The end of the season is finally upon us. A season in which defied all expectations. A season where even the most optimistic of Toon fans would have struggled to predict what would be.
Newcastle United gate-crashed the top six, and also knocked on the door of the Premier League’s top four. As it turned out at 5pm on Sunday the 13th of May 2012, Newcastle United were confirmed as finishing in 5th place, above Chelsea, above Liverpool, and above the majority of peoples expectations.
The Europa League awaits the Magpies next season, a new chapter or perhaps a new beginning is on the horizon. But before we look forward into what might be, I’m now going to relive the season that was. Cast my mind back and tell the tale of Newcastle United’s 2011 / 2012 season. I hope you are all sitting comfortably… (more…)
Attack, attack, attack!Following on from my piece on the contributions of our defenders and utilty players this season, let’s carry on with our assessment of Newcastle’s players with a view to deciding who is our Player of the season. I’ll be moving on the engine room now, and later the forwards. There are undoubtedly a few worthy recipients here!
Who's best?Looking back over Newcastle United’s last two seasons since we were promoted from the Championship, one thing it’s hard to argue with is that most of the club’s major signings have been a success.
Much of the credit for this has gone to the club’s current chief scout, Graham Carr, who was brought into the club in February 2010 by previous manager and Carr’s former Tottenham colleague, Chris Hughton. Of the players included below, Carr was involved in all but three of them (James Perch, Demba Ba and Gabriel Obertan).
I have listed eight of the signings made since the club was promoted below. Of course, there have been more but I have left out more peripheral members of the squad such as temporary loanees like Stephen Ireland and Sheffki Kuqi, bairns for the future such as Mehdi Abeid, those who haven’t been able to make much of an impact one way or the other through injury such as Sylvain Marveaux and so on. All of the players listed below have made at least ten first team competitive appearences; here’s a brief résumé of their Toon histories so far. (more…)
Thumbs-up to fans, says PardewAlan Pardew praises Newcastle United fans for their support this season and reckons the fans have been worth an extra place or two for the team.
So, just the one game to go then. And then what are we going to have in terms of football until next season? Well I suppose there’ll be the Euro’s to keep to keep us amused, although I’m finding it hard to raise any enthusiasm for England at the moment. One thing we will have though is a fair few extra fixtures next season thanks to European qualification and, assuming we don’t manage a miracle next weekend, that’s looking like it’ll be the Europa League.
If we finish 5th, we’d start in the Play-Offs, which take place on the 23rd and 30th of August but if we get bumped down to the 3rd qualifier – maybe due to Chelsea winning the Champions League or us only managing to finish 6th – then we’d have two ties ahead of that on the 2nd and 9th of August.
There will of course be plenty of rumours about players leaving and joining during the summer and it will be interesting to see how our squad looks at the end of the summer transfer window, which opens in July. We’ve already had press reports about teams who might ‘swoop’ for our players and on the weekend the press was suggesting Arsenal would be in for taking both Yohan Cabaye and Demba Ba. As is often the case with such reports, no evidence by way of direct quotes from any official at the club has been offered, so it’s probably all tosh. (more…)
A view from the bridge.Walking into Stamford Bridge on Wednesday evening, chatting to Chelsea fans, it was plain to see that they seemed to think Newcastle were only there to make up the numbers.
But I had a good feeling about the game as we went through the various security checks and finally into the Shed (lower level gate 1). We found our seats then turned our attention to drinks. But this isn’t Ashburton Grove (Goonersville) and it was disappointing to say the least that nothing alcoholic was allowed or even for sale. Weird!
Anyhoo,
The guy with the mic walked onto the pitch to start the crowd ‘wind up’.
It was good to see that Alan Pardew put a good attacking team out. Danny Simpson didn’t make the team through injury but I wasn’t worried by the inclusion of James Perch at right back, as he’s shown us how he’s come on this season recently and was once again a stand out performer. (more…)
