Guest TrEe Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premiership/newcastle/article1991255.ece f****** ACE if this is true!!! From The Times June 27, 2007 Allardyce to embark on £50m spree after Ashley completes takeover at Newcastle George Caulkin Sam Allardyce will be provided with about £50 million to restore Newcastle United’s fortunes next season after Mike Ashley completed his takeover of the club yesterday. In a flurry of developments at St James’ Park, the billionaire sportswear tycoon assumed full control on Tyneside and installed his own personnel as directors, although Freddy Shepherd is to remain as chairman on a temporary basis. Ashley, Britain’s 25th-richest man with a personal fortune of about £1.9 billion, is on the threshold of a 90 per cent stake in Newcastle’s shares, allowing him automatically to purchase the outstanding 10 per cent and return the club to private ownership. It will now be delisted from the stock market, ending a ten-year association that can be regarded only as partially successful. As expected, a board meeting at Newcastle brought the resignations of Douglas Hall, the deputy chairman, and the directors, Bruce Shepherd, Timothy Revill and Allison Antonopoulos, plus confirmation that Shepherd will continue in a figurehead role to guide the club through a testing period. Chris Mort, a leading lawyer, was appointed deputy chairman with immediate effect, while Steve Hayward, a marketing manager for Sports Direct – he also had involvement with Coca-Cola’s football sponsorship programme – becomes a nonexecutive director. As corporate partner of Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer’s leisure sector group, from which he will now take leave, Mort, 38, advised Ashley on his £133 million acquisition of Newcastle. He has no football experience and is expected to work closely with Shepherd, who accepted Ashley’s invitation to stay in a paid capacity, but it is Mort who will effectively run Newcastle on Ashley’s behalf and to whom Allardyce, the manager, will report directly. “I am delighted to take on this role,” Mort said. “Newcastle United is a fantastic football club with a wonderful set of supporters. My first task is to lead a review of all aspects of the club and I look forward to starting that work immediately.” Shepherd sold his 28.6 per cent stake to Ashley this month, but with Allardyce needing to strengthen the squad and the club planning a £300 million development that will increase stadium capacity to 60,000 and involve an hotel and a conference centre being built on adjacent land, continuity is desired. Shepherd’s retention is not expected to stretch much beyond the next three months, but he will claim to have acted in Newcastle’s best interests in enabling the new regime to settle. Priority will be given to improving the squad, backroom staff and playing facilities. Having completed the £3 million signing of David Rozehnal from Paris Saint-Germain on a four-year contract, Allardyce has turned his attentions to luring Habib Beye, the Senegal defender, from Marseilles. Beye, 29, is comfortable at centre half or right back and would add experience and expertise to a defence that has lost Titus Bramble, Craig Moore, Olivier Bernard and Oguchi Onyewu this summer. Allardyce also hopes to tempt Sami Hyypia from Liverpool, having already persuaded Joey Barton and Mark Viduka to join, and while they will be only the first of several new arrivals, there is more to his approach than merely adding a smattering of exotic names to his team-sheet. He believes that nothing short of a revolution is necessary at a club that has a long history of underachievement. Mark Taylor, who worked with Allardyce at Bolton Wanderers, will shortly be named as Newcastle’s head of sports science and the manager is still intent on bringing Mike Forde from his former club as performance director. Such important changes will involve a significant level of funding, but a source close to Ashley has already confirmed the reclusive tycoon’s determination to “build the biggest and the best and be successful”. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
EthiGeordie Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 If Big Sam continues his current bargining and get all his targets under 25 mil. I want the other 25 to be invested in trophy signing. Aka Deco or Adriano. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nobody Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 tbh Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Optimistic Nut Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 I'm pleased about this if true. Although he's done well in the market, my concern is that he's only been signing players a team like Bolton would be signing too. He's now got a bigger club, use it to his advantage and get better players than what he's used to signing. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ohmelads Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 I find it hard to believe we're going to spend that much and yet we're targetting fairly cheap players: Rozehnal, Hyypia, Beye, Viduka, Barton. Don't get me wrong, I'd be happy enough with those signings as they could put us back in the top 6, but with £50m we should be looking to challenge 4th and therefore signing better players to take us up a level. I know we have a lot to replace and probably need another 4 more after the Rozehnal deal plus any replacements should Owen/Martins leave, but you would think we would be going for more expensive players than Beye or Hyypia? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baggio Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 I bet Allardyce can't believe his luck, he came to the club after convincing Freddy he will need a big backroom team and now he's getting £50 million to spend! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
EthiGeordie Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Beye is not cheap option he can play in two postions and he can cost a fortune. The thing is we can't fill in all positions with stars we just need practical players in and get one trophy signing. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Good players > expensive players Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nobody Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 We need a few cheap squad players before spending on any big names IMO. We can't waste the entire budget on 10-15m signings as we need far many more players than that Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Baggio Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 I'd rather put £20 million into buying top young talent for the youth team rather than blowing it on a trophy signing tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yorkie Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Good players > expensive players Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keefaz Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 SHOW. ME. THE MONEY. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Optimistic Nut Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Good players = Expensive players Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Pie Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 I find it hard to believe we're going to spend that much and yet we're targetting fairly cheap players: Rozehnal, Hyypia, Beye, Viduka, Barton. I know we have a lot to replace and probably need another 4 more after the Rozehnal deal plus any replacements should Owen/Martins leave, but you would think we would be going for more expensive players than Beye or Hyypia? Seems a sensible approach given that £50 million doesnt really go very far nowadays. We spent that a couple of seasons ago with the scatter gun approach and it got us nowhere. Think Sam is spending what we have at the moment to flesh the squad out. Not bad buys either really. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TRon Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Beye is not cheap option he can play in two postions and he can cost a fortune. The thing is we can't fill in all positions with stars we just need practical players in and get one trophy signing. We already have plenty of trophy signings tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ohmelads Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Beye is not cheap option he can play in two postions and he can cost a fortune. The thing is we can't fill in all positions with stars we just need practical players in and get one trophy signing. I appreciate that, but perhaps instead of Hyypia we could get someone experienced but still in his prime such as Andrade who said a few days ago it's time for him to find a new club? That sort of player would take us up a level and give us another 4-5 years service. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Good players = Expensive players Not cessinarily. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yorkie Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Good players = Expensive players Viduka and Barton have equated to a total price of less than £6m. That's fecking cheap tbh. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dinho lad Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 get in. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dave Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Thing is we're not even in Europe this year, never mind the Champions League. If we were to try and persuade megabucks signings to come here this year it'd be via one method only. And look at Owen for what happened last time we tried that. Let's build our way to the top, no need to spend £50m this summer. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keefaz Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Anelka cost Wenger about 1/2 a mill, iirc. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest eyeball_tickler Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 "Shepherd’s retention is not expected to stretch much beyond the next three months" Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Optimistic Nut Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 Good players = Expensive players Viduka and Barton have equated to a total price of less than £6m. That's fecking cheap tbh. I know that, but if we'd spent £15m on Ashton and £10m on Gattuso, we'd be better. More expensive, but much better. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest TrEe Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 what I would love us to do with that kind of money, is buy a real attacking midfeilder! Someone who might cost alot of money, but will be worth it, say £20-25m. that still gives us a hell of alot left. We don't have one real attacking midfeilder who I think is good enough if we are to get up to the top were we belong. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leazes1986 Posted June 26, 2007 Share Posted June 26, 2007 For the people wanting big money signings over cheaper players i say why don't you go on nufc.com and look at the tansfer section under Souness and have a little think. If the £50m bit is true i would be happy for him to spend £30-£35m on bulking up the squad with good quality players, then maybe bringing in one big signing and it would have to be a creative playmaker for me. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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