Pardew on Barton, Nolan and the captaincy – No one is irreplacable.
Posted on July 6th, 2011 | 45 Comments |
Welcome to the third part of this transcript of Alan Pardew’s long interview for ‘Total Sport’ on BBC Radio Newcastle.
I’ve been strting to wonder if it has all been worth transcribing all this stuff, but it is as it gives a very revealing picture of Newcastle United’s current manager, and as such is far more interesting than a succession of mostly made up ‘silly season’ stories about who Newcastle may be linked with, or what some imaginary ‘club insider’ is saying. Well, it is to me anyway.
So here we go again!
Total Sport: “You touched on Joey Barton. How confident are you that the whole issue can be resolved? I mean I know he’s almost said on record a couple of occaisions that he’ll stay at the football club and see out his final year, now that’s by no means certain. Is your feeling at this minute that Joey Barton will start the season for Newcastle United?”
“Alan Pardew: Well listen, the one thing to say about Joey is that he’s his own man, and Joey sometimes has an opinion that can change, you know, he has something set in his mind and then sometimes he can change on that; but I think that the most important thing for Joey is that he sees that the squad has real quality in it. He had a few times last season when he came and saw me and he was frustrated that we weren’t getting the results in terms of the performances that he was putting in, and I had to agree with some of that sentiment. He’s an outstanding player. I think his contract situation has been difficult, especially for me and him, as player and manager, and at times I think Joey will admit that he hasn’t helped the cause either. But, you know, a year is a long time in football and I’ll be speaking to Joey over the summer. I think me and him have got a good relationship and I think if I can keep him where he was last year for another year, at the end of the season, who’s to say we can’t agree another contract? My situation with Joey is to try to get the best out of him, and what Joey wants is success, that’s what he wants. So again, going back to the question earlier, Joey needs to see that success on the pitch and if we can give that to him, I think he could stay.”
Total Sport listener ‘Bob’: “Firstly Alan, I would like to hope that you’re the most successful manager we’ve ever had, but I temper that with a serious doubt about the club captaicy. I think you’ve got rid of a stalwart of the club in the last two seasons (the telephone connection strts to break up a little and few words are inaudible at this point) he organises behind the scenes from what I hear, he organises on the pitch, he can talk to referees, he winds opposition players up, he has a laugh with them, he’s got such skills in that club that hes just lost wiothout an obvious replacement currently, and I just wondered what you’re going to do about that?”
Alan Pardew: “I think that some of the thing you’ve just pointed out are correct ’cause Kevin was more than a captain really at times, and what he gave us, on and off the pitch, was all of that, but he has moved on, and my experience as a football manager is you’ll be surprised that when someone leaves the club someone replaces that, it always is the case. You can lose your funniest player, the guy who always makes someone laugh on the training ground, and someone else will evolve. It gives room for somebody to lead, and I think that will happen. I think the situation with Kev is that the contract extension that he wanted we couldn’t go to, and with that view he didn’t want to stay at the club. Therefore his leadership wouldn’t have counted for much this year if he didn’t want to be at the club, so you have to just temper that with what we got left, and I think that a leader will emerge. I’ve got a couple of ideas in my mind who I think that will be and over the next two or three weeks, obviously, you’ll see who that will be.”
Total Sport: “Were you disappointed with that decision Al?”
Alan Pardew: “Well, what can I say. Could I have had Kevin for the next two years? Yes I would have definitely had him for the next two years, but I couldn’t have Kevin here if he didn’t have a contract that he felt kept him happy, and that obviously wasn’t going to be the situation, and in some ways I had to support that because four, five years down the line is a bloody long time. I wish Kev all the best, he’s at my old club and I think he’ll do a great job there. But we all move on and as I say, within squads it gets replaced, it always gets replaced.”
Total Sport: “People talk about how other players, and you’ll probably back this up Marco (Gabbiadini) move on pretty quickly don’t they, and probabaly won’t have the dramatic effect some people have suggested it might.”
Marco Gabbiadini: “You move on in days. We’ve all been at clubs where managers change and coaches change. I’ve been at clubs where it happens two or three times in a season sometimes, you just have to get on with the cards that your dealt with. Footballers are pragmatic people and I think alot of the calls we get on this show I try and give the view that sometimes as players you block everything out. You can be quite selfish sometimes within a squad and quickly adapt to a situation, and Alan spoke earlier on about the relationships earlier on you try and build within squads and it does happen quite quickly. You do find others in the group who you naturally levitate to (I think he meant ‘gravitate’) and ‘float you boat’ and have a frienship with but you have a working relationship with that is part of what Alan looks for, any manager looks for at the start of pre-season.”
Total Sport: “I don’t know who you’ve got in mind for a Captain. I mean obviously it doesn’t take a genius to work out that people will think Steven Taylor, people will think Fabricio Colccini. I’m just wondering, because of the makeup of a squad and you’ve got so many new faces in there, and you’ve got alot of foreign faces in there, is the role of the Captain going to be fairly pivotal this close season? Or more pivotal than it might be if say, your Captain was Kevin Nolan and he had the squad around him that Newcastle have had for the last two years. I’m just wondering, there seem to be alot of new faces that will need honing, will need blending, will need moulding.”
Alan Pardew: “Well you’ve got to remember that some Captains, and I can think of a couple I’ve had, Nigel Reo Coker for example at West Ham who didn’t really offer anything off the pitch. All he did was drive the team on the pitch, but he did that well, and we’ll have a different Captain this year. I don’t expect the Captain to have that role, John Carver and Steve Stone remember are in my building and I expect them to do that job, to make sure that the guys are in good shape, that there’s a good feeling in the dressing room, and use their knowledge to make sure that the players bring that out in each other. At most clubs that’s how it works.”
Total Sport: “Are Captains less important now than they were in yesteryear or not?”
Alan Pardew: Well you’re not talking about Cricket here where they select the team and talk tactics. Kevin was an exceptional, and I mentioned this last year, probably when I came in here I remember talking about it, that he had tremendous leadership skills which will probably serve him very very well when he ends because he’ll end up as a coach or a manager. On the pitch of course, he had certain traits which we will miss next year. I think it’s Bob isn’t it who said the question that. you know, influencing referees and influencing players of the opposition, that part we probably won’t replace but we’ll replace it with something else. I’m absolutely assured that amongst us within that changing room that we’ll have enough.”
I guess this will just have to run into another part!
NUFCBlog Author: workyticket
workyticket has written 1096 articles on this blog.
I can now listen to Pardew online, but thanks to you Worky, I guess I don’t have too.
Ta,
:-)