Newcastle's new-look midfield?I’ve had this thought for sometime but I’ve never written about it for one reason or another, but I think that now is a good time to change that, hence the article.
Anyway, over the summer we added to our ranks with no less than five players, and two of them were central midfield players. As a result, when they are all fit, we have enough central midfield players in our squad to sill two teams. Great for competition, right?
Well it will be good for competition this season, but what about next season, and the season after that? You see, I have a different train of thought regarding the state of our midfield, and it appears that it is a thought that is shared with quite a few ‘bloggers on here. To illustrate my point, I’m going to take you back, way back, to when we were a club that paid silly wages.
Now a lot of this is going to contain figures that are hearsay or speculation, but they will be the most commonly speculated about figures. Like when we signed Alan Smith on a wage that was reported to be around £60,000 a week for example, and Joey Barton on an amount that is supposed to be roughly the same. (more…)
Williamson vs Taylor - The battle is on!Steven Taylor came through 60-odd minutes of reserve-team acton yesterday as he stepped up his return to first-team football.
I said in an article yesterday that Taylor won’t find it easy to get back in the first-team and will have a fight on his hands for a first-team place for arguably the first time in his Newcastle career.
So in an article inspired by one of our poster’s, TonyGreenSupreme. I decided that perhaps now would be a good time to take a look at just what Steven Taylor is up against if he wants to break into the first-team. He was named on the bench for Sunday’s demolition derby, and he is expected to make the bench again for this weekend’s trip to The Emirates. After near enough ten-months out I would say that a start is out of the question at this early juncture, but at least it gives an option should anyone suffer an injury during the game.
You have to look at just who Taylor will replace, if he is to prove himself worthy of a place in the team in the forthcoming weeks of course. I think most of us are in agreement with regard to Fabricio Coloccini being the central defender who is least likely to get dropped. His form over the past eighteen months or so has been fantastic, and he looks to have carried over his good form from The Championship into the Premier League. (more…)
Cheeky Cheick is fitting right in.When Newcastle fans heard that the club had signed Cheick Tiote from FC Twente, a lot of fans were left wondering just what he would be like.
It’s fair to say that Cheick was a relative unknown quantity. He came to Newcastle after appearing in the World Cup for Ivory Coast and having been a lynchpin in an FC Twente side that won the Dutch Eredivisie under the guidance of the ‘wally with the brolly’, or Steve McClaren if you want his real name.
McClaren got an awful lot of things wrong with the England team whilst he was managing them, so when he turned around and told us Newcastle fans that we would love Tiote as a player at Newcastle you could be forgiven for remaining a little sceptical. It turns out that the former Middlesbrough manager was absolutely spot on with assesment and Tiote has gone on to establish himself as somewhat of a crowd favourite amongst the Toon Army. (more…)
Emirates next for Newcastle.Actually, I would prefer Newcastle to be walking away from the next five games with fifteen points in the bag, but being realistic it just isn’t going to happen.
So how do you think we will do?
Next up for United is a trip to The Emirates on Sunday, and whilst I harbour some slim hopes of us being able to take something from the game, there is a very real prospect that we could end up losing, like most teams do when they visit Arsenal.
I’ve got the match down as a loss on my little season planner of where I think we can pick up points from, but as many of you know, my predictions, so it seems, are not the best.
Following on from Arsenal we have two games at home. First up is Blackburn next Wednesday evening, a team who appear hold a voodoo card over us and always seem to be able to get results against us. (more…)
Taylor back in business?Steven Taylor stepped up his comeback from a shoulder injury today as he managed to play an hour for the reserves at Wigan Athletic this afternoon.
Taylor has had an injury-plagued last ten months on Tyneside but will be hoping that his troubles are now behind him and that he can now concentrate on playing the game.
Of course, it’s not a given that he will walk straight back into the first-team anyway and he will face a fight for his position for arguably the first time in his Newcastle career. Fabricio Coloccini and Mike Williamson will not want to give up their places in the team, and at the moment I honestly don’t think they deserve to be dropped. Likewise with Danny Simpson, who has been excellent since he came back into the first-team at West Ham a couple of weeks back.
Realistically though, a first-team return for Taylor is still a couple of weeks away in my opinion. The lad effectively has to play another pre-season again before he can even be considered, much like Danny Simpson had to do before he was drafted back into the team. (more…)
