Damning emails?It’s the News of the World, so don’t take it too seriously, but they claim that Keegan has a bunch of emails that will prove Mike Ashley made his position untenable and he was therefore constructively dismissed.
‘Sources close to Keegan’ (hmm) claim that the emails will blow Ashley’s case out of the water. One such source said:
“There are emails people have never seen. If the truth comes out about what went on, then Ashley and Wise will be decimated. The last thing Kevin wanted to do was walk out but his position was impossible.”
The article then goes on to claim that all parties in the tribunal have signed a declaration stating that they will not leak information, although that doesn’t seem to have prevented the leaked information that somehow seems to have found its way to the News of the World. (more…)
Get out of this toonAccording to a statement the club made to The Journal, Ashley’s £100m asking price has been met and ‘all parties are at the sale and purchase stage‘, which sounds a bit different to any parties I’ve been to.
The Journal then goes on to speculate that it could still be some time before the takeover situation is resolved and they quote ‘sources’ who say the club has just renegotiated a £25m overdraft with Barclays, reduced from last seasons £39m facility.
The Journal further speculates that Barry Moat is behind the £100m offer but that Barclays are not prepared to offer him the same £25m overdraft facility they’ll offer to Ashley.
‘Sources’ have apparently also confirmed that 2 overseas parties are also still interested in the club and have progressed beyond the due diligence phase, although they haven’t yet made formal offers.
So what can we make of this? I suspect our decent start to the season has encouraged Ashley to think about the possibilities of promotion. If he hangs onto the club and we do get promoted, he’ll probably be able to at least double his asking price. Although he’ll be taking a risk in doing that – we might not get promoted and the club may then be worth less than it is now and his potential buyers might have disappeared. (more…)
Newcastle v PlymouthBottom of the table Plymouth make the pilgrimage to St James’s Park today as the Toon hope to get back on track after the midweek defeat at Blackpool.
Plymouth have a paltry 2 points from their opening 7 games, picked up via an away draw at Crystal Palace and a home draw against QPR in the first 2 games of the season. Since then they’ve lost to Cardiff, Derby, Sheffield Wednesday, West Brom and Watford, scoring just 6 goals along the way. Alan Gow – a £200,000 signing from Rangers in the summer – is Plymouth’s top scorer with 2 goals and they also have Bradley Wright-Phillips on the books.
Alan Smith returns from suspension for us which means we only have Ameobi and Jonas unavailable for selection. I’d expect Smith to come straight back into the team, most logically at the expense of Butt although I’m not entirely convinced Hughton will drop Butt. We shall see. (more…)
Hughton 'bitterly disappointed'I’ve only got the match reports to go on but the general impression I get is that we were both out-thought and out-fought by Blackpool last night, which has got to be something of a reality check in terms of our Championship aspirations.
Chris Hughton had this to say about the game:
“I am bitterly disappointed, Blackpool were better than us in every department, especially in the first half.
“We need to regroup quickly as we have another big game at the weekend.
“We came into the game a lot more strongly after the break but over 90 minutes we were not the better side.”
Blackpool manager Ian Holloway commented as follows:
“I am absolutely delighted, we set off and started to run at Newcastle and passed the ball around them.
“I don’t think they realised what was hitting them. We had to draw on a lot of experience, particularly up front with Jason Euell and Brett Ormerod.
“We have got to keep this going now and prove that it’s not some sort of one-off.” (more…)
Pre-match tableNewcastle can regain the top spot with a point at Blackpool, although we should be expecting 3 points from our visit to Bloomfield Road if we want to match West Brom and Middlesbrough who both won last night.
Blackpool are lingering in the middle of the table having taken 7 points from 6 games. They’ve only lost one match though and that was away to Leicester last weekend.
Before that, their season started with 4 draws: away to QPR, home to Cardiff, home to Derby and away to Watford. Their solitary Championship win came after that when they beat Coventry 3-0.
Blackpool have had a decent Carling Cup run too, dispatching Crewe and – most impressively – Premier League Wigan.
Blackpool strikers Ben Burgess and Gary Taylor-Fletcher have 2 league goals a piece this season, as does midfielder Charlie Adam who is Blackpool’s record signing at £500,000 from Rangers in August this year. (more…)
