, when Jacobo Solis — a senior figure from the Saudi Public Investment Fund, the majority owners — asked questions over the day-to-day running of the club, Eales communicated that he could not do things as he would like because Staveley and Ghodoussi were too involved. It caused a split at the very top of the club, and Staveley and Ghodoussi felt they had no option but to sell their six per cent share and go. This, it is said, left them heartbroken.

For fans, Howe and players, it meant the loss of the reassuring presence of a pair who had been the face of Newcastle re-United. Staveley could be a maverick, but as one source said: ‘Everything around her was a million miles an hour, but she always wanted the best for the club. She got s*** done.’
 

Without them — and with Eales and his new appointment Mitchell now taking the lead on recruitment — s*** hasn’t got done this summer. In fact, it’s been a bit of a s***show.

This brings us back to Ashley. In 2008, he brought in Dennis Wise as a de facto director of football when Kevin Keegan was manager. Keegan quit within eight months and later won a constructive dismissal case, citing the interference of Wise and the removal of his control over transfers. That is not to compare anyone at the club to Wise and Keegan, Mitchell arrives with a good reputation, but more so to highlight the dangers when the ‘working dynamic’ — Howe’s words — suddenly changes.

He said that during an extraordinary half-hour with written journalists at a pre-season training camp in Germany in July, when he effectively placed a probationary period on his working relationship with Eales, Mitchell and new performance director James Bunce. It was at a time when he was being linked with the England job, a vacancy he is yet to categorically distance himself from.

‘I absolutely want to stay but it has to be right for me and the club,’ he said. ‘There’s no point in me saying I’m happy staying at Newcastle if the dynamic isn’t right. As a new team coming together, we have to set our boundaries.’

Howe was told to concentrate on coaching the squad. Before this window, he worked closely with Staveley and Ghodoussi. They were his allies and formed a transfer team, aided (but not necessarily led) by sporting director Dan Ashworth.

It has all started to feel a bit Mike Ashley this summer, a statement that would have been barely believable 12 months ago as Newcastle began their return to the Champions League

Chief executive Darren Eales has come under heavy criticism for his work over the window

Alongside new sporting director Paul Mitchell, the pair have taken a lead on recruitment

Their record was close to perfect — Kieran Trippier, Bruno Guimaraes, Nick Pope, Alexander Isak, Gordon, each brought in at what have proven to be bargain prices. Howe had round-the-clock updates, even jumping off water slides during a family holiday in California to take calls from the owners. This summer, he has been left somewhat in the dark.

Mitchell, we are told, said that he could deliver Guehi when it was decided that the Crystal Palace centre back was the target all parties agreed would improve the team. And so began a month-long saga in which Palace chairman Steve Parish, some suspect, never really intended to sell Guehi. Mitchell believed he had a good relationship with Parish, but every failed offer found its way into the public domain, much to Newcastle’s annoyance.
 

Those inside St James’ Park also disputed what constituted an offer. A text message? A chat? Either way, the figures being discussed went from £45m to close to £70m in a one-horse race. It was not a good look.

Sources say Parish was enjoying it all the while. He was, it is claimed, extremely miffed by Newcastle’s approach for his sporting director Dougie Freedman in April. It is said that he felt Eales and Newcastle had gone behind his back. Freedman opted to stay — the salary on offer was said to be too low — and Mitchell was instead appointed in July.

As recently as Tuesday, there was confidence that a deal for Guehi would happen. Some close to Palace raised eyebrows and a smile when Alan Shearer publicly called on Eales and Mitchell to deliver a big signing, and within hours an offer of £65m plus £5m in add-ons had landed. But when Parish told Newcastle that, after a knee injury suffered by defender Chadi Riad, the asking price was £70m plus £5m, Mitchell was furious.

It is said he has been driven mad by the constant moving of the goalposts on the deal. Parish strung them along, perhaps always intent on retribution over Freedman. There is, then, sympathy for Newcastle and Mitchell, who had worked hard in the belief it could happen.

But one source said: ‘There is a way to play Steve Parish. You wonder if Amanda and Mehrdad would have got the deal done.

‘There was a feeling earlier in the summer that £50m should have been enough for Guehi. They were excellent negotiators. Look at the deal for Gordon last year — she stuck to her guns and got it done at £40m. Maybe that has been missed.’

Guehi, who was Howe's No 1 target this summer, was chased throughout the transfer window

Newcastle figures became increasingly miffed as they failed to get a deal done with Palace chairman Steve Parish for the England defender, who some claim enjoyed the whole saga

Mitchell has suggested other names to Howe in recent weeks — including Chelsea’s Axel Disasi and Nice defender Jean-Clair Todibo — but the head coach did not want to sign the wrong type of player or character for the sake of it. Todibo went to West Ham on loan and was hooked after just 45 minutes of his full debut this week. Multiple sources have told us that Howe was right to guard against signing him.

It is suggested that Mitchell has been frustrated by Guehi being the only viable option at centre back, but we understand there was a longer list of targets who Howe had liked coming into the summer, but they moved on. Two players have arrived — Lloyd Kelly on a free transfer (a deal that was brokered towards the end of last season) and striker William Osula, a 21-year-old understudy from Sheffield United.

With talk of increasing tension internally, it left Howe to answer some difficult questions yesterday morning, when he conceded to the press that no new faces were likely to arrive.

‘We haven’t had the window that we wanted to have, there is no denying that,’ he said. ‘I’m not going to sit here and say it’s been a brilliant transfer window for us. I think everyone would look at me and think, “I’m not sure he’s telling the truth there”.
 

‘We’re in a really difficult situation with PSR and available funds, attracting the right players and players who we think can make a difference. It’s such a delicate spot for us, we’ve got to try and get it right and if we don’t, then doing nothing — as frustrating as that is — is probably the best option. There’s a feeling we have a good squad, but there’s a feeling there’s a few areas we need to strengthen.’

One of those areas was right wing, a position in need of improvement since the Saudi takeover nearly three years ago. There was a deadline-day approach for Nottingham Forest’s Anthony Elanga, but it was all too late for a deal to happen. Again, it evoked memory of calamitous deadline days under Ashley.

It has left Howe and supporters frustrated. Newcastle have managed to keep Gordon, Isak and Guimaraes this summer, but fail to make the Champions League come May and there is a danger the trio will be off. To that end, the need to strengthen the team this season was even greater.

And what of that chaotic weekend at the end of June when Newcastle frantically battled to avoid breaching PSR rules and a 10-point deduction? Howe had warned the club that the hole in the accounts needed to be resolved in good time, without star players being unsettled. But that is what happened with Gordon.

Mail Sport broke the story of the winger being offered to Liverpool. He was with England in Germany at the time, and a medical in Leipzig was even mooted, so real was the possibility of a deal accelerating.

It did not happen because Staveley brokered the £33m sale of Yankuba Minteh to Brighton and Elliot Anderson — much to the player and Howe’s disappointment — was sold to Forest for £35m. However, the latter was only possible because Newcastle agreed to take Greek goalkeeper Odysseas Vlachodimos for an eight-figure fee that we are told would ‘make your eyes water’. The Magpies have since tried to send him out on loan.

William Osula's £10m move from Sheffield United meant he was the only outfield player Newcastle spent money on this summer, yet the Danish striker is merely a back-up

Many have claimed the window would've gone a lot better if Staveley was still around the club

Howe has been left frustrated but it is him who has to pick up the pieces amid the turbulence

But with PSR satisfied, they had money to spend this summer. As one source said: ‘Yes, PSR limits what the club can do, but there was still big scope to spend with the funds available, plus extra headroom generated by sales. But they haven’t sold and haven’t bought. That’s nothing to do with PSR — that’s negotiating skills.’

Supporter angst will turn on Eales and Mitchell, not least because of Shearer’s warning to them. Eales did not help himself when, on a stage in the St James’ fan zone this month, he started a terrace chant with a crowd who would rather he was closing deals. Dancing Darren, as he was dubbed, has got PIF to dance to his tune with the removal of Staveley and Ghodoussi, but his first transfer window in charge has ended on the flattest of notes.

To compound a bad day, the club were forced to distance themselves from Conservative MP Robert Jenrick using access to St James’ to promote his leadership candidacy. He was with former chairman Sir John Hall who, Newcastle said, had told them he wanted to film a biographical piece on his own life.

There was also the bizarre issue of a private landowner erecting fencing directly outside some East Stand turnstiles, raising concerns over fan safety ahead of tomorrow’s visit of Tottenham. This isn’t the club’s fault, of course, but it is an extra headache for them, especially as brows will already be banging after the most disorderly summer in recent memory.

And we thought the bedlam of Ashley was a thing of the past.

 

 

Edited 57 minutes ago by Kazzie

 

Felt this had a place in here.

[Sima]

This cunt resigned yet?

[Decky]

Jesus none of that sounds good. Only positive is unlike the Ashley years PIF won't suffer fools and if Eales continues the trend of disappointment he'll be out.

[r0cafella]

9 minutes ago, TheBrownBottle said:

Said it on another thread, but I agree.  My suspicion at this point is that:

 

1) there is truth in those articles

2) Staveley has been on the blower to her favourite journos to get a bit of revenge (how exactly would Hope know what the European head of PIF and Eales discussed?)

 

Unimpressed by pretty much all of them at this point, tired of the club being a basketcase

I mean I see a bucket load of contradictions tbh, I’m not overly keen on Eales and I think you’ve summed up his achievements perfectly but we are seeing some revisions to history. 
 

AS didn’t want the job as CEO YAR told her she could do it and she declined, she appointed eales. I’m not speaking negatively of AS because she’s been an absolute force of nature for the club but at the same time the PSR issues we’ve run in to happened under her watch. 
 

I think you’ve summed it up perfectly mind it’s an absolute shambles from top to bottom and these noises are sadly predictable. 

[Pilko]

I heard he was late for the urgent post transfer window review meeting today because he was at his desk trying to get Oasis tickets.