Llambias: “Do I care what Alan Shearer has to say?”

Posted on February 2nd, 2011 | 71 Comments |

Derek Llambias, Newcastle United
Do I care what Shearer says?
Derek Llambias engages in a war of words with Alan Shearer.

Alan Shearer has been critical of Newcastle United’s sale of Andy Carroll to Liverpool, particularly following assurances that he wouldn’t be sold and given that no replacement was made in the transfer window. Shearer said:

“I’m staggered just like the rest of Newcastle fans. I am surprised at how quickly it came along and it’s an astonishing amount for a young guy with huge potential.

“It’s all right selling your best player, but not getting anyone in to replace him is staggering.

“People are saying that Liverpool have sold Torres, but they have got two guys in for over £50million to replace him. I just hope Newcastle invest some of the £35million in new players at the end of the season.

“I am disappointed as he is Newcastle’s best player and their best hope of being successful this season and getting a Europe League place.

“They would have just been happy to avoid relegation at the start of the season but, mainly because of him, they had a chance of a Europa spot.“

Derek Llambias, who I was beginning to think had actually been replaced with a cardboard cutout as he’s been so quiet recently, decided he wasn’t going to take Shearer’s comments lying down and replied as follows:

“Do I care what Alan Shearer has to say? When he ran this football club we were relegated after picking up just five points from his eight games in charge.

“Mike Ashley has only ever put money into this football club. He has never taken a single penny out.

“And he won’t take a single penny of this £35m either – all the money will go to the club and we are already working on identifying transfer targets for the summer.”

Obviously, this whole Andy Carroll business isn’t going to go away overnight but Llambias is hardly likely to win any popularity contests by dissing Shearer, even if his comments are factually accurate.

NUFCBlog Author: Hugh de Payen I'm a baby-boomer of the punk rock persuasion, currently exiled in Somerset for crimes committed in a previous life where locals keep trying to poison me with something called 'scrumpy'. Hates sprouts, coat-hangers, Cilla Black, ornaments, Steven Seagull movies and 50 Cent (he's not worth 10). Hugh de Payen has written 634 articles on this blog.

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71 Responses

  1. the man is a tosser!he is there only to please ashley(wat a thought!!)
    he cant do his job propoerly!
    If only he could explain where all the xfer money has went to in the past!!

  2. Did he not also say appointing Shearer was the best decision they had made at the club at the time, even after relegation……the man’s an idiot.

  3. U must be pretty f***ing stupid if you’re the managing
    Director of newcastle to go out against geordie
    Legend #1

  5. No time for Llambias – but I’m afraid this season I’m rapidly ceasing to care what Shearer says.

  6. I Hate You Derek Llambias!!!!!
    Alan has the rught to say whatever he wants!!!
    Take your big fat arse back to London you piece of sh1t!!!

  7. I think Shearer should have kept out of this. Makes him look bitter, but to be fair to him what ever he said has probably been reconstructed by the press to get headlines and stir the pot.

    Whatever mistakes Ashley has made it amazes me that people can say he is greedy in so far as NUFC is concerned. All the evidence so far points the other way.

  8. It’s all getting very messy and childish.Llambias is showing that he has no class at all,and unfortunatly that means the club is percieved in the same way.Hugh, I prefered it when he didn’t say anything.

  9. No-one is being made to look good out of this, but I think if Pardew picks up the lads, then has that money to spend next season, he’s going to come out of this very well. One question for everyone, if we’ve held off that 35m til the summer, will we now get interest on that? surely it would be quite an amount of interest?

  10. Shearer seems happy to comment on everything at the moment and while thats fine I remember him having a go at players of the past doing the same thing when he was playing.
    He will always be a hero up here but its a fact he was a hopeless manager, too big a job, too little time, not enough experience. I think he will end up staying on the TV he knows he doesnt want to run back to management.

    as for ashley ive never been a fan but it is a fact that Sheperd and Hall took large salaries and pension options from the club and put very little into it for the return they got.

    I dont think we want them back and ashley is a bigger and more succesful businessman than both of them put together when you combine wealth. I think thats starting to show in some of the decisons made at the club.

    Andy C the 8th highest transfer fee of all time for a player who has not played a full season in the premiership represents the best fee anyone will ever get for him. I dont think his next move will be for a higher fee. As for his view he was being pushed out , this is just utter rubbish. He signed a contract in october and wanted to rip it up and start a new one again in January,the club cannot ever be blackmailed by a player in this way. imagine if you did this at work where you would be. As for the club what would this mean if they had given into his demands,would he have wanted another new deal in April and aother at the end of July.

    We are better of as a club though not as a team (in the short term) by not agreeing to this.

    Would anyone like to comment on how quick Andy C injury will heal up.I bet he is not four or five weeks away now.

    It hurts to lose a good player but for the long term future of the club showing we will not be blackmailed by players or agents is the right decision. The scousers are welcome to him. If he feels the club are telling lies he can always take them to court for slander if he wants to protect his good name.

  11. I’m afraid to say that the legend that is Alan Shearer went way down in my opinion when he and his smug BBC pundit pals ( Lineker etc )sat there giggling like school girls over the hammering that Barton took by that pack of Wolves thugs earlier this season.
    We need to put Andy Carrol in the past & put in a performance tonight like we have done numerous times over the past 2 years when our backs have been up against the wall.
    By the way i think Lambias is a complete N*B

  12. seems to be that we get more media attention and drama when we are in the epl then we were in the championship absolute farce

  13. So the club confirm that all the transfer money is going back into the club and the fans are still complaining, was Carrol the first “superstar” to ever leave a club? No! Manure do it regular, so do Arsenal etc.

    What makes Newcastle any different? and AC was by no means a superstar, just a kid with great potential who believed his own hype and tried to blackmail the club, bigger fools Liverpool for paying an extortionate fee as he was clearly overpriced. I wish everyone would wake up and smell the coffee, the club is still on the up and we will meet this seasons goal of consolidating permiership survival, it never was to get into Europe which would have been a disaster for next season.

  15. It’s a bit childish from Llambias to imply it was Shearer who got us relegated. If they hadn’t signed players behind Keegans back and sold players without replacing them then we definitely would have stayed up anyway.
    So for Ashley and Llambias to blame anyone but themselves for that nightmare we had to endure is disgusting.
    Shearer has a right to speak his mind like any other NUFC fan. I actually hate Llambias more than Ashley. If Ashley had of brought in someone who actually knows something about running a footall club we’d never have had this crap for the last 3 seasons.
    Llambias has shown he has no class. You never hear anything from him for months and when we do he comes out with that load of bullshit.

  16. We can all pick over who said what. It won’t take us anywhere apart from hospital with blood pressure. The bigger worry is not what Llambias thinks of Shearer because most of us know Shearer wasn’t running the club (to use Llambias reported comment) anymore than Pardew is. The transfer activity is handled elsewhere. They managed to screw up Keegan’s tenure by doing their own thing – against their agreements with KK. No the bigger problem is that fresh from assuring us Carroll would not be sold he is now saying he will be using all the money to strengthen the squad. How many of us believe that? The N’Zogbia developments, for me, finally cemented my view that we are badly run. Looked like desperation to most of us. What kind of judge would offer £12m for someone who did not want to play for us before, sought Arsenal or a bigger club and then joined Wigan. I wonder why we did not pursue the Larsson deal at a fraction of the cost in fees and wages. Anyone want Xisco and Gonzalez back if only as a permanent reminder of where Newcastle’s relegation started? It certainly was not in the last eight games. An attempt at persuading the fans to buy into Ashley’s vision is well overdue. They make no attempt to communicate and that is at the root of our contempt.

  18. What does worry me is that Pardew has said that the 35mil will all be spent. On fees AND wages. Joy. What a cop out, that should limit the number of new faces we see rather heavily…

  19. Childish comment from DL. He said like him and Ashley are not one of the reason we relegated. They are the main problem. Absolutely hopeless for this guy.

  20. According to Caulkin of The Times, Pardew has let slip that the £35m is for transfers AND WAGES… so any 5 year deal like Carroll had with us before he left will be an extra £5m on top of a transfer fee (that’s my maths and I could be wrong a bit). A top striker (or even Bendtner)would prob want double that

  21. There were strong rumours coming out of Liverpool that Shearer recommended Carroll to his mate and former manager Dalglish. Shearer was a great cente forward and that is it. He is an armchair pundit like all the others that pontificate on the telly who have no or very little experience of managing a club and dealing with the demands of millionaire players and the transfer business. If left to Shearer he would have kept his mate Owen on at the club. Without heaping any praise on Ashley and Lambias, Newcastle United have shown with recent signings (and the rejection of players who wanted too much) that they are far better at doing the business than recent Newcastle management, although that might not be a good comparison when we think of all the duff duds that came through the door on Freddie’s watch.

  22. kamar give ya head a shake prick just like the rest of yas who trust the fatman ,hes srewing us fans once agen , a lot of players will be off in summer and will be replaced by shite

  23. Shearer has a right to comment, just as anyone does. His comments weren’t far off the mark and apart from to BBC, he is answerable to no one but himself.

    Shearer was useless in the 8 games like. Interesting stats about how we would have stayed up under Hughton OR JK, in both cases marginally mind. However, Ashley appointed him, so Ashley and Llambias have to take that on themselves.

    Surprised Llambias would let his guard down like this. He is an ambassador for the club after all, and it sounds like he’s lost his temper, which just adds to the embarrassment of it all.

  24. King Kenny back and £22m Suarez to make debut but Liverpool still haven’t sold out little Anfield tonight. Big club my etc etc.. hope Stoke hammer them!

  25. Has anyone stopped to think how off this seems? ‘Llambias told The Sun’ the bloke who says nothing all of a sudden gives a quote to The Sun, of all papers, on one of the biggest transfers ever?

    Nah, doesn’t add up to me, wouldn’t be surprised if it is completley made up if i’m honest.

  26. Does Lamarse’s face look bothered?

    My vitriol…contempt, hatred, is squarely aimed at Ashley. If you lads think we’re getting 35m to spend, then fill your boots with your spending plans and shopping lists…Oh, I think we should get so and so, he’d do a job for us. And so it goes, on and on…

    That fat tw*t HATES us…and yes he IS small minded and petty enough to pull all manner of stunts to p*ss us off…whilst making money out of us while he’s at it!

    The bloke doesn’t want to be here, we don’t want him here…it’s a f*cking joke,man.

  27. ashley has made some of the most bizzare decisions in the history of association football,but employing that tit derek llambias,is by far the worst.
    one of the first things he should have done to to redeem himself was sack that liability,all the trouble seems to come through this horrible little man.he was a major player in the keegangate scandal,caused nothing but trouble for fatboy,i will never understand why ashley has him around,nothing more than an irritation.
    ashley should have shown some sense,and employed a proper football man to run the club,who would be there day in day out,not some mouthy little tit,who only turns up a couple of times a week.

  28. antmanbee,ashley doesn’t hate us,he like that with everyone he comes into contact with.
    look at the contempt he has shown towards people who have shares in sports direct.

  29. After Shearer publicly tried to humiliate Joey Barton on MOTD after the Wolves game, I have absolutely no respect for what the man says anymore. His status as a legendary player will never be in doubt and I shudder to think where we’d be had he not played for us, but some of the crap he comes up with makes me squirm. I have to pinch myself sometimes watching MOTD to make sure I haven’t been teleported back to the 1920’s.

    That bing said, Llambias is a complete arse. He’s so far out of his depth at Newcastle that I feel embarrassed for him.

  30. Trojan, morning mate, sorry but spitting feathers ;0)

    Ashley won’t even SPEAK to the fans, directly. So I guess that’s what Lambiass is for. They have contempt for most things, people, institutions that people hold dear, everything that has values outside of profit.

    Lovers of money, power, and the buzz of high stake risk…They know the price of everything and the value of nowt!

  31. Lads at the end of the day we are never going to know the truth about Carrolls transfer. We have to move on.

    I would suggest buying Ricky VanWolfwinkle who is 22 and plays for Utrecht and Holland. He has scored a lot of goals and would be a great addition. After all there are not many bad Dutch strikers, that I could name.
    He would be a great addition to the squad. That said Im sure Pardew could find some free be over the hill player for nowt instead!

  33. Let’s just beat Fulham tonight and draw line under this sorry mess once and for all.

    Howay the lads!!!

  34. Sorry to be the devils advocate here, but surely Lambias has as much right to voice his opinion as anyone else, no matter whether it is ill advised or if you disagree with it.

  35. Agreed, Toon Chicken. That’s the bottom line, getting behind the lads. It would be great if we can get 3 points tonight…the results last night didn’t do us any harm, and a win would be great, the way the table is looking.

  36. Wasn’t Shearer quoted as saying: ‘It was too much to turn down’ just a day & a half ago?
    & anyway, there is no way that ac was our best player, that’s a dumb thing to say. Aye he scored a few goals, but he wasn’t our best player. One of our best players, yes.
    Did Shearer really say any of this?
    If so, is he just turning into yet another ex player with lots to say, but nothing to add?

  38. Grumpy: Totally, mate. But looking at the content…a thinly-veiled, arrogant swipe at Shearer in what amounts to a PR/damage limitation exercise. No integrity, or sincerity, just HMV…his master’s voice.

  39. I agree with you on that Clint, re: Shearer saying AC our best player…he was one of them though. Obviously the Shearer/Ashley thing has history, no doubt bad blood, but to me, they’re all just talking heads, in this case, rearranging deck chairs with words.

    To me, none of this is the point, other than Lambias has uncharacteristically broken ranks to try some PR. The point I’m trying to make is why bother…they don’t normally feel they need to explain themselves. Now he’s out shouting the odds…

  40. Lambias’ statements show the same level of realism and sincerity as that 11th hour bid they made for N’zogbia. They’re havin a larff, man. That’s why I’ll never ever believe a word that comes out of that collective mouth again.

  41. ant,
    fair enough mate,
    but,
    ac has dropped us right in it, not only at the last minute but left us floundering trying to get someone else in.
    It’s easy to blame the owner/chairman, especially if you base it on past stuff. But to want a raise a couple of months after getting one, & lacking the patience to wait until summer, we’ve got to ask ourselves what was ac thinking? He didn’t have to go, he chose to, for the money.
    It’s a lot harder to hold a player to a contract than a club, when all they have to do is hand in a request.
    Once they’ve done that they no longer wanna be at that club. They couldn’t have made him leave. He saw dollar signs, cheekily asked for a raise, so he walked.

  42. Clint, I just think this is the grey area, and also Ashley’s trump card. Carroll was greedy…I’m not even trying to defend the lad. Despite all the words, we don’t know all the facts…

    But Carroll doesn’t run this club, and those who do have form as long as your arm. I think they played him. They got what they wanted, imo, but with added kudos of, ” well, what could we do?” Time also on their side before any reinvestment…so the jury’s out until then.

    I’m not one of the long term anti Ashley brigade, I just reached my limit with all the benefits of the doubt. Carroll doesn’t come out of this well at all, but think the stooges are delighted with that bit of business, particularly in that Carroll comes out of all this as the main villain to most people.

  43. in my opinion llambias should focus on keeping his mouth shut before slagging off a toon legend when will this prick learn to gan long. And i’m sorry but if you can’t afford to pay a footballer 80k a week now whats the point in owning a club, were never going to sign a huge player if we can’t afford to pay high enough wages, there is no hope, we just can’t develop as a team with these cockney c***s in charge , kevin keegan knows it, Allardyce knows it, Shearer knows it and now Andy Carrol does aswell good look to you Carrol at lest you can go somewhere with your new club.

  44. ant,
    ultimately,
    we all thought/said carroll bled B & W, i don’t see/hear anything, not a single peep from him or anyone else about how he fought the bastards tooth & claw to stay at the club he loves.
    He doesn’t bleed B&W, he bleeds RED, like everyone else.

    Know what i’m saying?
    ;)

  46. Yeah, Clint. In a way it’s a moot point again. No-one wants a player at the club who doesn’t want to be here. Me included…Northern pride I suppose…I just fall on the other side of the ‘ultimately’ in your last post.

    I know it’s done and nowt can change it, I just don’t think Carroll was forcing the club to ‘break’ their wage structure, but merely get paid a little more in line with what his goals were worth to the club. What was the value of his last contract…30k a week?…that’s nowhere near the figure I heard for the likes of Xisco. Smith.

    He says he was due a wage rise in the summer, and then was told they weren’t going to review the wage after all…right when the offers were coming in. They say they’ve got Carroll’s request in writing. Does it say ” I want 80k or I’m off”? Or was he peed ‘cos they provoked him when Pardew told him “his hands were tied”?

    Too many questions and discrepancies for me to just blame the lad, like.

  47. First Shearer is an idiot. Any number of comments he made of the last year can display that- laughing when Barton was kicked off the pitch, saying that French International Ben Arfa “came out of nowhere” etc. But he is not the only ex-player to comment about their club rightly or wrongly. You do not see Arsenal directors or the Chairman of MU commenting every time someone says something critical of them. It’s an amateur thing to do.

    As for the deal everyone worrying about cloak and dagger stuff are reacting FAR too emotionally about this. AC is a player who has a limited time to make money. He hears there’s another job offering more money and he tried to use it as leverage. It backfired as the club wanted to sell. That does not mean he is a judas or left us in the lurch. We can react more emotionally as we are fans but players have only 10 years and have to look at their own interests.

    The club decided they had a sale able asset and cashed in. Now of course they didn’t go around saying we will sell him. I also think it was incredibly short sighted and left us in the sh*t but they made a financial decision. As for the money staying in the club it doesn’t have to go on transfers to stay in the club. There are lots of other costs that need to be paid and that otherwise add to the debt.

    I think Ashley is a terrible owner who doesn’t understand the business of football. However I don’t think he is “trying to destroy the club” etc why would he? If he does he gets even less return on a depreciating asset. Furthermore there is absolutely no money to be made in running football clubs compared to almost all other businesses.

  48. clint – there’s plenty players that hand in transfer requests & have them turned down by the board – no board worth their salt would have sold him with only a few hours left in the transfer window (apart from ours like)leaving them with no chance (very handy!) of replacing him :(

    the bottom line is they had him on a 5 1/2 year contract & could’a should’a told him to stop being a – prick – & get on with what we pay you for & we’ll talk in the summer.

    they didn’t have to sell him – but couldn’t resist the smell of the – candy – on offer.

    c@nts the lot ov em – carroll included.

  49. xisco & Smith were bought with wages attached, carroll came through the ranks. If he’d caused no trouble in that time, he’d have been on better wages. But he decided to be a dick as he came through & shit in his own nest.
    The lad was still ‘potential’, not a seasoned pro that we’d bought.
    He’ll say anything to not look a traitor to the Geordie public & he also knows he can play the ashley’s a tw@ card, which he has. It’s what i expected.
    We’ll probably never know the exact truth, ver batim.
    But i don’t care really, he’s gone, he coulda kicked off big time & pissed about ’til the deadline passed, he didn’t.
    Him & his dumb, treacherous agent probably thought he could pull a fast one on the contract. But for ‘silly money’ why should the club be held to ransom?
    He wanted more when he heard the figures bandied about.
    It woulda been a free for all if he’d got more after his recent raise.
    I hope he’s happy with his new bank balance, living in the north midlands @ a desperate club, with a dour manager that has phucked the Toon up twice now.
    The only good to come out of it is that fact that a bunch of scousers got robbed for a change.
    :)

  55. Aye…Two sides of the same coin…I’ll let it go, lads. It’s just I find it more difficult each time, to just keep “moving on” every time the rug goes from under us. Apols for the pash, but high stakes and all that…

  56. Certainly Derek won that verbal joust. Shearer should not get involved by letting his emotions get the better of him. He is no doubt a fan but he needs to keep a lid on it.

  57. ant,
    no sweat mate,
    we’re all mighty pissed about this.
    If anyone’s culpable, they all are.

    Aye Michael,
    Shearer needs to stop adding fuel to the roaring blaze.
    ;)

  58. 1) All you muppets having a pop at shearer need to STFU. What he did for us alone on the pitch is a thousand times more than enough and i will love him for ever for that. he is employed as a footy pundit for a neutral national media organisation and has no obligation to look at us with rose tinted glasses. And you know what, I like the fact he speaks his mind.
    2) You guys that are hating on carroll seriously need to wake up and get in real world. He is on less money than barton, smith, xisxo, nolan, shola (close pal) collocini, enrique, guti, and campbell. never find overpaid wastes we had before such as owen, kluivert, luque and boumsong. It royally does my head in when we as fans think ‘because they come from the area’ they shudnt care about money! Why?? Because we wouldn’t? Its foolish, the lad is one of ours, like shola, an academy graduate who didnt cost us a massive transfer fee. GIVE HIM WHAT HE WANTED!!! If its good enough with Sir Alex (Rooney, Rio) who also cost transfer fees combined of £60 mio then its should be good enough for Pards and Carroll who cost us, erm, NOTHING. Its not every year we produce an england international striker.
    3) im past hate for ashley and llambias, im more numb now. Going to the game as ever tonight and will cheer on the lads. But Lord Jesus, please please please please grant us a new owner. Please. Amen

  60. Shearer is a supporter like us and is entitled to his opinion. I can`t see how anybody can give Ashley and his sidekick any respect. In my eyes what Lambsarse has said is the final insult. Nobody else would have taken the job at that stage. We were relegated through the incompetence of Ashley and co.
    They lie every time they speak to the press, lots of examples to back up this statement. They have`nt got the bottle to come out publicly and speak instead they leave it to their puppets.
    Time to go back where you belong arses

  61. So Llambias doesn’t care what Shearer thinks, Shearer is a fan, so by deduction Llambias doesn’t care what the fans think…

    Makes sense to me.

  63. Rat face Derek – does anyone care what he thinks? What doesn’t actually do at OUR club? Just read Oliver Holts excellent column in The Mirror, speaks a lot of sense – actually felt sorry for Pardew, feelings which passed quite quickly however.

  64. “It royally does my head in when we as fans think ‘because they come from the area’ they shudnt care about money! Why?? Because we wouldn’t?”

    Your right on so many counts BTT.

    I’m not sure what boils my piss more. Laurel and Hardy treating the fans like mushrooms (in the dark etc etc) or the so called fans who lap up the crap they’re spoonfed because the cant think for themselves ?

  65. As long as the loyal fans keep paying to see crap they will give you crap! Shola for example is absolute worst player in recent history and we did send out feelers to sell him,hmmm. Still here? Shocking. And now they are borrowing everyones injured rejects,my god play Nile ranger he has way more enthusiasm to play than shoal and send him to blyth where he belongs,as for ac ,he is a good talent but not that good,way over priced! What would you pay for van persie.the money from this will go to paying ashleys out of pocket expenses etc…if u look in any good Sunday league u can spot talent and bring them into ur team but when big money is waived they will leave,unfortunately money has ruined the gam me for the real fans like the geordie faithful ,imagine what size stadium we would need if we had 20 years like man u,here s a crazy idea…no one go to the next game if this is such a shock he will sell quick without revenues ,he will sell all the talent on this team and keep shola and the other loans. Ughhhh.

  67. Going by the info available and other sources etc, ashleys now spent approx 70 million on transfer fees and recouped approx 105 million.
    When you think that each home game revenue is inbetween 1-1.5 million and also taking into account merchandise and broadcasting money etc (we are still one of the most supported and marketable clubs around) its hard to believe that ashley has had to put money into the club. Fair enough we have to pay wages and sackings but still….
    Any losses are down to his shoddy management and lack of business sense.

  68. Support will not win trophy s what a shame we would be loaded with it,I’ve been waitIng 30 yrs for a trophy and I think I will be waiting another 30 we need new owners with money like Chelsea to buy a team,that’s the only way with how much It costs for players and carrol is a perfect case of local talent we could nt keep,thank god shearer was willing to give up silverware to play for the toon ,he cud a went to man u,that alone is class.

  69. Oh my god what will we do know! I know let’s bring in a washed up player to help get us to relegation,same old,same. Old. And this has nothing to do with carrol. It’s dejavou let’s get some youth in for rest of yr and move forward,speed kills we don’t have any anywhere, maybe another coach. I heard keegans available,no one wants this team,howay the lads! I wud not pay that f***ing defense.

  70. I can’t believe that the best we can get is lovenkrap! Best or worst amiobi thank god he s hurt I’m bewildered on the pathetic player selection ,maybe time for a new scout!