St James' Park yesterday.Has St James Park started to become a ‘fortress’ since Alan Pardew took the managerial reigns, starting from his first match against Liverpool on the 11th of December 2010?
If we cast our minds back to the 2009 – 2010 Championship winning season under Chris Hughton, Newcastle managed to complete the season without loss at St James’ Park. In fact, Newcastle only suffered four defeats in the league that entire campaign. I remember Newcastle having a reasonably easy ride at home that season, largely due to the quality of squad we possessed in comparison to the rest of the league, though I do recall West Brom giving us a scare, in our 2-2 draw towards the latter stages of the season.
Newcastle’s first match at home in the Premier League the following season, consisted of a 6-0 thumping of Aston Villa. With United seemingly continuing their fantastic home form, you would have been forgiven for thinking Newcastle would ease past their next home opponents, Blackpool, and extend their unbeaten home run on Tyneside to an impressive 26 games in all competitions. (more…)
Right attitudeNewcastle United Assistant Manager John Carver talks about the squad’s attitude and how it has helped us get off to a good start this season.
Team harmony, attitude and understanding is worth points. I’m not sure how many points it’s worth but sometimes teams that are ‘together’ and have the right attitude can get points against teams that might be ‘better’ on paper.
Attitude was something Chris Hughton was big on when he was Newcastle manager and it seems that Alan Pardew is following suit. Few players have any complaints – or at least none that they voice – and most are enthusiastic about competing for places and have only good things to say about their team-mates and the club in general.
Assistant manager John Carver has been talking about the bonds formed within the squad and says:
“It helps that we’re winning, of course it does. When you lose, that is the first time your team spirit is really tested but there is a good atmosphere in the group.” (more…)
I couldn't help myself!I swore to myself I wouldn’t get involved and would stay away from this fight as Ashley has got the fans at each other throats with the current state of affairs at SJP but after reading a recent ‘blog by my colleague on here, and the fairly large response to it, I couldn’t hold my water any further!
I had decided i would reserve my judgement on the current regime and thought it would be fair to see where we are at after the window has closed and we are a few games into the season, hopefully with a new striker and some sensible investment in place, I had hoped we wouldn’t be having the Ashley argument again as we all just want NUFC to move forward with sensible investment. But after the appalling lack of squad strengthening and ambition from the current regime, the nonsense printed in the Chronicle’s Q&A and amazingly some fans actually backing Ashley as a master of business and Professor in the school of running a football club, I feel the need to point out a few things missing from this boiling pot. What immediate springs to my mind is:
What about the fans feeling more interested and enthused and therefore more inclined to forking out more money to support Newcastle United as well? (more…)
Shoule we cut Pardew some slack?So a few weeks ago i decided that I was going to try and be as positive as possible about Newcastle United and to try and look on the bright side of life with regards to the current manager.
Reading this blog daily, and like most Toon fans, not in the North East, I crave even more than usual my daily fix of NUFC news. What I am noticing is that Alan Pardew is not only disliked, but he is hated by the majority of fans and has some very unrealistic expectations on his shoulders given the current regime hes working under. Every comment Pardew seems to make is scrutinised and analysed by the fans who are coming to the conclusions that he ‘talks far to much’, hes ‘patronising’, that he is an ‘Ashley propaganda machine’ and have already written him off as one of the Southern shandy drinkers ruining the club!
I cant agree, and in my positive frame of mind, as far as I can see he has not done much wrong in his relatively short term here, he was not my first or even fifth choice, but he is here now and I have a theory on why the fans should try to not be so negative about him and maybe lower expectations this season as its the clubs hierarchy, not Pardew, that clearly have the lack of ambition to move NUFC to the next level. (more…)
Happy campers?From what I can recall, at the start of last season, Newcastle United were seemingly going about their pre-season in reasonably quiet fashion.
We had of course, just dispensed of the Championship at a canter, and were looking forward to a return to the Premier League. At the start of that particular summer, we had a statement from the Newcastle board, citing mainly that:
“The first team squad that won the Championship this year will form the basis of the team for next season in the Premier League.
“There is no plan for new capital outlay on players.”
Well, that particular line certainly had a few people up in arms at the time. In the end though, Newcastle did do some business recruitment wise, bringing in Dan Gosling, Hatem Ben Arfa, Sol Campbell, Cheick Tiote and the majestic James Perch.
More importantly last summer, I remember the current crop of players being reasonably happy with life at St James Park. There was no moaning or bitching about the ‘politics’ of the club. This could be due to the explosion of ‘Twitter’ this past year (certainly in Newcastle United’s case anyway), with a fair few of our squad now signed up to the social networking site. (more…)
