Who is right? Patronising Pardew or revolting fans?As many of you will be aware, a motley collection of fan groups angered by Mike Ashley’s mismanagement, repeated dishonesty, a perceived lack of ambition and Newcastle United’s general underperformance on the pitch will be on the march before Saturday’s early kick-off against Liverpool.
On the other side, Alan Pardew in his recent interview with Sky Sports’ “Goals on Sunday” painted a picture of Newcastle United fans as small town, simple minded football obsessives who actually damage the club with overreactions like this, as well as being too financially unsophisticated to understand that Mike Ashley has put over £200 million into the club.
But who is right?
Pardew has suggested that we’re “not in a bad position” but that the fans have unrealistic expectations that the club should be competing with the likes of Manchester City and Manchester United: (more…)
The fans are revolting, but Will they be effective this time?Newcastle United fans are revolting!
However, writing as someone who used to be an protester and fundraiser myself in the past, not over Newcastle United but over causes such as civil liberties, racism and the like, from what I have read and seen of Newcastle United fans’ planned protests so far, the chances of success don’t seem to be that great at all. This isn’t because the protestors don’t have a case, more that the protagonists don’t seem to be protesters, quite simply, they don’t know how to do it properly. They’re more like brickies and plumbers who are blundering around in a field they don’t understand, a bit like Mike Ashley trying to run a large Premier League football club really!
Please don’t misunderstand, this is not to be unecessarily disparaging at all, it’s just an appeal to realism, a plea for the protestors to consult with people who know what they are doing this time before they go blundering in once again with their size 10s and misspelled bedsheets. In a David and Goliath struggle, you don’t just need all the help you can get, you need the right help to avoid falling at the first few hurdles. (more…)
Labour giving the NUST a helping hand?We haven’t been hearing much about the Newcastle United Supporters Trust (NUST) recently, maybe because at this moment in time they don’t have an angle to attack the current ownership of Newcastle United from.
With things going well on the pitch and remaining quiet off it, any negative comments could possibly backfire on them as they would then be viewed as the ones who are unsettling things. Despite that though, it appears that their desire to have at least a fan representation at board room level could move a step closer under new proposals by the Labour party. The proposed Labour manifesto would force clubs into handing 25% of the shares over to the fans based on the German model, although the current German model requires 51% of any club to be fan owned. This comes amidst a financial deck of cards that faces the very real risk of falling over as clubs run up unsustainable debts under the cover of a lack of regulation within the Premier League. (more…)
SIPP Broker Ltd's Lynn Steele (right).The acronym “SIPP” (Self Invested Personal Pension) has recently become a familiar one to all those who have supported the NUST in their bid to drive owner, Mike Ashley, from St James’s Park. It is one of the primary financial vehicles used to persuade people to invest savings and pensions in the NUST’s Barack Obama inspired “Yes We Can” campaign.
In this story I will be looking at the financial brain behind the NUST, Lynn Steele, and her company, “The SIPP Broker Ltd”, in Halifax. Formed less than two years ago, the SIPP Broker Ltd’s rise has been not far short of meteoric, and it’s business development team includes figures such as ex Chelsea player, David Speedie, and ex ‘Spurs player, Graham Roberts, who were brought in to exploit oppotunities from the highly lucrative world of football.
It was Speedie who caused a huge furore in 2004 after referring to black people as “blackies” and “ni**ers” at a charity function, after agreeing with Ron Atkinson’s comments about black player, Marcel Desailly, who was described as a “lazy thick ni**er” by the veteran manager and pundit. It was Roberts who, in his capacity as a business development advisor for the pension selling firm, also fronted the “Fans 401” bid for Newcastle United some time ago.
On that bid, Lynn Steele said in an interview with the Halifax Courier:
I suppose it depends on whether you asked one mind…
Peter Williams, a Blog Liaison for the trust, kindly offered to answer some questions that many Newcastle United fans were asking and some of you lot on the blog wanted answers to. Having gathered a number of questions via the blog, I passed these on to Peter.
However, I must confess that Peter provided the answers in 2009. The tardiness of the response is entirely my doing, and owes probably to some intoxication on the day I read it and filed it away, then promptly forgot about it. As a result, some of the information is now outdated, but I’d like to point out that shouldn’t be taken as any indication of my views of NUST or the people who asked the question. So I say again, sorry for being p*ssed at Christmas.
Anyway, rather than me prattling on, here’s the response in it’s entirety – (more…)
I suppose it depends on whether you asked one mind…