ST: we must improve at homeNewcastle United defender Steven Taylor talks about how he wants our home form to improve next season.
Steven Taylor wants to turn St James’ Park into a fortress. He’s not talking about a drawbridge, some cannons and a couple of Rottweilers, but rather our ability to remain undefeated on the pitch during home games.
We were second bottom of the home wins table this season, equal with Birmingham, with only West Ham, Wigan and Blackpool having won fewer games at home than us. In total we won 6, drew 8 and lost 5 at St James’ Park in the league this season.
Many folk feel one of the secrets to Premier league success is to be virtually unbeatable at home and Steven Taylor tends to agree.
“It’s something we’re definitely looking to improve on.
“We couldn’t have asked for a better year in the Championship when we managed to stay unbeaten at home throughout the season.
“And last summer the main aim was to continue that in our home games to give us some solid foundations for the season.
“But it didn’t turn out that way, and it’s something we need to address.” (more…)
Who are we after?A summary of the current transfer targets at Newcastle United, not a single one of which has actually been confirmed by the club!
As another week gets underway, we can no doubt expect a load more transfer speculation relating to our club because it is after all silly season.
So I thought I’d kick off by doing a brief summary of where we supposedly stand with some of the transfer targets rumoured to date.
First of all, let’s be clear about one thing: the club have not confirmed a single transfer in and have only confirmed the exit of Sol Campbell and Shefki Kuqi, so that is our official transfer status at the moment.
Mehdi Abeid
By all accounts this is actually a done deal and the player himself has confirmed that he has agreed a deal with Newcastle after being welcomed and encouraged by Tiote and Ben Arfa. The 18 year old attacking midfielder has played most of his football for the Lens B team, so I’m guessing he’s down as one for the future. (more…)
Contract woes?Contract woes for Nolan now at Newcastle United?
According to The Mirror, Kevin Nolan is having difficulty getting a new contract out of the club.
He has two years left on his current contract and was supposedly in talks to extend that by at least another two years, however it seems to 28 year-old has been told that there will be no further contract discussions for him until the end of next season.
The Mirror alleges that this now has Nolan reluctantly considering his future with the club.
Now before we get carried away, I should point out that there are no direct quotes in the Mirror’s article and it all comes from ‘sources close to the player’, so it could just as easily be a load of garbage intended to whip up a storm at our club. It wouldn’t be the first time the press have done that.
However, it does seem odd that a few weeks ago we were hearing all sorts of noises about Nolan entering into contract negotiations and then nothing further was heard.
Nolan’s wage bill will no doubt be large and we’re all aware that reducing the wage bill is a long-term aim of the club, but we’re talking about our captain here and a player that umpteen others have come out to praise as being a great influence on them. (more…)
Shown the exit?It seems that Nile Ranger is surplus to requirements at Newcastle United.
According to a fistful of press reports, Nile Ranger is being shown the exit at St James’ Park as he does not figure in Alan Pardew’s future plans.
To be honest, he never really got properly started at Newcastle. He was used mainly as a substitute striker and goals seemed to elude him.
His tally of 3 goals in 58 games doesn’t really tell the whole story because for a lot of those he won’t have been on the pitch for 90 minutes (and was probably only on as a late sub for most) but it’s still not a particularly good set of stats for a striker.
Ranger showed some promise and seemed to be able to hold the ball up well, but he scored very few goals.
The 21 year-old was often criticised for poor time-keeping and not being disciplined enough and of course he recently attracted some bad press by posing with a (allegedly fake) gun at a party, after which a photograph of the pose – taken by one of his so-called friends – found its way into the public domain. (more…)
4-2-3-1 next season?Gervinho rumours persist but what do Newcastle United in terms of strikers anyway?
The French press are announcing the ‘imminent’ arrival of Gervinho at Newcastle, which sounded promising until I noticed they got their information from Sky Sports.
Allegedly we’ve made a €16m bid for the player (£14.25m) – which may be true – but I can find nothing to confirm that Gervinho will be on Tyneside at all, let alone imminently.
But what do we need in terms of strikers anyway? And what sort of formations is Alan Pardew likely to consider?
For most games last season we played two up front, even after our (then) top scorer was sold to Liverpool.
Last season we used the following strikers:
– Ameobi, scoring 9 goals in 30 games,
– Lovenkrands, scoring 7 goals in 29 games,
– Best, scoring 6 goals in 12 games,
– Ranger, scoring 1 goal in 28 games (most of which were as a sub), and
– Carroll, scoring 11 goals in 20 games.
And our top scorer turned out to be a midfielder in the shape of Kevin Nolan, who scored 12 goals in 32 games. (more…)
