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Number 1
EDIT: When I went to QPR at the end of the 12-13 season, I remember we had Ben Arfa as a central striker with Gouffran wide right and Cisse wide left. The mechanics of that are still baffling.
Elsewhere, Yanga-Mbiwa has said he made a mistake in joining Newcastle, which means he probably won't be coming back, while Ben Arfa did one of those open letter things.
Meanwhile... https://twitter.com/UtdForNewcastle
Assuming what they've just posted is true (and given the amount of control on club communications to the outside world, who knows), any wild guesses who they might be?
Shola
If it's true 'fan' means it's most likely, Taylor, Dummett, Ameobi or Armstrong. Very unlikely to be Taylor, Armstrong and Dummett aren't likely to be too keen on a loan. So by process of elimination Sammy. Although I doubt it's true, I doubt senior players would confide in a fringe player their thoughts on Newcastle, and I doubt the fringe player would confide in some random about the inner workings of a football club.
Plus it says Coloccini, has no personal problem with Pardew but also wants away from Pardew.
Shola
And lets not kid ourselves the club was already on the slide when Robson was sacked, we scrapped into 5th on the final day ahead of Aston Villa. After 2 seasons of being outside challengers for the title.
The big question should be at Newcastle, why for every one season of success, does it take about 5 to recover from?
Number 1
Its always complex to know with these sort of things whether they're accurate or not. I'm not sure its 100% true but I don't think its completely false. Its probably somewhere in between, but the only way we'd ever know what's going on for sure is if we were actually on the inside. Though I think it implies he wanted away because he fell out with Pardew in January 2013 but chose not to go, and is now thinking "Why is this idiot still here?"
That's the best explanation I can think of, and even then that might be pushing it, although I do recall rumours of them falling out before we beat QPR in December 2012.
EDIT: Maybe its just me but I never wanted Robson fired, plus I don't recall the away end shouting "Robson Out" when I was at his last game back in August 2004 and Souness was from the get go a lousy idea. I do recall the media being stupidly harsh to him from the random conjunctivitis but that's about it.
Shola
Robson was no where near the scale of Pardew, but then Robson was sacked a lot quicker. (If Pardew was sacked in Jan2013 for example he certainly wouldn't be viewed this negatively)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/n/newcastle_united/3611456.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/n/newcastle_united/3610042.stm
Change the names and them articles could pretty much be printed of Pardew was sacked today.
geordie1981
I'm sorry, it's a bit of a pet hate for me this guy's reign being compared to Robson, Keegan mk 1 and during stabilitygate even Alex Ferguson.
BR.
I had no idea Shearer was even a candidate, let alone the early favourite, after Sir Bobby was sacked
Poe
Don't listen to Shola, he twists stats in a way that no other fan could.
Pardew would never be looked on as favourably as Robson ffs
Poe
Number 1
Meanwhile the Mirror is reporting Siem de Jong maybe out for 4 months with a groin tear. Joy.
Poe
We have no real replacement for de Jong.
We've got no creative centre midfielders either - going to be a long season this - we didn't strengthen at all in the summer - unsure why Ashley hasn't learned his lesson from 2 years ago.
K3V0
Number 1
Well, first you'd actually have to ask him that, and the last time he was interviewed by any media for anything was... not sure if he ever has been.
This window is a puzzle as we spent £35M (figure I've seen quoted - could be more, could be less, but its tricky when almost everything is undisclosed) but the bulk of it came from selling Cabaye and Debuchy, so our next spend for the calendar year is less than £5-10M. Not exactly confidence boosting considering the £80-oddmillion we got for a top half finish last year would be enough to have paid for at least one more player. Plus we still have the same incompetent fucktards that made the end of last season nauseating.
So... who knows. He likes the free ad space for SportsDirect at least.
Poe
We have the same 3 senior centrebacks that we did in the Championship ffs. Two aren't good enough.
We still haven't replaced Cabaye or Remy properly who carried us last year.
Shola
And it's also very, very easy to suggest players haven't been replaced, but it's very, very hard to directly replace players who have left the squad to go onto better things. It's totally reductive Liverpool haven't replaced Suarez, ManUtd haven't replaced Ronaldo, Newcastle still haven't replaced Shearer, Arsenal still haven't replaced Henry, Messi will never be adequately replaced at Barcelona etc.
But our midfield when Cabaye arrived was Cabaye, Tiote and Guthrie it's now Tiote, Sissoko, Colback, Anita and De Jong (+Bigi and Abeid possibly). Newcastle are seemingly hoping the improved quantity will mask the lack of absolute quality.
Newcastle strikeforce last year was Remy, Cisse, Shola and De Jong, Now it's Riviere, Cisse, Ferrerya & Perez.
3 senior CB's that also finished 5th but whatever.
Chera
Number 1
I'm not sure what Pardew's reputation would've been had Ashley pulled the plug on him in January 2013. Better than when he arrived and better than if he was sacked today at least, given his manager of the year award was still fresh in the mind. But its an odd one - his spell with us is the second longest he's ever managed anyone (and if he's still in charge in mid-November it will have surpassed his longest previous stint) and all of them have ended in some form of acrimony, albeit in different ways to the current one. Its certainly not comparable to the legal action Reading took out on him after he tried to resign to force his move to West Ham, for example.
Though it is certain Pardew and Ben Arfa fell out (although by the sounds of it, the rest of the players fell out with HBA as well after that), and it is quite irritating and perhaps a wee bit predictable that our old number 10 could've been used as a replacement for our new number 10 given he appears to be injured. Again.
Oba
Number 1
Poe
Teams need to be freshened up once in a while.
K3V0
That's what baffles me though!! You've a top stadium with fans who seem absolutely mad about the club, I mean they'd sell it out to play almost anybody so pushing for European football and investing some money could potentially be worth hundreds of millions. Like I've often thought what would have happened had Abramovich taken over you lot instead of Chelsea.
Number 1
Meanwhile, Aarons scored one and set up two in the England U20s the other night. Could be a key player this season.
Shola
We're £120m in debt to Ashley anyway. Newcastle are quite simply not any sort of value for money for investors looking for pragmatic reasons. - And it would cost £100s of Millions to actually be able to get up there. And absolutely bleed money over the next 10 years. Chelsea for example have posted one profit in the past decade of £1.4m.
Number 1
But yes - Ashley is going to take a blockbuster bid to sell up. The £120million of club debts to him and the £100-odd million asking price would be the bare minimum of his asking price, and there are very few people wealthy and/or insane enough to spend that kinda cash.
Poe
If Ashley decided he wanted to spend 100m in a transfer window I'd be very excited.
Number 1
Shola
My point was more that it takes £100's of millions to take a mid-table club to the 'next level' without any sort of guarantee of ever getting much of a return. - This is why there is no mystery investor ready to step up. Unless they're running it for their own ego or to promote something else, like a Middle Eastern country.
Number 1
Meanwhile, the club has confirmed a new scoreboard is being put on the cantilever structure by the away end. Which has led to the inevitable "Are you just going to paint the words Newcastle 0 on the side of it" comments on the club's FB page.
Number 1
Poe
New board and new manager would be quite a good tonic for the poor transfer window we've just had.