How will that £35m be spent?The transfer market is a strange and sometimes scary place, with confusion abound by exactly how much money we apparently have, others have the knowledge only provided by Football Manager and FIFA and you’d be surprised how correct that actually is. The long and short is, we have never had £35m to spend – never.
There’s a lot of confusion around exactly what we have to spend since the sale of local lad and full time thug Andy Carroll to Liverpool for £35m with £30 of that being handed over in cold, hard cash – just how we like it. Alan Pardew himself stated that the money was to be reinvested in the squad and even went as far as to say that he wanted it solely for players but unfortunately, that isn’t how it works.
At the start of the season, the manager and the chairman sits down and discusses season targets, contracts, incoming players, outgoing players and everything else you’d come to associate with a professional football club. (more…)
Brace yourselvesMike Ashley’s ‘5 year plan’ is to create a self sufficient business model, this is the aim for his Newcastle United project. Now, this should be the aim for any business, and especially where football clubs are concerned with the financial rules set to take effect, and the current state of the economic climate. This of course will take time to achieve and will not happen overnight, but will it work at all with Ashley at the helm, and is long term success on the pitch part of his true intentions?
This ‘5 year plan’, which I assume has been extended every year since he took charge after some abject failings (like relegation in 2009), has some positive factors incorporated. I like the idea of young, home grown players running out at St James Park and the focus on youth and development should be welcomed by many of us.
If you refer to Ashley’s statement back in 2008 it declares:
“My investment in the club has extended to time, effort and yet again, money being poured into the Academy. I want Newcastle to be able to create its own legends of the future to rival those of the past. This is a long term plan. A long term plan for the future of the club so that it can flourish”.
I think we all want to see that don’t we?
Ashley has also created an extensive scouting network, spearheaded by Graham Carr and his band of merry men, instructed to scour France and the rest of the continent, in search of diamonds in the rough, unheard of players, those who’s career is in front of them and not behind them. In the same 2008 statement Ashley stated: (more…)
No bids, but is he up for sale anyway?Much confusion abounds at Newcastle United about the futures of Joey Barton, Jonas Gutierrez and Fabricio Coloccini, but it seems that a lot of the confusion has come about from one quote and an awful lot of hearsay.
Micky Quinn sparked up a bit of a storm recently by saying that he knew through a third party that Arsenal have enquired about Joey Barton. To be fair he didn’t say what they’d enquired about and maybe Arsene just wants Joey to feed his fish while he’s on holiday, although it’s reasonable to assume Quinn was talking about Arsenal enquiring about Joey’s availability for transfer.
This caused much discussion – particularly on Gunners’ fan boards – about whether or not Barton’s Arsenal material, how much he would cost and suchlike and so forth.
On top of that we had the Journal claiming that Jonas Gutierrez was next for the chop and then – somehow – Coloccini was added in as a potential leaver for good measure.
Yet with all three of these players there’s very little in the way of evidence to suggest that they’re either for sale or have attracted interest from other clubs, and at the end of last week a flurry of reports appeared suggesting that Newcastle have received no enquiries about Barton, Coloccini and Gutierrez. (more…)
Matuidi and Erdinç - realistic targets?Newcastle United allegedly maintain a strong interest in Saint-Etienne’s Blaise Matuidi and Paris Saint-Germain’s Mevlüt Erdinç.
According to ‘France Football’ (as well as our very own Chronicle) the French revolution is far from over at Newcastle.
Apparently we are still pursuing a legendary ‘double swoop’ for Blaise Matuidi and Mevlüt Erdinç. I have reported our supposed interest in both these players a few times on this ‘blog and the rumours seem to be gaining momentum rather than going away.
Matuidi won’t come cheap though. Saint-Etienne President Roland Romeyer has previously said:
“We will not discuss anything below €15m for Blaise Matuidi.”
That’s £13.4m that Ashley will have to fork out if he wants to bag the 24 year-old.
As a defensive midfielder, presumably the plan would be to play him alongside Tiote, maybe in a standard 4-4-2 or possibly in a 4-2-3-1 formation. (more…)
Ash-bashing QuinnFormer Newcastle United striker Micky Quinn attacks Ashley for (potentially) letting Barton go and suggests that our transfer policy consists mainly of trying to buy cheap foreign players we can profit from in the future.
Former Toon striker Micky Quinn has launched a scathing attack on the head honchos at Newcastle United and in the process has confirmed that Arsenal have a legitimate interest in Joey Barton, which I originally doubted.
In an interview with talkSPORT, Quinn said:
“I know through a third party that Arsenal have enquired about Joey Barton. What I’m gutted about as an ex-Newcastle player is that the spine of the team, the personality of the team is going to be gone.
“Why are they letting players like Joey Barton go if they have any ambition, but it’s only going to Arsenal’s gain. He’ll put a bit of steel into that Arsenal team, he goes forward, he was made captain, he’s grown up and he said himself that he’s making up for lost time for stupidity and injury, he wants to get to the top.
“I think Joey has settled down a lot now, we know he’s a bit of a hot-head, we know he’s paid on and off the pitch for his stupidity but he’s settled down.(more…)
