Happy Face

Or "You know exactly what you're doing" The way I see it.... Ashley has paid £138Million for the club. The value of which can depreciate. He's loaned the club £100M, the value of which is set in stone. Using transfer income to spend on transfer outgoings would mean the club is run within it's means and Ashley's return depends for the most part on the value of the club. Deferring transfer income, and using loans from Ashley to buy up front in full means that Ashley is assured his money back. So the £20M he's supposed to have since put in on top of the initial loan has bought players whose value might drop, Xisco for example. But the £6m Ashley pumped in for him is a loan he's guaranteed to be paid back in full. The club might only recoup £2M from his sale, but Ashley is still owed the full amount. I assume he saw the money being paid out on Luque and thought to himself, "well I'll fund those sorts of signings and be guaranteed the return irrespective of the success of the player".

What the fuck? What planet are these fucking clowns on, thinking anybody will believe this shit? FFS, we have Joe Kinnear as manager and a 10 million budget for new players! Why not indeed, I feel like I am in some lucid nightmare regarding this club, how did it come to this? I read it in the original post. I thought it to myself when I read it. But reading someone else say it has tickled me immensley. £10M and Kinnear - Take that Arsenal. Step aside Chelsea. Fucking delusional.

"Over the summer, we will look to strengthen the squad further, in addition to immediate fixes, we will want to acquire players that can help make Newcastle United a top team for the medium and long term." Chris Mort May 2008 ”We’ll probably end up spending, at the moment, about £10m" Joe Kinnear - January 2009 Net profit in both windows. There's a word for doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Insanity.

Some people still have a bit of spon... http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/St...+group+-+report

The days of a manager coming in and been allowed to spend millions off their own back, I think are long gone from newcastle and many other clubs. It was fun while it lasted but as Gordon would say, prudence is the buzz word these days. Footballers are now relatively just too expensive and too big a risk to a clubs financial stability. The current player pricing is unsubstainable especially with the goings on at city and I'm not sure what comes next. We have been spoilt over the last 15 years and can't get used to the fact that the partys over and it's tidy up time. £160M was spent in January gone. Up £10M on the year before. http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/fe...ier-league-2009 Lets not get too carried away. The article goes on to say... "The record level of gross spending has largely been driven by transfers between Premier League clubs [about £105m], in particular fuelled by the activity of Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur." Statistics, damn statistics. We're a Premier league club though. For now. I was referring to the fact that £105 of the £160 was spent by two clubs, City and Spuds. We all know City are throwing silly money at everyone (except Newcastle) and likewise, Spurs seem to be throwing "silly" money at Harry (btw a very overated manager imo). Arsenal took it to £175M once the Arshavin deal was done too....and it was January.

The BBC have him down as 40% in the Premier league (24 points out of 60 available). All competitions, they would give him 38% (25 points out of 66 available). However this includes the West Brom game, and I say he was already on leave by then, so I give him 35% (22 points out of 63 available). Ardiles is only just worse on 34% (all competitions) http://www.toontastic.net/board/index.php?...st&p=573532 http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/t...ats/default.stm

The days of a manager coming in and been allowed to spend millions off their own back, I think are long gone from newcastle and many other clubs. It was fun while it lasted but as Gordon would say, prudence is the buzz word these days. Footballers are now relatively just too expensive and too big a risk to a clubs financial stability. The current player pricing is unsubstainable especially with the goings on at city and I'm not sure what comes next. We have been spoilt over the last 15 years and can't get used to the fact that the partys over and it's tidy up time. £160M was spent in January gone. Up £10M on the year before. http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/fe...ier-league-2009 Lets not get too carried away. The article goes on to say... "The record level of gross spending has largely been driven by transfers between Premier League clubs [about £105m], in particular fuelled by the activity of Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur." Statistics, damn statistics. We're a Premier league club though. For now.

The days of a manager coming in and been allowed to spend millions off their own back, I think are long gone from newcastle and many other clubs. It was fun while it lasted but as Gordon would say, prudence is the buzz word these days. Footballers are now relatively just too expensive and too big a risk to a clubs financial stability. The current player pricing is unsubstainable especially with the goings on at city and I'm not sure what comes next. We have been spoilt over the last 15 years and can't get used to the fact that the partys over and it's tidy up time. £160M was spent in January gone. Up £10M on the year before. http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2009/fe...ier-league-2009

Looks like one of the Maggie Suttons on day release in the park.

Doesn't matter a jot. Once a kid is handed over to Kinnear he'll have 13 years of accrued talent expertly man managed out of him within a month.

He wasn't tempted to do that when Keegan was here and getting his "full support". Made a profit that summer and left us needing all over the park. He didn't have the excuse of all us negative ninnies spoiling his fun* for him and getting between him and his hobby then though. *how dare we by the way? We're just paying customers keeping afloat the company he's running for a hobby. Thank god his non Geordie kids can go to the match again.

The hope was for them to communicate the reasons for what they've done and the action they're going to take in future to fix things. "We spent lots of money, we'll take nothing out, we got a curve ball and didn't know what to do, we were naive and unfortunate, we understand now, we'll get 46 points, challenge for the lot in 5 years, Ashley is passionate, we've caught up, don't want to fail, fans make it difficult saying "Ashley out", we're looking forward" Can you find me one contstructive tid-bit in all this guff?

They do and the apathy shown at games is making it appear that way. We can't win tbh as I realise that doing anything at the matches could have a negative effect on the team at a crucial time when we badly need points, however its pissed me off that again for the last two home games we have put shit performances in, came away with point when we badly need 3 (especially at home), but most leave the match content.. I'm starting to think "fuck the players". It seems to be widely accepted now that having a go at the owners in the stadium makes you a twat. Which is patently bollocks. If the players are too delicate to disregard a bit of Ashley abuse then fuck it, let's go down. Why prolong the agony? We'll just go down next year if we keep supporting the dirge. If we abuse the players they'll blame the fans If we abuse the owner/management they'll blame the fans If we back the players and owner/management they'll take the piss Frightening isn't it I'm not worried about getting the blame. There's not been a peep of negativity out of the fans since the Hull game. It's not seen them improve things in any way shape or form.

They do and the apathy shown at games is making it appear that way. We can't win tbh as I realise that doing anything at the matches could have a negative effect on the team at a crucial time when we badly need points, however its pissed me off that again for the last two home games we have put shit performances in, came away with point when we badly need 3 (especially at home), but most leave the match content.. I'm starting to think "fuck the players". It seems to be widely accepted now that having a go at the owners in the stadium makes you a twat. Which is patently bollocks. If the players are too delicate to disregard a bit of Ashley abuse then fuck it, let's go down. Why prolong the agony? We'll just go down next year if we keep supporting the dirge.

What? Ever?

18 points:- Bolton Man U Hull Arsenal Chelsea Stoke Spurs Portsmouth Liverpool Boro Fulham Villa Easy.

There Will Be Blood I AM THE THIRD REVELATION!!

The words of Chris Mort in November 2007. It was a refreshing thing at that time, to have a chairman meeting regularly with fan representatives, discussing where the club is and where he wants it to be. As a customer relations exercise it was perfect, and suggested those in charge knew how to keep us happy. Some might have thought it was going too far showing up down the Bigg Market to get a round in, but far better to be drinking with the chairman, than have him in Marbella calling wor lass a dog. It wasn't to last. In June 2008 Mort stepped down as chairman and the replacement figurehead at the club was Derek Llambias as Managing Director. Before he bowed to pressure and gave an interview to the Chronicle and Journal recently, Llambias had only spoken publicly twice. He gave us some platitudes on the day he started - as an aside, they included this corker I don't know Llambias' definition of "fully supported", but it clearly differs from Keegan's. The other time we heard from him was when rumours abounded that Mike Ashley wanted to sell the club, and he felt compelled to nip those stories in the bud. Those stories may well have been utter nonsense, but as he says himself "actions speak louder than words", so let's look at each of those actions he's so proud of in retrospect: Put a new management structure in place - didn't last very long did it? Invest in new signings - since taking over, Mike Ashley is roughly £2M in profit on transfers. Cheaper tickets - credit where it's due, cheaper tickets are available , I wonder to myself if they would be if we could manage to sell out the stadium regularly, like we used to three years back though. Speaking even louder though has been their inaction. Rather than taking any positive action, Mike Ashley chose the 5-1 defeat by Liverpool to say I thought January was the new year, but towards the end of the month as another Ashley promise failed to materialise, Joe Kinnear was rolled out to let us know it would be happening later rather than sooner This was strange. Rather than reassure us early on that they’d be taking whatever ACTION was necessary in the window to halt our slide and guarantee Premier League survival, they chose to wait until it was too late, with the promise they would use WORDS to explain to us what we could have found out by reading a newspaper…we sold more than we bought, making money on some of our best first team players, we got no cover at left or right back, and remained short of pace in midfield. Their actions spoke volumes. Since telling us that he understands we want to hear from him “direct”, Mike Ashley still hasn’t said a word in public. But in mid-February, Llambias spoke for all those in the board room in a four part interview in which he apologised for mis-communication and promised things would be different. As a fan who picks the bones out of every utterance coming from the club and highlights any inconsistency I can find, I still cannot accept the excuse he provided for the deafening silence. There were 3 months of virtual silence before “KK happened”. Upon arrival, without saying a word to explain why, Llambias decided (with Ashley) to put a stop to the communication that had proven effective. What work Mort had put into creating a bond between the club and supporters, they decided it wasn’t worth working on any further. They cannot blame either the KK saga or any misrepresentation of what short statements had been made (which were taken at face value at the time) for that decision, as much as they’d like to. However, now we’ve got through the misrepresentations in what was said, I will agree that following Keegans departure, whatever was said only make it worse. Not because communication is bad per se as they seems to believe, but because the faceless statements released via the official website were cursory, semantics arguing, excuses at best. Rather than showing strong leadership in troubled times, stepping to the fore to take the flak and ride it through with positive steps to put their plan back on track, they hid behind carefully worded lawyer speak. I admit that I look to use what they say against them, I have an agenda, but it was far more difficult to do that when Mort ran the show because he was very personable and he always came across as being frank both in presentation and content. There was little contradiction between what he said and did that I could see – the due diligence post is as close as I’ve come. As much as there has been a clamour for Ashley and Llambias to talk to us, I’m afraid that once it happened, to steal a phrase, they failed to find the “correct tone”. Describing some of your most loyal customers as “a small group given more credence than they deserve" displays a shocking contempt for the people paying your wages. As does underestimating the intelligence of every customer to such a degree that you believe you can sell over £30million of first team players in six months and then claim "We are not a selling club”. Or offering Joe Kinnear a two and a half year contract (despite his management record being second only to Ossie Ardiles in terms of failure to win points) and then claiming he’ll have us on the road to “challenge for everything within five years”. Actions or words? I know which I think speak louder, it would be a start if the club could just get what they say and do to match. I find myself wondering if it is propaganda or if they're actually delusional enough to believe that Kinnear can set us on the path to Champions league qualification. I'm not sure which would be worse either. http://nufc-ashlies.blogspot.com/2009/02/c...-breakdown.html

"raby street grans!!wow what a classic!"

Jet from Gladiators to host a Millenium Barn Dance at Yeovil Aerodome. Heavily policed, it must not, repeat not, turn into an all night rave.

I once said hello to Alan Robson in South Shields leisure centre. Malcolm Macdonald held the door for me when I had a handful of pints at a Bob Dylan concert. I got Norman Wisdom's autograph at Newcastle Central Station. Wossy ain't shit

...and was created by Ameobi who shouldn't have been on the pitch.

Once Irish film about a lonely musician who's still floundering along in life years after splitting with the love of his life, then he's given purpose by a married immigrant. His emotional resurgance is traced by musical growth from a deadbeat busker to recording studio tracks and heading to the bright lights of that there London. I wondered what all the fuss was half way through, it didn't seem to be going anywhere and wasn't really gripping me. But once they get in the studio it got hold of me a lot more, I ended up with a massive grin on my face. The Good Shepherd Slow moving story of the origins of the CIA. Drags along and MATT DAAAMON isn't great. His role needs him to be as dull and unemotional as he is, but you can never believe he's got a 22 year old son. The fictionalisation of real events like WW2 and The Bay of Pigs doesn't sit well with me either and as much as they might want to use those things to say something about the 'war on terror' (by shoe horning in references to current CIA hot potatoes like water boarding and oversight), the script has been doing the rounds for 20 years and it shows, it never actually says anything about what the CIA is or should be. EDIT: But it looks lush and is geet classy.

Said as much when Martins whacked a shot out for a throw in and got applause. Ameobi would have been harangued for it. Fair enough, it's not for what they do but what they've done, but surely we should support them both. Booing the lad off is a disgrace.