Newcastle in the Premiership: How do we measure up with the rest?
Posted on May 16th, 2010 | 93 Comments |
All the noises coming out of the club seem to suggest, well, more than suggest that the days of the NUFC retirement home for football gentlefolk has gone, with an emphasis on younger players and a much more careful and measured approach. It is time to forget the past though and move on. Of course, being relegated to the Championship also had a huge financial price, and many of these ‘big ticket’ players were offloaded ASAP. The rollcall including Michael Owen, Damien Duff, Habib Beye and someone who came out of nowhere (well, Metz actually) to make a name for himself amidst the wreckage of last season, Sebastien Bassong. Some key players were kept on of course, and Chris Hughton signed reinforcements, albeit on a budget that was somewhat less grand than in the past. So, as things stand at the moment, how does our diminished squad measure up to the rest of the sides competing in next year’s Premier League?
With the exception of our two fellow relegatees last season, West Bromwich Albion and Middlesbrough. it could easily be said that our squad was quite a still a long way ahead of the chasing pack, even after the removal of many of it’s supposed ‘Crown Jewels’ as mentioned above. So, will the Newcastle United squad measure up in terms of quality to the much higher standards of the Premiership? If this question means “will our squad be better than at least three other squads?” then the answer will probably be “yes”.
Firstly there are the two clubs who will be promoted with us, West Bromwich and either Cardiff or Blackpool. Being fellow ex Premiership casualties themselves, West Brom were one of the few sides in the Championship with a squad which came close to ours, with stars such as goalkeeper, Scott Carson, Gianni Zuiverloon, Abdoulaye Méïté, Chris Brunt, James Morrison and the up and coming Graham Dorrans, who had an excellent season for the ‘Baggies’. However, they do not have one single player currently valued at over £5 million, no players who are on quite the same level as Fabricio Coloccini, Jose Enrique, Steven Taylor, Kevin Nolan, Joey Barton, or perhaps most of all, Jonas Gutirerrez. It was Argentina coach, Diego Armando Maradona, who said that his Argentina side would be “Mascherano, Messi, Jonas and eight more”. We have only seen the first, faint stirrings of what he’s truly capable of in the Premiership. Along with his fellow Magpie and Argentina star, Fabricio Coloccini, he will blossom next year in the same way as Jose Enrique has in the preceding season. Along with the already mentioned Gutierrez, Coloccini and Enrique, West Brom also do not have any players whose Premierhip experience, and value, would compare with those of players such as Kevin Nolan, Steven Taylor and Joey Barton. Danny Guthrie is also proving to be a rapidly appreciating asset. As for Cardiff and Blackpool, do me a favour! Whilst there are some talented players within those squads, in terms of squad value and investmant, both of their squads put together would be worth less than Newcastle United’s first team squad, and even with the huge windfall that promotion to the Premiership brings, they will still struggle financially to invest in significant reinforcements.
So that’s two out of the way, lets look at some of the lesser squads who were already in the Premiership last year. All of the three teams who were relegated, Portsmouth, Hull and Burnley had squads which were estimated to be worth less than our own as things stood at the end of the season. Of the survivors with whom we will be competing next year, both Birmingham and Wolves, who managed to finish 15th and 9th respectively, have squads which are worth less than our own at this point.
Looking at our own squad purely in terms of it’s perceived monetary value, perhaps the closest examples in the Premiership are Wigan and Stoke. All of our first team squads are around the £60 million mark, and like Wolves and Birmingham, they were not relegated, with Wigan in 16th place, and Stoke, like Birmingham City, could be said to be thriving with an 11th placed finish at the end of the season.
Of course though, this is only part of the story. If that were the only issue, Newcastle should never have been relegated in the first place. However it does rather damage the argument that we will be immediately relegated unless we immediately spend huge amounts on players. Just as other teams, like the two midlands examples mentioned above have survived, and in Birmingham City’s case, even thrived with a less expensive squad than we have at this moment, so we have our own example from the 2008/9 season, that of a highly expensively assembled squad which should have been in permanent residence in the top half of the Premiership getting relegated. Continuing with our own example though, what we have lost in terms of star players, we have more than made up for through managerial consistency, good decisionmaking and co-ordination, and that phrase which is rapidly becoming something of a cliché at Saint James’s, “Team Spirit”.
NUFCBlog Author: workyticket
workyticket has written 1095 articles on this blog.
There have been many voices crying that Newcastle will need to draft in lots of big name players merely to survive?
Not heard anyone on here demanding big names at all-just sensible investment.