Revolution Rock

[Scottish Mag 3]

You know we didn't play particularly badly at The Beasts. We probably played as well as we can. And that is probably the saddest thing I can say about the trip to the toxic tip. We could and should have won the game at a canter because we had plenty of chances but if your players don't have the ability to take those chances then, you aren't going to win football matches.

 

More of us are asking serious questions of almost everything at NUFC. On every level there is dissatisfaction with the running of our club and the view that the current regime is a busted flush has taken alight. As far as I can see there is very little at the club's disposal to put out that fire. Should the club fail to beat Portsmouth at home on Wednesday night, then Freddie Shepherd and the football geniuses in the boardroom will be directly in the line of fire and there will be plenty bullets and poisoned arrows heading in his direction.

 

But Shepherd and the others who allegedly run our football club should take succour from the fact supporters are angry, piss-boiling angry. That shows we care, that we love the club, though tolerate the bufonery that characterises much of what happens at SJP less and less.

 

The time for Shepherd and his merry men to truly worry is when apathy sets in. The hardcore will always be there. The people whose lives revolve around the club - they will always keep on, keepin' on. But for those who see NUFC as something of a leisure pursuit rather than a calling, then I am fraid those people are going to abandon their seats for the golf courses, shopping malls and whatever it is people do when there's a match on and they aren't there. Who knows what the attendance will be on Wednesday night - the club may be saved by school half term and a parental "treat" to take the bairns to the match. Don't laugh. When the club is in something approaching meltdown that can't be much of a treat to be honest.

 

After the club binned Kevin Bond, Roeder has brought in relegation specialist, Nigel Pearson, whose track record and credentials are hardly impressive. More and more of us are looking at Roeder seriously but coming to the conclusion that he is symptom rather than cause of the problems at our beloved Newcastle United. The cause of the problems rests in the boardroom and shit decision making, the absence of a real plan to develop Newcastle United as a serious football club that will punch its weight rather than make the occassional trophy signing to stroke our collective ego that Newcastle United is "big". Newcastle United isn't a big club. Newcastle United is just a club with lots of supporters who care about the club. Big clubs win things and we don't do that.

 

Let's get on the record what we are unhappy about. This squad is woefully short. We may have spunked money here and there (though that is hugely debatable and a subject of close analysis in itself) but we are left with a pool of misfits, rejects and those who are just not up to the standard required of a club with our potential and aspirations.

 

Much of our current malaise goes back to Shepherd's complete inability to plan a succession for the end of Sir Bobby Robson's time at NUFC. His time was up but Shepherd, dithered, talked shite about not being the man who shot Bambi! We had a close season of discord and intrigue. Robson, who had lost the plot started the season badly and Shepherd sacked Robson with no Plan B. Coming in at Plan X was Souness who proceeded to grotesquely mis-manage the club as well thought he would, spend fortunes on rubbish and be prompty dismissed, again with no Plan B to be executed. Souness was Shepherd's man, just as Roeder is Shepherd's man. These are the decisions Shepherd is more than richly rewarded to make. He isn't giving the supporters what they want as his sycophants in the local media would have us believe. That is his decision and it is patronising nonsense to suggest anything else. How many more appointments will Shepherd be allowed to make? How many piss poor players on top dollar wages bought for ludicrously inflated fees come into our club, fail and then move on with their pckets filled for having achieved the sum total of **** all?

 

The club appears to lack strategy, vision and the current regime has taken far too much money out of the club over the last ten years whilst achieving little. Shepherd and Hall have failed us.

 

Their defence will be they have provided managers with plenty money to invest in players. Well, they should add that it is our money. By and large the cash that has haemoraged out of NUFC over the last decade has been wasted on poorly researched players and by and large we now have a squad which is low in quality and light years from the top four but not that far from the bottom three.

 

It is early days and perhaps I am premature but our big close signing Obafemi Martins looks nothing like a £10M player. A panic buy, a player from the c-list of preferred players Roeder asked Shepherd to go out and get for the club. Nice company for Luque on the bench whilst a limping and willing Shola with a clear injury, threatens his fitness further playing at 50% of his capacity, I'd guess. Two years to replace Shearer and the club fail miserably. It's shambolic.

 

And there is nothing coming through. No names from the youth team to quicken the pulses. Millions has been invested in training facilities etc but there's nothing coming through that can set a new agenda for the club. Why?

 

Things could get a whole lot worse before they start getting better.

 

In the words of our new anthem - "We Want Shepherd Out, We Want Shepherd Out!

 

Keep On, Keepin' On ....

[Tom 14011]

[GafferTape 0]

We'll probably beat Charlton and Sheff Utd in a couple of scrappy games, and the whole protest thing will be forgotten in absolutely the same way as last season, when Owen's signing appeased the braindeads.