Ashley’s paper statement is in tatters.

Posted on June 4th, 2010 | 73 Comments |

Ashley's intent has fallen on deaf ears.
Ashley's intent has fallen on deaf ears.
It was a noble thought, a thought that was backed by many fans of NUFC, and a thought that was supposed to unite the Premier League.

This is of course the release of the statement a week or so ago in which Newcastle United stuck up for something that was in the national interest, by banning The Daily Mail and Mail On Sunday from St James’ Park, from press conferences, and from the training ground.

It was a move that was formed from the fallout of the Lord Triesman affair, and the impact that the whole debacle may now have on the chances of England hosting the World Cup in 2018. Mike Ashley cited this as a reason as to why such drastic acton had been taken, and urged the chairmen at other Premier League clubs to join in the boycott of the newspaper. They didn’t, and now it looks like it could be another blunder in the making for Newcastle United.

Perhaps the reason why chairmen at other clubs in the Premier League chose to ignore the plea from Ashley is because they know how to use the press. We all know that the press spout a load of rubbish most of the time and that most of what is printed should be ignored, like you would ignore that weird demented shouty woman in the street. That doesn’t negate the fact that, if used correctly, the press can actually be of great assitance, especially to someone like Ashley who appears to have no idea of how to communicate with fans, or how public relations works. If you keep them on your side, then thay can actually work for you.

A letter was supposedly circulated to all 20 Premier League clubs, only one has replied, which makes this manoeuvre a failure. What we have now is a well intentioned stance, that recieved the backing of the majority of fans for a change, that has fallen flat on it’s face whilst managing to antagonise the media at the same time. Not good.

The press already have a free reign to write what they want about us after the release of the original statement, which said that the club will not be confirming or denying anything unless it is official. That was fine, but now Ashley has managed to poke them with a stick, it has given the media a motive to use that free reign.

This is not the first run in Ashley has had with the press, and it probably wont be the last. Various news outlets have been banned from Newcastle before, but it hasn’t stopped the stories. As fans we understand that the newspapers print rubbish a lot of the time, so why doesn’t Ashley? Why doesn’t he just learn to ignore all the speculation and rumours, like we have learned to?

The principled stance against the papers is a noble thought. Unfortunately though, it has fallen on deaf ears.

NUFCBlog Author: toonsy toonsy has written 643 articles on this blog.

Related Posts:

  • No Related Posts

Posted on by toonsy in category: Club Statements and General miscellany and Mike Ashley and Thoughts and reflections and Toonsy , with tags:
Comment on this post

73 Responses

  1. ashley put out that statment coz it could cost his shite clothing company millions,nothing more he was thinking of sports direct not newcastle united

  2. Who’s running this story, toonsy? The Daily Mail? :)

    Hitman – how would not banning the Daily Mail from SJP cost Sports Direct millions?

  3. not getting the WC would TC,thats what ashley was really botherd about..but im glad he has banned them from toon,very poor paper.

  4. Ah right – i’m with ya.

    Dunno if I buy that like. That World Cup is not for another 6 years – he’ll have probably sold Sports Direct by then and retired to some tropical hideaway.

  5. Nothing’s changed. Still the same old horseshit in the papers. I suspect that Ashley’s statement is more a case of water off a ducks back than a poke with a stick.

    Hitman; don’t see how this has anything to do with Sports Direct.

  6. Could be right there hitman about ashley n the world cup thing , but if ashley still owns the club is it not in our intrest his comapny make he more money that he might invest into the club?

  9. he should ban a few others while he’s on. i fail to see what benefits peddling lies bring to the club or the supporters. i agree with him on this one.

  10. if ashley banned every paper that has spouted shite about the toon,there would be no reporters left in SJP.. :)

  12. “if ashley banned every paper that has spouted shite about the toon,there would be no reporters left in SJP..”

    good.

  13. Sky just go on what the rags say in general tho – “investigative” journalism isn’t really their thing.

  14. that pic of ashley,all it needs is an upside down coat hanger above his head and the jobs a goodin :)

  15. It’s bad for the whole country to miss out on the world cup, not just MA, he has done the right thing.

  17. Best move he’s ever made! I can’t beleive the other chairmen didn’t have te balls to follow suit.

  18. agree paul, it’s a shame. maybe it’s coz they get decent press a fair amount of the time whereas NUFC don’t, admittedly brought on by ourselves a lot of the time, but a fair amount is unwarranted and aimed at unsettling the club and the fans.

    serious paranoia kickin in now btw…

  20. if the fat b@stard ran the club properly then he wouldn’t be worried about what a few papers wrote…

    …clowns at the helm will always attract the wrong type of headlines.

    ..GET OUT OF OUR CLUB YOU FAT B@STARD.

  21. In fairness this was a well intentioned move by the club but handled in a ridiculously incompetant way – But that’s par for the course with this lot.

    Like it or not, the papers can be influential and can make you or break you.

    I don’t know anybody who has taken on the press and won in the long term.

  22. Just for the record, why did the Mail get banned?

    I heard Llambias saying it was for trying to entice a riot at one of the home games. What was the riot to be about?

  23. He’s hardly taking on the press. He’s banned The Mail. That’s it. End of.

    Is Gary Lineker also “taking on the press” by resigning his role as a writer for the Mail?

  24. I know the Sunday Sun is banned too but I don’t think they even warrant a mention.

    Waste of effin paper that.

  25. Ban the lot except George Caulkin at the Times – we probably wouldn’t notice the difference

  28. As usual with anything to do with the press or PR, it’s well-intentioned and badly executed by the club. Personally I agree with the thought and it just confirms my disrespect for pretty much everyone in top-end football. Gutless, unprincipled tossers, the lot of ’em.

    I work for an organisation that the press collectively decided to attack a while back. Our incredibly intelligent and pragmatic bosses eventually came to a conclusion along the lines of: e’ve tried co-operating, debating, confronting; everything. Conclusion: nothing works, because the press make their money by picking a victim and slaughtering it. We will now pretty much ignore them and just get on with our jobs.

    Incidentally, they also commissioned a study into perceptions via the press compared to perceptions among customers and others that deal with us directly. Conclusion: EXACT OPPOSITE. It really was that bad; the press basically take all truth and destroy it to make a story.

    “Flat Earth News” is a good book to read if you ever want to know what it’s like that.

  29. Any players signed yet?
    Yawwwwwwwwwn………Stretch……Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
    That’s better :lol:

  31. I wouldn’t have thought it matters much. It is a extemist right wing rag that nobody reads. Their match reports are always crap 99% of substance is slagging off fans and club then you get a sentence on how good the other team was

  32. It was a move that was formed from the fallout of the Lord Triesman affair, and the impact that the whole debacle may now have on the chances of England hosting the World Cup in 2018.

    Yeah the guy was found guilty of talking about bribes and corruption of other nations and had to resign…fair play to the paper four outing the stupid chump anyway.

    Stupid stance by MA…Like he is whiter than white?
    MA is a TOSS POT :lol:

  33. MA Photo Caption Number Two

    MA “Listen to this one ladies PAAAAAAAAAARP PAARP”.

  35. budalovesa patsy says:
    June 4, 2010 at 1:08 pm

    “I wouldn’t have thought it matters much. It is a extemist right wing rag that nobody reads.”

    The Mail and the Sun are the two most popular papers in the UK.

  37. Photo Caption 3

    MA-“Oi Owl Heed come and wipe my backside I’ve shit my nappy”.

  39. Not bothered mate-think a country that is almost bankrupt shouldn’t be doing these kind of events TBH.

  42. SJT – we’ve already got the stadiums tho. Wouldn’t require the sort of investment that say a country like South Africa have had to fork out.

    The extra revenue that would created during the 6 weeks of the tournament would be a huge boost for the British economy though.

  44. Can you not say anything without twisting the words to suit your argument, Stuart?

  46. Toon Chicken says:
    June 4, 2010 at 1:30 pm
    Can you not say anything without twisting the words to suit your argument, Stuart?

    Took ya 3 minutes – Thought you’d have been quicker on to it than that.

    Not to worry though, your predictability didn’t dissapoint though.

  47. SJT – “Give it time DB”

    Can’t see it happening, really.

    He’d have to be keeping some pretty bad company and frequenting shady establishments for that to go down.

    Hang on a mo… :)

  48. As TC says, we already have a World Cup infrastructure, so it would take relatively little cash to sort out when compared to places like South Africa etc.

    It would be a massive boost to the economy of the country, just the tonic really.

  50. And it took you a whole ten to bite back, Stuart.

    This is a fun game isn’t it?

  53. What was it you said to someone yesterday?

    “Close the door on your way out then”

  57. Doesn’t look good for Ferdinand – Left hospital on crutches! Just hope King can play most of the games.

    Would rather have Gerrard as captain though, so there might be one good thing come out of it.

  58. What really got me about the Triesman thing was how the reaction totally summed up everything about the football industry ethos:

    Knowledgeable and respected football boss ‘gets caught’ saying: “these countries are trying to bribe refs”

    Football industry says “You must resign!”

    Absolutely nobody says “Really? We must investigate your accusations!!”

    The World Cup will be won by the biggest team of cheats run by the biggest crooks.

  59. I’d love to see the WC here. Shame the Mail had to go scuppering it – and the billions it would have brought in to our economy – just to make a few quid on that day’s paper.

    Utter, contemptible, amoral gits the lot of them. Ashley was right to try; shame everyone else is a brown-nosing shyster.

  62. problem with ashley is after all his carry on over the last few years,nobody takes the man seriously.
    mike ashley is a joke and a pariah in football circles,so i doubt anyone would support him.
    the only thing that could support ashley is a cast iron belt.

  64. just because the rest of the premier league clubs don’t have the balls nor get singled out like ours in the press doesn’t take any away from Ashley’s decision. I for one see it as a testament to our club willingness to move forward for better and do away with all the negatives. long live the days of Ashley choosing the ‘right’ thing to do I say!

  65. stuart79, gerrard captain? surely a responsibility too many for a guy facing a scandal outbreak sometime soon? ;)

  66. TBH i could not give a toss about the world cup or even our national side. Dunno why, i havent followed our country with any real conviction for ages and ages… prob back in shearers hay days. Around euro 96 and gazzas brilliance etc. since then i have just thought they are a bunch of over paid, thick twats with huge egos that never perform well enough and to be honest play bloody ugly football.

  67. i liked ashleys stance with these two rag papers but alas, its liek the old saying goes, keep your friends close and your enemies closer still. The way to beatr these tabloid scum papers would be to bring them onboard. Every conflict is eventually settled around a table and diplomacy. to fight the papers is suicide in reality.

  68. you dont half write some tosh T

    this site is running close to being exactly what it said it wouldnt be and thats running loads of inane threads when there’s no news

    hypocrites

  69. Well if you want NEWS, then there is always NewsNow, or if you want the odd original thought instead of reshashed news articles, then this BLOG, you know BLOG, opinions etc, is fine.

    What is wrong with being original and thinking about something the club have done recently? And how it hasn’t worked at all?

    You know, thoughts, opinions….

    Or must we explicitly be the 25,645,897 place to find news about?

  71. Stu – We agree 8O

    This is a guy who only comes on to have a pop at us. Right from day 1 I noticed that, with his subtle digs at Bowburn, Geordie Deb etc.

    Be critcal by all means, and people have been, but when it turns to into an agenda it’s fecking laughable.

  72. It always amazes me when people complain about something like a blog. As if they are being forced to read and frequent the site.

    In my own mind, if I don’t like a specific website or article. I dont read it…

    Yet people like eastend toon will continue to, and then complain about it! That is laughable.