Nolan and Harper to miss the rest of the season.

Posted on May 12th, 2011 | 35 Comments |

Kevin Nolan.
Ankle injury requires surgery.
At the holy ground of St. James Park it’s always been a case of “it never rains but it pours”, which is of course the shortened version. The full idiom is “it never rains but it pours toxic waste with the occasional sharp object thrown in to further increase damage.” Not even joking.

Our long standing goalkeeper Steve Harper has already decided to stay on the bench in favour of giving young Tim Krul a chance to impress between the sticks and so far the young Dutchman has done exactly that, and long may it continue! Newcastle United may lack depth in other areas, we have a wealth of gold in our goalkeepers and have done for many years but now it seems it’s time for that young gold to start shining as Ole Soderberg will be on the bench for the important game against Chelsea this coming Sunday.

Harps is blessed with what I like to call “buggered knees” (which is a very apt medical term) and the powers that be have smiled upon our wonderful club, and have decided he needs to undergo surgery to correct whatever is causing him those problems.

In the case of the Easington born shot stopper, I think that’s for the best. We have Tim Krul who is more than capable of filling Steve’s shoes and Soderberg can pick up some important experience on the bench. He may even get a small run out in the game against West Brom if he impresses in training.

Once again, the good news does not end there!

Toon skipper Kevin “The Hat-Trick Chicken” Nolan has also ruled himself out of contention for the final two games to also undergo surgery on his ankle, which has troubled him throughout the season and saw him miss a match or two. The question remains – who is going to come in for him? A straight swap is largely out of the question, so perhaps Joey Barton will take up his position in the centre of the park with Ryan Taylor moving in on the right of midfield.

Both Steve Harper and Kevin Nolan are missing the last two games in hopes of being fit for pre-season and to hopefully avoid the situation Danny Simpson found himself in earlier this season, where he missed the opening games due to an ankle injury.

We have, once again, been plagued by injuries this season and the past couple of weeks have been particularly cruel to us as we have lost Mike Williamson, Ben Arfa, Steve Harper and now Kevin Nolan. One thing is for sure – we need to find out what is happening at Newcastle United that is causing all of these injuries, and no, I refuse to believe it’s the training ground although I’m sure it plays a part.

I have trained and played on a pitch that was as smooth as a 13 year old’s acne and picked up injury after injury including one that resulted in a muscle tear – but dammit, I still scored!

That was in Tyneside Amateur Division 2 with a pitch the council gave us and we trained on the public fields behind that. To get to the Premier League, you have to go a whole 15 tiers up and I simply can’t believe that a Premier League club has such inadequate training facilities.

The under soil heating may very well help and we can only hope it’s the magic fix for our injury woes. It’s time to pray to whoever you revere as a God.

Sir Bobby, we’re calling on you.

NUFCBlog Author: Thump Some say his bones are black and white but that is yet to be medically proven. Currently writes for a few different publications and likes to assert his imaginary authority on nobody in particular. Beware: eats children. Thump has written 36 articles on this blog.

Related Posts:

Posted on by Thump in category: Bobby Robson and Injuries and fitness and Kevin Nolan and St James's Park and Steve Harper and Thump , with tags: , , , , , , , ,
Comment on this post

35 Responses

  1. There’s no better time for them to have surgery imo.
    They have both managed their injuries throughout the season until we have achieved mathamatical safety. Job done.
    Now to get treated and fit again for pre season.
    Its also a good time for a few of the younguns to man up and push the boss for a starting or bench place. Why not, these aren’t quite such important games especially if manure win on sat.

  2. Completely agree with Beardsley’s Boots. We’ve accomplished the most important goal for the season by avoiding relegation.

    No need to panic about the next few matches in my opinion; the only real goal should be targeting success next season and letting some of the younger members of the squad get some first-team experience without the pressure of it all coming down to the wire.

  3. Newcastle may lack depth in other areas,we have a wealth of gold in goalkeepers and have done for years.
    Well theres a smidgin of truth in that, we had Given for years, but to consider our present lot as gold is a bit over the top.
    We got Harper who sat on the bench for years, a shakey young dutchman who doesnt show much improvement and a couple of youngsters who are not PL quality
    C`mon that the best you can come up with, we should put in a bid to get Shay back or try for Green if the Hammers go down.
    Fact is our goalies are poor to average !

  4. given, green?
    Haddaway & shite man.
    given is not as good as he thinks he is & is a bench sitter now, he made his bed.
    & please don’t get me started on green, haven’t you seen him-‘play’?

    Eeeesh!

    :)

  5. We have been once again been plagued by injuries.
    Hey! every side has injuries, part of the game.
    It`s more noticable here because of our short bench, what we have to do this summer is get some bodies in, some quality.
    Not many teams field the same eleven week after week, to days sides have to platoon players, horses for courses, if we are to be competitive we have to do the same, but will someone please explain this to our two football geniuses.
    Eleven guys cant be expected to carry the side for the entire season.

  7. Would take a forty plus year old Brad. Friedel over any of our present keepers, gold indeed !

  8. I agree – the games are less important now than at any time this season. We have Krul and Sodabread, we can rejig our team (Ranger to start? Raylor on the wing / Joey inside? Is Haris Vukcic back?)
    Two questions. Do we play Tiote or consider him “injured”? Also, any more mews on Leon Best?

  9. chuck,
    i’m allowed mate.
    :)
    Friedel, now ya’ talking chuck, he’s a proper ‘keeper.

    Nowt much wrang wi’ Harper like.
    I know some seem to not like him, knuck fows why, but he’s a top ‘keeper & has a few years left in him, as Friedel has proven.
    Krul still has stuff to learn, but that’s what you want/need at this point from a back up.
    Isn’t it?

  13. Magie6969 – I would consider Tiote as suspended, not injured. Either way surely it makes sense not to play him.
    Basically means he has missed 7 games thru getting too many yellow cards ffs :evil:
    I kna he has picked up some cheap bookings and 5 or 6 poor ref decisions, but I hope he improves on this next year.

  14. Soh ! Whats up with Enrique, does he have a done deal that he does`nt want to talk about or is he still comparing/awaiting offers ?
    If he does`nt make his mind up we should keep him until the winter window, less money perhaps but then maybe not.
    Hear good things about Izaguirre @ Celtic, what the hell use the Enrique money to replace him with Izaguirre, Cetic could use the money.

  15. would prefer it if he just stays and signs a new improved contract tho.

    Howay man Jose, just do the right thing like.

  16. What’s up with Enrique is that the press have bored us all to death about it for a few weeks/months, to the point of it feeling like years.
    It’s what they do best.

    Boycott the press, just make up your own stories & give yerself a quid.

    :)

  17. “in favour of giving young Tim Krul a chance to impress between the sticks and so far the young Dutchman has done exactly that”

    Thump, I think that he still makes a few mistakes too many, and has some way to go.

    “we need to find out what is happening at Newcastle United that is causing all of these injuries”

    Although some are unavoidable and can happen to any team, some have been caused by Alan Pardew through rushing players back from injury too soon, and also pushing the squad too hard in training.

  18. “…pushing the squad too hard in training”

    FFS! thats a load of tosh mate.
    IMHO they dont get pushed hard enuff by half. Part the reason why we have little or no pace in the team.

    No feck it lets blame ashley for that.

  19. I dont suppose it has anything to do with having a small squad and having to play the same few players in too many games whether carrying what`s been described as niggling injuries.
    Case in point why now for Nolans operation ?
    Has he been playing hurt ?
    And if thats the case, how many others ?
    I tend to agree with Workey, that there`s reason to believe both Gosling and Ireland may have been coerced into playing, before they were 100%.
    I recall headlines proclaiming something to the effect that it`s Irelands last chance to prove himself in the late stages of the season, for god`s sake we all know the guy can play, why does he have to come back before he`s ready.
    Was there pressure on Pardew from above to play him or was it in fact his idea ?
    Guess we will never know unless one of the squad drops a dime.

  20. Wasn’t Nolan missing games before January? I’d imagine quite some time. As for Ireland, if he was that bad, he simply should not have been brought in and then, as you said, being told it was his last chance.

    I do agree that it’s better now than 3 months ago but the fact these problems are occurring is what’s getting on my gripe. Don’t players have to pass fitness tests before they play?

    Also completely agree with BB up there. These lads train a few hours a day and injure themselves in training. It might very well be a case of them simply not being up to it – push them harder, make it last. We’re in the run up to pre-season now, we need to make sure every player has a regime that they should stick to over the break so they can come back with that extra 10%.

    Edit: Think you’ll find I’m not Hugh, Worky ;)

  21. Slow day in regard to news or are we all footballed out?
    Nineteen of thirty seven articles in news now are about Nolans injury, Zzzzzzzzzz !

  22. Thump says:
    May 12, 2011 at 6:45 pm (Edit)

    Edit: Think you’ll find I’m not Hugh, Worky ;)

    ===

    I can confirm this. I think I’d know if Thump was me.

  24. Thump says:
    May 12, 2011 at 6:45 pm

    “As for Ireland, if he was that bad, he simply should not have been brought in and then, as you said, being told it was his last chance.”

    Thump, Pardew said that Ireland had already proven that he was a very good player, but that he still had to prove that he was a very good player in a black and white shirt.

    Pardew’s quote:

    “I don’t think there is pressure on him as a player, he has already proven he is a very good player at Manchester City,”

    “The question with Stephen is whether he can do it in a black-and-white shirt. We’ve got this period between now and the end of the season where he has to show he can.

    “If we don’t see it in the next six games, it’s highly unlikely we are going to bring him here permanently.”

  25. To say he (ireland) was a good player @ Citeh but has to prove he can do it in a black and white shirt, is oxymoronic, the type of nonsense that we can expect from this genius in the future, AAaaarrrgghhhh !

  26. Unless we get Ireland off Villa for next to nowt and pay him on a per-game basis I wouldn’t risk it. He has all the look of a player who’ll spend a lot of time in the treatment room.

    That might be unfair and he may just have had an unlucky spell of injuries while here, but I wouldn’t risk it given our seeming proclivity to injuries anyway.

  27. With regards injuries i think chuck@19 hits the nail on the head , we have a far too small squad , we have then the choice of playing kids or pushing the senior players to the very limit . Pardew pushed the seniors knowing throwing kids into battle was asking for a relegation dogfight . The fact that we had no under soil heating at the training grounds certainly does not help , meaning training on hard frozen surfaces or training indoors on hard surfaces is punishing the body even more . With the under soil heating now being laid and a few more faces in the squad next season injuries will hopefully be down to a normal level . i just hope that the players have not been pushed so hard that some will have long lasting problems .

  28. Hugh
    Pure speculation, with no real foundation!

    Axel
    Pure genius !

    Amstel time, later !

  30. Chuck, I’m afraid I would argue that there is foundation given that he was on the injury list for all bar 2 substitute appearances while he was on loan to us.

    I did qualify it by saying he might just have been unlucky.

    Nevertheless, AP has to be in the driving seat on that one now and if Villa want shot of him we offer low and if Ireland wants to come to us we put safeguards in his contract about injury, like SAF did with Owen.

  31. Hugh de Payen says:
    May 12, 2011 at 8:22 pm

    “if Ireland wants to come to us we put safeguards in his contract about injury, like SAF did with Owen.”

    Hugh, Didn’t we do that with Ireland’s loan deal? I seem to recall reading somewhere that the club didn’t have to pay his wages while he was knacked, but the story may have been wrong.

  32. We may have done and I’d continue with that if we do decide to take him on in the longer-term, at least until he proves he can maintain fitness.

  33. one thing with Ireland , if joey and captain kev sign new deals do we really need him ? Pardew has already stated he wants to play with hba behind the forwards next season and with Barton , Nolan , Tiote , Guthrie and Smith on the books i think another cm is not what we need even if we can shift Smith out .

  34. He was on a pay to play contract, worky. If he wasn’t playing, Villa kept on paying his wages.

    Ireland is an interesting character, though. Since he joined Villa he’s been enjoying life in the Viduka room. That said, I think he’s a person who primarily works on mental attributes, when he’s good, he plays amazing. When he’s a bit dodgy, he’s injured.

    That said, I liked the look of him in his short run outs. Sign him up on a 12 month contract and see how well he fairs. If his injuries are persistent, the door is open for him.