Demba Ba

[Gemmill 44900]

That Luke Edwards article was awful imo. Not a peep of that sort of crack the whole time Ba was here and an absolute hatchet job the day he leaves.

[Howmanheyman 33246]

Aye of course it's all about money - it's ridiculous to suggest otherwise.

 

Look we took a punt on him when he was free, he scored vital goals for us and was one of the primary reasons we do so well last season. Getting £5m for him 18 months later on is decent business for us.

 

Can't really argue with him for not wanting to relinquish the release clause in his contract either - it was his golden ticket to his day in the sun and he's cashed it in.

 

If you want to blame anyone here, blame twitch. It's him who made it public knowledge that such a clause existed which to me is crystal clear evidence that he tapped up Demba, or more likely his agent, while he was still in charge at Spurs - otherwise, how would Harry know the ins and outs of his contract?

Sorry Craig but as much as Redknapp was completely out of order, the club agreed to the clause, nobody else.

 

Just seen footage of Demba sitting in the stand at Stamford Bridge, by the way. Considering he's getting his dream move his bottom lip was fucking tripping him.

[Alex 35095]

I can see you're upset but that's a bit racist.

[McFaul 35]

Sorry Craig but as much as Redknapp was completely out of order, the club agreed to the clause, nobody else.

 

Just seen footage of Demba sitting in the stand at Stamford Bridge, by the way. Considering he's getting his dream move his bottom lip was fucking tripping him.

Because he's on here reading how little respect we have for him after a day away. Montreal my arse.

[Gemmill 44900]

Turk"ey"?

[Alex 35095]

I'm not sure if Stevie is being serious when he does this sort of thing. And I prefer not to know tbh

[Howmanheyman 33246]

I can see you're upset but that's a bit racist.

Glad you put 'bit' by the way.

 

It's a part of his looks which not everyone of his race has. If I'm wrong and 'racist' I'll go and sit on the naughty step for a bit.

[Craig 6682]

Sorry Craig but as much as Redknapp was completely out of order, the club agreed to the clause, nobody else

 

Aye the club did agree to it, but they weren't the ones to make it public. Although as BW points out it was probably more his 'representatives' that let the cat out of the bag so they could get another payday rather than Redknapp on the tap-up. That said it was still the saggy-face git who spoke.

 

As for release clauses I think it's a bit naive to think this is an exception. There'll be other players at the club with similar clauses, they'll just not be public knowledge.

[Howmanheyman 33246]

Unless your signing for a Man U or the likes then relegation clauses would perhaps seem sensible but as a club we took a chance on Ba and in a way it's come off if you look at it financially but now they need another rabbit out the hat. You can't keep doing it.

[Alex 35095]

Glad you put 'bit' by the way.

 

It's a part of his looks which not everyone of his race has. If I'm wrong and 'racist' I'll go and sit on the naughty step for a bit.

Just to be clear, I was taking the piss

[Howmanheyman 33246]

Just to be clear, I was taking the piss

Phew!

 

While we're talking about monkeys*, did anyone see Peyter Reid last night? Fuck me he looks more like a chimpanzee than ever. Is he on a diet of bananas and PG tips?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* JOKE!!! ;)

[PaddockLad 17281]

Unless your signing for a Man U or the likes then relegation clauses would perhaps seem sensible but as a club we took a chance on Ba and in a way it's come off if you look at it financially but now they need another rabbit out the hat. You can't keep doing it.

 

Good point Davey...when you bring in only 5 million or so and have a 15 million pound player to replace, it doesn't look quite such a bit of good business iyam. Without his goals we wouldnt be in Europe this season, so we'll see how much our Europa run brings in.

[Alex 35095]

Sorry if it's already been mentioned earlier in the thread but in terms of goals / team ratio, no other top flight side has relied on one single player than we have with Ba. When you take his goals out of a side 2 points above the relegation zone it a bit of a sphincter twitcher.

[Happy Face 29]

 

While we're talking about monkeys*, did anyone see Peyter Reid last night? Fuck me he looks more like a chimpanzee than ever. Is he on a diet of bananas and PG tips?

 

 

 

The blue dipper that came to the game with us last night was saying the same thing about him at half time.

 

I was impressed that Sky once again failed to find anyone with a Newcastle connection to get paid to watch the game from the comfort of a box and chat about it for all of half an hour.....and once again they brought in a bitter ex-mackem they could tie-in with our non-Mackem opponents.

 

No idea what he said like, but he's a cunt.

[Howmanheyman 33246]

Sorry if it's already been mentioned earlier in the thread but in terms of goals / team ratio, no other top flight side has relied on one single player than we have with Ba. When you take his goals out of a side 2 points above the relegation zone it a bit of a sphincter twitcher.

It's a concern. Instead of 'wiping our own nose' we may be struggling to wipe our arses in April/May as the sphincters twitch like a Bunny Rabbits nose.

[Happy Face 29]

Sorry if it's already been mentioned earlier in the thread but in terms of goals / team ratio, no other top flight side has relied on one single player than we have with Ba. When you take his goals out of a side 2 points above the relegation zone it a bit of a sphincter twitcher.

 

The stat I read was that Van Persie and Ba score the highest percentage of goals for their clubs than anyone else in Europes top 5 leagues...at 50%.

[Howmanheyman 33246]

 

The blue dipper that came to the game with us last night was saying the same thing about him at half time.

 

I was impressed that Sky once again failed to find anyone with a Newcastle connection to get paid to watch the game from the comfort of a box and chat about it for all of half an hour.....and once again they brought in a bitter ex-mackem they could tie-in with our non-Mackem opponents.

 

No idea what he said like, but he's a cunt.

He was ok and fair to be honest, far more pro-NUFC than that cunt Niall Quinn who has his sly digs hidden in his Oirish charming man brogue.

 

It takes some doing not to have any representation at all in a game you're featured in so kudos to SKY for achieving it once more.

[Alex 35095]

Was 13 out of our 26 before last night for Ba, which was 50%. But RVP has 16 out of their 54. Suarez is probably not far off 50% of Liverpool's league goals though.

[ewerk 30620]

As for release clauses I think it's a bit naive to think this is an exception. There'll be other players at the club with similar clauses, they'll just not be public knowledge.

 

He was a reasonably proven PL striker on a free and had other clubs interested, he called the shots and ultimately the club hasn't lost any money on him. If we had've paid a fee then the club certainly wouldn't have agreed to the fee, not when we actively look to exploit similar clauses in other players' contracts.

 

Why West Ham agreed to the release clause when they were already hurtling towards the Championship is beyond me.

[colinh9 0]

I still don't understand how anyone could have resentment towards Demba. At 27 years old, with knees that aren't great- he is supposed to stay at a club that's showing limited ambition and paying less money? As I've said before, being a footballer is not a long-term career. You need to make as much money as possible now, because in 6 years he will most likely be retired with limited options to make money. Most of us will never make that much cash- I get it- but most of us didn't dedicate our lives to being a professional footballer. He earned it, you don't just to that level with luck.

 

So, there is every reason to try to make as much money as possible.

 

And as far as ambition in terms of winning things- he has every right to go do that too. If Ashley were serious about winning things as an owner- we would have spent 10-15 million this summer on new players. Instead, we made a profit of ~3 million. For a club about to go into Europe with a lot of midweek matches ahead- that's utterly pathetic. He had a choice to stay with a club that was showing limited ambitions and has a history of selling it's best players for the right price- to a club that has won the ultimate club honor (no matter how fortunate it was). At the very least, you are talking about playing European football on a consistent basis. People talk about him rotting on the bench but that's nonsense. He will get his matches and if he performs he will be chosen. The only other out and out striker he has to compete against right now is a torrid Torres. Lukaku will be back next year- but Demba could easily be first choice if he's knocking them in.

 

It's a shame to see all this misguided anger. Against Pardew, against our players, against Demba Ba. Mike Ashley is the main culprit here and there isn't a doubt in my mind. Never once has anyone asked him for a 30 million pound signing, never would I. But considering the new TV money, it wasn't much to ask for 5-15 million investment over the summer so that we could have pushed on a bit. The league has never been worse/more open in 15 years, that's a fact. English clubs are getting destroyed in Europe and honestly the likes of Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal are the weakest they've been in ages. There is a legitimate shot for new clubs (Spurs, Everton) etc to get into those European spots. We are moving backwards because of a lack of investment.

Edited January 3, 2013 by colinh9

[Asprilla 96]

I still don't understand how anyone could have resentment towards Demba. At 27 years old, with knees that aren't great- he is supposed to stay at a club that's showing limited ambition and paying less money? As I've said before, being a footballer is not a long-term career. You need to make as much money as possible now, because in 6 years he will most likely be retired with limited options to make money. Most of us will never make that much cash- I get it- but most of us didn't dedicate our lives to being a professional footballer. He earned it, you don't just to that level with luck.

 

So, there is every reason to try to make as much money as possible.

 

And as far as ambition in terms of winning things- he has every right to go do that too. If Ashley were serious about winning things as an owner- we would have spent 10-15 million this summer on new players. Instead, we made a profit of ~3 million. For a club about to go into Europe with a lot of midweek matches ahead- that's utterly pathetic. He had a choice to stay with a club that was showing limited ambitions and has a history of selling it's best players for the right price- to a club that has won the ultimate club honor (no matter how fortunate it was). At the very least, you are talking about playing European football on a consistent basis. People talk about him rotting on the bench but that's nonsense. He will get his matches and if he performs he will be chosen. The only other out and out striker he has to compete against right now is a torrid Torres. Lukaku will be back next year- but Demba could easily be first choice if he's knocking them in.

 

It's a shame to see all this misguided anger. Against Pardew, against our players, against Demba Ba. Mike Ashley is the main culprit here and there isn't a doubt in my mind. Never once has anyone asked him for a 30 million pound signing, never would I. But considering the new TV money, it wasn't much to ask for 5-15 million investment over the summer so that we could have pushed on a bit. The league has never been worse/more open in 15 years, that's a fact. English clubs are getting destroyed in Europe and honestly the likes of Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal are the weakest they've been in ages. There is a legitimate shot for new clubs (Spurs, Everton) etc to get into those European spots. We are moving backwards because of a lack of investment.

Good post, although any premiership footballer who ends up with money worries deserves them tbf.

 

I keep changing my mind on this one. The other day I thought the club were right to hold firm on paying him silly money, just because I thought it would upset the team spirit which was there last year.

 

The fact is though, why would any of our players stay when the owner will undo any good work achieved by cashing in or not investing anyway?

[Howmanheyman 33246]

For an few quid extra in his pay/sign on fee we might have had a proven scorer tied down with only a big fee standing in the way of losing him. Pay peanuts and deal with the consequences.

[David Kelly 1245]

I doubt we would have been able to keep him no matter what we offered. If he had an inkling that Chelsea were interested in him he would always chose them over us no matter how happy he was here. They are a far more attractive proposition as club than us now. They have an owner who wants to make them the very best and has the money and will to spend it that we simply can't compete with under Ashley.

If we expected to keep him we needed to spend on adding to the team in the summer but we didn't. We showed zero ambition so any player in their right mind would choose Chelsea over us unless they are a mad keen fan of the club.

[Howmanheyman 33246]

I doubt we would have been able to keep him no matter what we offered. If he had an inkling that Chelsea were interested in him he would always chose them over us no matter how happy he was here. They are a far more attractive proposition as club than us now. They have an owner who wants to make them the very best and has the money and will to spend it that we simply can't compete with under Ashley.

If we expected to keep him we needed to spend on adding to the team in the summer but we didn't. We showed zero ambition so any player in their right mind would choose Chelsea over us unless they are a mad keen fan of the club.

I meant offered him originally.

[colinh9 0]

Good post, although any premiership footballer who ends up with money worries deserves them tbf.

 

I keep changing my mind on this one. The other day I thought the club were right to hold firm on paying him silly money, just because I thought it would upset the team spirit which was there last year.

 

The fact is though, why would any of our players stay when the owner will undo any good work achieved by cashing in or not investing anyway?

 

Yeah, to a certain extent that's true. I'd certainly love to be making that money and think I'd invest/save wisely- but it's difficult given the culture surrounding professional athletes. They should save- but I also don't begrudge them trying to make as much money as possible in a short career. Most of us are in the early part of our careers at 27. He's looking at the back-end of it.

 

It's not an easy call on whether to break the bank to pay him, or to break a wage structure. I think it's intelligent to keep that in place and you have to be reasonable, no matter how important the player is. However, the club could have invested over the summer- showed Ba some intent and offered him a new contract. If he didn't accept it, all well and good- they did their best....but they didn't invest and I have no hard feelings against Demba Ba whatsoever.

 

Nobody is expecting us to compete against Manchester City for players or for titles at this point. Our objective has to be long-term goals. Incremental improvements. There will absolutely be blips along the way, bad runs etc. I don't expect to be in the Champions League overnight. However, I do think it makes good business sense to put investment into the first-team. 10-15 million would have easily been doable for Mike Ashley this summer. We could have gotten 3-4 more quality/young players in to challenge for places where we are sorely lacking. RB/LB, CB, AM/winger (least of the prority), Striker. And there were areas to try to improve- possibly moving on Jonas or Simpson in the off-season. Anyway, I'm getting off topic- but the point is that even 5 million of investment would have been better than -3 million.

 

Also, we are going to lose players to the big boys- these things are going to happen. What we need to avoid is losing 5-6 players in our first-team because of massive dip in form/squad. Cabaye may eventually get a 20 million pound bid from Manchester United- we have to accept that. Just a matter of the way things are set up. That's fine- because that will allow us to go out and buy 3-4 more players and improve the overall squad. It will be a loss, but one we can actually improve upon. But if you are moving backwards as a club, you start to lose everything. Potentially Cisse, Ben Arfa, Tiote (eh I'd be fine if he left), Colo, Krul etc want to leave if they don't see ambition. If the club shows a long-term plan- invests properly etc- it will get better and better aside from those minor blips.