Happy Face

Louise Taylor may be a cernt, but the opening line of her article today is spot on... http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2014/apr/15/alan-pardew-dangerous-blame-game-newcastle-united :lol:

The day that Alan Pardew took the manager's job at Newcastle this was the respective Premier League record for him and Chris Hughton, the man he was replacing. The difference between the two was imperceptible in terms of results, which made the decision bizarre. There were other factors that took it to the realms of concerning though. In terms of character, the gulf between the two men was huge. Pardew arrived with a history of "dodgy" moments in his past which Reading Chairman John Madejski, Arsenal Manager Arsene Wenger, Ian Ashbee, West Ham fans and the entire MOTD audience can attest too. Pardew has since gone on to commit further indiscressions against match officials, opposition managers and players, while Hughton's respect and popularity in the game remain undiminished, despite his less than successful stint at Norwich. It seemed to me like Mike Ashley was bringing in the Frank Spencer of the football world to replace Gus Fring. Someone who demanded no respect from anybody whatsoever, a derided individual who would put their foot in it at any and every opportunity in place of someone cool and collected who may not have ultimately succeeded, but ran a tight ship and inspired 100% effort and respect from every one of his employees. And has black and white hair. As you will guess, like most, I was not keen on the appointment. Then came the 2011/2012 season. With new signings Cabaye, Ba and Santon in the team Newcastle went undefeated for the first eleven games, winning seven of them on the way to sitting pretty in third place by November. Pardew’s stock was on the rise. To paraphrase Paul Simon, pundits can gather all the news they need from the Premier League table. For those of us that actually paid money to watch it week in and week out though, it wasn't so simple. The football was awful even in that early run which remains Pardew’s best. We were scraping wins on individual moments of skill, by one goal, against relegation bait like Wigan, Wolves and Sunderland. We were taken to extra time in the cup by lowly Scunthorpe and Nottingham Forest. While the laziest observers (Redknapp, Lawrenson) were waxing lyrical about the job Pardew was doing, I looked at the quality of opposition each Premier League team had faced in the opening ten games. The result showed Newcastle had had one of the easiest starts possible. It was clear to me Pardew had landed on his feet, but his good fortune couldn't last. And so it proved. After those initial eleven games Newcastle went on a run of eight games with just one solitary win against (ultimately relegated) Bolton. Only five points. While you might suppose that new players bedding into a team should see the performances improve over time, as players learn about the system and each other, the opposite seemed to be true at Newcastle. Players were not gelling over time. They were becoming more disjointed. Then Papiss Cisse arrived. From his debut, when he scored a peach of a volley against Aston Villa, Cisse scored in every single game we won from then on, up to his unbelievable strike, from the dugout if I remember correctly, in our last win of the season at Chelsea. Everything he swung a foot at seemed to fly into the back of the net. Mike Ashley had loosened the purse strings and papered over the cracks for Pardew on what had been starting to look like a downward spiral. For the remainder of the season Newcastle never dropped below 7th and ultimately finished 5th, securing a UEFA cup place for the following season. Pardew won the LMA Manager of the year award and the likes of Redknapp and Lawrenson had an ever so pleased look on their ill-informed, stupid, smug, melty faces. Begrudgingly I had to accept the man was staying, not enthusiastically. The way 2012/2013 went, it should have been vindication for those of us opposed to Pardew, but a strange thing happened. He started to gain some of my sympathy. On the transfer front, Vurnon Anita was little (in every sense) reward for having achieved UEFA qualification, in whatever style. With over a dozen extra fixtures in the calendar Pardew was being forced to make do. The relegation scrap that ensued was one that Ashley took the blame for almost entirely. The club went on a dreadful pre-christmas run (again) of thirteen games with just two victories (against lowly Wigan and QPR), but criticism of Pardew was muted and always caveated by the fact the threadbare squad had not been strengthened to any great degree. In January, Pardew went cap in hand to Ashley and once again would have been grateful as five signings dug him out of the hole he found himself in. Five wins in the following nine games were largely attributable to the new blood and only just ensured survival for the club and for Pardew. Whatever the failings of Ashley in the transfer market, a pattern was emerging of results worsening consistently under Pardew until new players came in. He has never been able to maintain the performance of those new players or the team further than their initial honeymoon. It was a pattern that would continue into the current season. Once again at the beginning of the season we saw small shoots of success. Loic Remy arrived on loan and singlehandedly fired us up the league while the Cisse that we had known and loved continued to go AWOL. The long balls we had been lumping up to Ba and Shola previously were less prevalent as we instead capitalised on Remy’s speed and skill to score goals on the break. It’s at times like these, in the moment, you are tempted to take the positives. I found myself defending Pardew based on Ashley’s dereliction of duty on the transfer front. The justification that we flirted with relegation as a cost of Europa league qualification without squad improvement seemed logical, and here we were back in the top six and passing it about much better. The form we’ve shown since Christmas has disavowed anyone of that notion though. It’s been relegation form without any Europa excuses whatsoever. Few Newcastle fans will make the mistake of listening to the excuses again. The pattern has become too recognisable. With the benefit of hindsight any minimal success Pardew has had can be put into context showing that he’s always been the problem, new players coming in to offer a temporary lift are the only solution he has. Under Mike Ashley, a man not keen to be signing expensive players to come straight into the first team, it’s not a sustainable approach. Ashley has two options in the summer. Keep bailing Pardew out, bring in another four or five players to ensure a good start, but watch them quickly fall off in form too, or he could bring in a manager who can maintain enthusiasm and effort enough to avoid relegation form from a squad which is better paid and cost more to build than over half of the other squads in the league. I’d say Chris Hughton is available, but Ashley has had problems with re-instating old Newcastle managers in the past.

Funny on the comedy awards when he got up to accept his comedy legend award, unfolded a 3 page speech, opened his mouth and before a word got out Wossy cut him off and said the show had to end for the news. He looked livid. Ripped up the speech iirc.

WTF? Stupid twat. Pardew should be sucking Remy and cabaye's cocks for what they did for the first half of the season because under no circumstances would our post xmas form be acceptable at ANY Premier League club. He's making out like if the season started in January then we'd be performing to expectations. Would like to know which wanker it was. Probably Rob Shepherd. That Prick was saying how Newcastle fans should be patient with the arsehole.

... Not the manager.

I put some words around the 2 charts above here.

I thought you'd be swimming in prizes. Second only to Stevie with your TV shows and pub quizzes. Must be the schooling

I won a pub raffle once. Got a 4 foot teddy. Also part of the winning team in the Whitburn Golf Club Texas Ramble. Finally won a massive clock at work. That was another raffle. Never won so much as a pub quiz otherwise. Are you a bigger success?

Gate Receipts are well down. Just because the attendances haven't dropped, doesn't mean they're willing to pay what they were before. Commercial revenue is everything that isn't TV or match day income. Anything sold in the stores, any advertising, sponsorship, stadium tours, hosting events at SJP etc. The biggest loss from those will be people unwilling to buy any merchandise from Ashley, the loss of blue chip advertisers to the barrell scrapers and Ashley not paying for his advertising at all.

They've not recovered since relegation.

I like the bit where he says that we can'rt compete with the top 6 commercially.... Think he meant the Top 9 given West Ham, Sunderland and Villa beat us on that score.

...and the opening page is... A man got to have a code. —Omar Little

Flash Boys - A Wall Street Revolt Same fella who wrote Moneyball and The Blind Side. About a fella who saw that the market was rigged against investors and set up his own system where information cannot be bought or sold a milisecond faster than others get it, or where information on your trades is not sold to other parties without your knowledge so they can make trades based upon that information which no-one else bought. It's proving more and more popular with investors demanding an equal footing. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-business/canadian-at-centre-of-spat-over-soundness-of-us-markets/article17839483/ Also looking to get The Divide by Matt Taibbi. He's done all the Rolling Stone coverage of the financial crisis and recently moved to The Intercept. This book is about the lack of criminal investigation and punishment for massive crimes of the wealthy Wall Street Bankers compared to the punitive approach to pety crime that sees America jail more poor people than any other country...and most combined. http://www.npr.org/2014/04/06/297857886/in-books-trial-of-u-s-justice-system-wealth-gap-is-exhibit-a

SUSPICIOUS MINDS - Why Nobody trusts anyone in authority today. Good read from the always excellent Adam Curtis on the failures of politicians on the left and right, police, intelligence services etc. Here's as good a place to put it as any I guess.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_W6e3l2jJU The new BBNG album due in mid May has leaked. CT, you'll love it with your newfound jazz penchant.

The values of Tiote, Ben arfa, krul, cisse, coloccini and Taylor have all plummeted in the last 2 year I'd say. Without relegation.

My Pardew takedown in the Mag... http://www.themag.co.uk/the-mag-articles/mike-ashley-selling-spending-newcastle-v-everton/

Fixer upper is the best song on the soundtrack.

The thing that strikes me when reading the statement is how much care they claim to put into player recruitment, how they don't want to waste any money...but then they're happy to hand any poor fucker that does come in to the cheapest, nastiest manager and training staff in the whole Premier League.

I've done a bit for the Mag which they reckon they'll hoy up soon where I say exactly that. Ashley won't replace Pardew for the fans, for better style, for a headbutt, for any string of dreadful results as long as he finisheds top half. BUT, as long as he is spending £15m a year on new blood (as he has since arriving), then he has a clear expectation of those players in their 20's increasing in value. If Pardew is damaging their value, then Ashley will act out of selfish interest.

Are there not rules about the size of the board. Has he not just joined to make up the numbers

Everton sold £40m of players this season alone. Ashley's never matched that.