One of these will own the club.There are rumours that Newcastle United will make an announcement about the sale of the club on Monday, although I can’t find a direct quote from anyone at the club about this announcement. Other rumours suggest it may be late next week before we find out anything.
Sky Sports claims that talks are continuing with Barry Moat and two other consortia, as does The Guardian, and both claim some sort of announcement is set for Monday.
The Telegraph claims that negotiations between Moat and Ashley are at an advanced stage and some sort of deal could be closed next week. They also mention that Barclays would like to see a reduction in the £40m loan the club uses to operate before they’ll stamp their authority on any deal for Barry Moat. (more…)
Jonas: Wants to stay and fight.Argentina coach, Diego Maradona has reassured Jonas Gutierrez that staying with Newcastle United will not affect his place in the Argentina squad.
Speaking of his chat with Maradona, Gutierrez reports:
“I’ve spoken to the national team coach and he says there is no problem for me being in the second division of English football. He said to take care, to do the things in my team, it’s no problem if I have to play in the second division, I’m going to be in the squad for qualification.
“And that was very important to hear. The words from the manager were encouraging. Now I am very happy about that because for me to play in the national team is a dream.
“If he had said ‘no you need to play in a top division’, it was going to be a difficult situation because I am very happy at Newcastle, but I want to play to with my national team, so it was going to be a difficult situation. But he told me it that no problems for me, it was important.” (more…)
Hughton stakes his claimIf you remember, the press were claiming that ‘D-Day’ for the club sale saga was either going to be Tuesday, Wednesday or Friday this week.
Since Tuesday and Wednesday have been and gone without anything happening, the big day must be today. I suppose if Tuesday was ‘D-Day’, Wednesday must have been ‘E-Day’ and today must be ‘F-Day’, which is really rather appropriate.
As it stands at around 6AM while I’m writing this, F-Day doesn’t look too promising. The Mail claims that Llambias has said Moat is ‘there or thereabouts‘ with his bid for Newcastle, which I believe The Mail pinched from an interview with Llambias on the ‘Total Sport’ radio show for BBC Newcastle.
My colleague has reported on the alleged bid by Graham Roberts and ‘Fanbase 410’, which I simply don’t believe has a chance.
Bid too good to be true?You couldn’t make it up could you? Well actually, you probably could judging by the recent Mahjoob and Parkinsons pranks and judging by the tosh written in the media. So which prospective buyers are legitimate and which ones are realistically anywhere near to buying our football club?
Latest to take a bow in the spotlight of the media are Fanbase 410, headed up by ex-Tottenham, Chelsea, Rangers and England man Graham Roberts. Following speculation in the press, Sky Sports are reporting that the outcome of today’s meeting which involved Roberts, the front man for the consortium, and other 410 members as well as club directors and “prominent members” of the NUSC was encouraging. Presumably they didn’t get laughed out of the meeting room because frankly even the most optimistic Mag is sceptical at both the concept and timing of this bid.
However, before we look into the whys and wherefores of the situation this is what Roberts had to say –
“It was a positive meeting. Now we will sit down with the supporters. They want to run their own football club, and why not?
“I just work for the company that is putting this together. Newcastle supporters will pick their own president and the manager.
“It’s the same at Barcelona and Real Madrid. You never know, they could end up buying £60 million or £70 million players. It works for Barcelona, why not Newcastle United?”(more…)
Healthy position after 3 games.Thanks to last night’s win over Sheffield Wednesday we go 3rd in the Championship, behind Cardiff and ‘Boro on goal difference, sharing 7 points with 5 other teams. Chris Hughton said of the game:
“I don’t think it was the prettiest win, but nonetheless it was very pleasing.
“I think we needed that second goal for the game to open up but their keeper has made some terrific saves.
“We got the early goal like we’d hoped and it was a great goal, real route one stuff and another fantastic finish from Shola.
“After that both sides have had a couple of good chances and we’ve got Steve Harper to thank for two great saves in the second-half.
“But we’ve got the win and that’s the most important thing.
“We’re back up to third and confidence is high and two successive wins.” (more…)
