Derek Llambias: The PR offensive continues.As Mike Ashley’s current PR offensive continues apace, Newcastle United’s managing director, Derek Llambias, claimed that the club have had some “nibbles” from “tyre kickers” expressing interest in the club’s stadium naming rights offer.
In the latest chapter of the offensive, planned on the back of an announcement of reduced losses in the club’s annual accounts after the sale of Andy Carroll, he claimed to “sympathise” with fans concerned over the stadium’s latest name change. I’m flattered to say that he also took a swipe at my own hypothesis as outlined in several previous stories on this blog. My hypothesis being that the sponsorship offer, including the highly questionable “showcase” idea, has broken so many rules of the golden rules of sponsorship, and is so overpriced in comparison to similar sponsorship deals (with one rather dubious exception in the North West), that it seems to be a ruse, something which has been planned to fail from the start, as it has for well over two years so far to Sports Direct’s benefit. (more…)
Positives? I think not.Newcastle United reserves lost 4-3 to Sunderland earlier in the week but some comments by Peter Beardsley got me thinking about team attitudes and how they might affect results.
Yesterday I was visited by a bunch of Bible-bashers called Seventh Day Adventists and their big beef with things – amongst all the problems the world faces – is that they think the Sabbath should be on a Saturday. I argued the advantages of making it a Wednesday to break the week up, but they soon realised I wasn’t being altogether serious and left before I had to release the caged tiger I keep for just such callers.
This reminded me of a Christian I used to know and one thing that really annoyed me about him was his eternal optimism. Our job at the time was to write software for satellites and even when two years of software work – and many more years than that of hardware work – exploded on the launching pad, he simply said “never mind, I’m sure it will all turn out okay”. He came to work happy, was happy throughout the day and went home extremely happy. And this made me very grumpy indeed.
Which brings me, in a round about way, to our reserve team’s 4-3 defeat against Sunderland earlier in the week about which Pedro said:
“There were plusses from the performance – there always is.”
Pardew: tall, nice Solvenian guyNewcastle United’s youth squad has much promise, although recent events might indicate that Nile Ranger isn’t destined to be part of it.
If the stories in the press are true, it seems that Nile Ranger is once again in hot water and this time it’s a bit more serious than an ill-informed pose with an allegedly replica handgun.
Ranger has been arrested on suspicion of assault after a 33 year-old victim was found with a broken jaw in the Groat Market in Newcastle. Ranger is currently “helping police with their enquiries”, which is police talk for “being interrogated to see if he’ll ‘fess up” and if he’s charged and subsequently found guilty he could face prison.
There were rumours that Ranger had been transfer-listed earlier in this transfer window and I get the impression that both the manager and the boardroom hierarchy were running out of patience with his indiscipline and allegedly casual approach to training anyway, but this latest escapade could, I believe, see the end of his prospects as a professional footballer.
He’s not the first Newcastle player to get into trouble of course. Notably both Joey Barton and Andy Carroll have had their off-pitch controversy, but their on-pitch contributions seem to have persuaded various managers back them through their troubles, although I suspect that Alan Pardew will be reluctant to provide too much backing for Ranger. (more…)
Destination Northampton?Ben Tozer and Newcastle United agree terms to cancel the player’s contract and allow him to leave on a free transfer.
Apparently Ben Tozer is quitting Newcastle in favour of Northampton. Or at least that’s what Sky Sports are suggesting.
The 21 year old defender started out as a youth player at Plymouth Argyle, which is his home town, and then he transferred to Swindon Town in 2007.
Newcastle signed him from Swindon in 2008 on a four and a half year deal after he was touted as one of the most promising young defenders in the country.
Alas he only played one cup game and three minutes of a league game for us and was loaned out to Northampton for most of last season where he made 31 appearances and scored 3 goals.
Given his struggle to get into the Newcastle first team, he would allegedly prefer to transfer to a club where he’ll get regular football and League 2’s Northampton are in the frame as the most likely club to take him. (more…)
Needs to prove himselfNewcastle United manager Alan Pardew has high praise for Haris Vuckic despite only having seem him play once.
You can tell it’s building up to silly season. The press already has Enrique at Liverpool, Barton at Birmingham, Tiote at Spurs and the entire team wearing the goalkeeper’s strip at away games.
I expect the summer will also consist of rumours about Ashley selling the club, Pardew being sacked, Keegan making a comeback and Llambias opening an owl sanctuary. It’s about par for the course.
Us bloggers really ought to sue the press for infringing on our jobs. Blogs are supposed to post rumour, speculation and gossip whereas the press are supposed to stick to reliable, confirmed news.
Thankfully The Sunday Sport made a return last weekend, so we might finally get some proper news. I was all for WWII bombers being found on the moon and everyone knows Elvis is alive and well and living in Grimsby.
Still, I digress. I expect the question most bothering you this morning is: what happened to Haris Vuckic? No? Well please yourselves, I’m going to talk about him anyway. (more…)
