You've got to be jokin' 'ere

Just when you thought it was safe to open your newspapers, yesterday saw the re-emergence of Joe "Fucking" Kinnear and his fantasy football world.  Yesterday JFK spoke to the Journal and made some ridiculous claims that he deserved more praise for his role as manager at Newcastle United.

JFK's reign at Newcastle started in tumultuous fashion. Appointed after Kevin Keegan's departure, in 2008 on an initial one month contract which then became a rolling month to month contract, he immediately endeared himself to the press by publicly calling Simon Bird of the Mirror a cunt in a press conference which saw him swear 52 times, and declare that he wouldn't deal with national media in the future and would only be speaking to the local press.

As Geordies everywhere cringed at the crassness of the bloke, we really had no clue what we were about to endure in a season which ultimately ended in the relegation of a team that on the whole lacked class, dignity, fight or dedication. A season which saw Shay Given sold to Manchester City, a season where JFK publicly mispronounced Charles N'Zogbia's name, and in calling him "Insomnia" managed to piss off the moody Frenchman even more than usual and which directly led to him joining a big club Wigan, a season in which he confronted referee Mike Riley to remonstrate with him after a 2-2 draw with this weekend's opponents Stoke City, and a season which saw Kinnear taken into hospital prior to the match with West Brom. JFK needed a  heart bypass operation, and after time with Chris Hughton at the helm as caretaker, Alan Shearer was appointed to steward the club until the end of the season, which finished with the relegation at Villa Park.

Despite JFK's remarks during the 2009 close season that Mike Ashley wanted him to come back to manage Newcastle, Hughton was appointed manager during the Championship season. That didn't stop Kinnear making comments about how there was a contract for him on the table, or claims that the club would be sold.

Much to the relief of Geordies everywhere Hughton managed to stabilise the club, get rid of the mercenaries and much of the deadwood and bring in the passion and camaraderie that had been lacking the previous season. This stabilisation effectively ruled JFK out of a return to the club, but like a bad smell, memories of JFK lingered.

In October 2010 former Newcastle player Mick Harford told the Sunday Sun:

 “Joe is absolutely certain...that he would have kept the club up if he hadn’t had his heart condition when he had it.”

“When you look back at it his results were good..."

Personally I wouldn't call a win rate of 19.23% and a run which saw us win only 2 game in 15 including the FA cup matches good myself, but obviously Mick Harford knows far more about football than me!

And JFK's heart problems also seem to have affected his memory. In this week's piece he angrily denied Steve Bruce's claims that the current Sunderland manager wanted to take Andy Carroll to Wigan but were outpriced at £4.5 million. Kinnear says:

“Andy Carroll was a kid I’d given his debut to..."

which is interesting seeing that Andy Carroll made his debut as a 90th minute substitute in Palermo under Glenn Roeder, nearly 2 years before Kinnear's appointment. 

Why JFK sees it fit to make any comments regarding Newcastle now, seeing that it's over 2 years since his last involvement, is questionable, but within his whinging he has also resurrected the alleged Geordie hate for southerners. Despite this hatred of southerners Geordies have taken the likes of Rob Lee, Supermac, Gavin Peacock, Les Ferdinand, Warren Barton and Chris Hughton into their hearts.

However JFK either ignores this, or more probably fails to see why these former Newcastle men are thought of with warmth while others including himself bring nothing but distain from the Newcastle fans. In 2009 JFK told the Guardian:

 "I think Mike Ashley got a lot of unfair criticism last year, I think anybody from London does, that's the way life is up there."

and this was repeated in the article from the Journal when he claims that his achievements (what achievements are these) were ignored "because I'm a cockney". He continues to say: 

"...it was me who brought in Kevin Nolan for £4m. He was Newcastle’s player of the year last year but do I get any credit for signing him? No, because I’m a cockney."

Sorry Joe, but in my opinion you've used three letters to many at the end of that sentence. 

Embarrassment of riches

This weekend Alan Pardew has admitted that he has a huge decision to make in the summer. Our current goalkeeping situation sees three men fighting for one place and Pardew has come out in the press to say that he has to decide whether to let one of the young 'keepers leave the club.

Steve Harper has been with Newcastle United since 1993, after signing from local non-league team Seaham Red Star. As Newcastle's longest serving player, he has spent the majority of his career acting as back up to Shay Given. Some cite a lack of ambition for Harper not moving away from Newcastle in that time, personally I see it as loyalty. Whenever Harper has been asked to step up to the mark he has shown that he is worthy of the number 1 shirt and he could have walked into the goalkeeping role at a number of other Premier League clubs and possibly have gained some England caps.

Harper is the model professional. Having completed an Open University degree while playing for Newcastle reserves, Harper is also an FA approved referee. He attends reserve team matches and keeps himself well out of the media spotlight. He is also reported to be a big fan of darts and a joker in the dressing room. He is certainly a fans favourite and deserves his place between the sticks but as he celebrates his 36th birthday today time is not on his side.

Coming up fast behind Harper Newcastle United are lucky enough to have two superb young 'keepers. Tim Krul currently holds the spot on Newcastle's bench, after 19 appearances this season. Signed from his hometown team, Den Haag, Krul had a cameo role in the 2006-2007 season when he starred in the UEFA cup game against Palermo making some astonishing saves due. Since then, with the two 'keepers in front of him, Krul has spent time on loan at Falkirk and Carlisle before returning as back up when Given moved to Manchester City. Krul is highly rated by his country, where he has represented Holland at Under 17 and Under 21 level and is now involved with the senior squad and is tipped to be Holland's future number 1. He has also courted interest from the likes of Juventus and Feyernood, and if he was to leave Newcastle would have no trouble finding a club to play for.

Meanwhile Fraser Forster has not been resting on his laurels. The young, Hexham-born 'keeper has spent time at Stockport, Bristol, Norwich and Celtic on loan where he has impressed both fans and managers. At Norwich he kept an astonishing 50% record for clean sheets, which earned him the Macron Golden Gloves award. Norwich were promoted from league one, and Forster earned the Players Player Award and came second in the Fans Player Awards. Forster then joined Celtic at the start of the 2010-2011 season, and has so far made 30 appearances for the SPL club.

It will have been invaluable for Forster to have played in front of 50, 000 fans every other week, as if he is to step into the 'keeper's role at St James Park, it will be something he has to face up to. Nothing teaches a young goalkeeper better than experience, and Forster has played his role in the Old Firm games this season showing that he can withstand the high pressure matches.

Come pre-season training Alan Pardew knows that he will have 3 goalkeepers banging on his door to show them why he is worthy of the regular goalkeeping spot at Newcastle. Personally I would like to see Forster given a chance to show that he can step up to the Premier League, with Harper in a player-coach role, and Krul being given a spell on loan at a high-level Championship/lower Premier League club. It's an interesting dilemma for Pardew to have, and one which I will be watching closely.

Snood believe it?

We have seen a remarkable week in football. Since last Saturday we have seen air-rifles being shot at work experience lads, referees giving free kicks for incidents they didn't see, ignoring incidents they obviously did see, Wayne Rooney clattering opposition players, dodgy penalties being given, stonewall penalties not being given, Alex Ferguson saying referees are superb and then saying they are crap, dubious offside's being flagged, managers squaring up to each other, player brawls on the pitch, owls being kicked and subsequently dying and Kolo Toure facing a ban for chugging his wife's slim-fast or whatever it was.

Fifa are footballing's highest body. They control world, if not universal, football and this week they held a meeting. You would think that they had some serious footballing matters to discuss. However what they decided was that snoods, the things that aren't quite a scarf, aren't quite a hood but are definitely a fashion faux pas and definitely something that young men playing football shouldn't be seen dead wearing, are to be banned. Fifa, in their wisdom, have ruled that the snoods are a health a safety risk, and that players could be choked by opposition players grabbing their woolly neck protectors.

There is nothing more hilarious than a player wearing a snood! It's laughable when you see a professional footballer wearing a short sleeved shirt and gloves. I have tried to imaging players such as Brian "Killer" Kilcline or Ron "Chopper" Harris in a snood, but my mind won't let such a preposterous thought. A professional footballer should be running around, the body heat keeping him warm. Gloves? Snoods? What next? Legwarmers? 19th Century handmuffs? Bodywarmers? Earmuffs?

Newcastle United fans have a reputation of being completely mental at times. It's not uncommon to see lads, like those pictured at the top of the blog, with their tops off for 90 minutes of the game in the middle of December, bouncing like loons. Some of them could definitely do with a trip to Sadie the Bra lady but they manage to make it through the game without thermal vests despite not having the physical exertion of a football match to keep them warm.

It beggars belief though, that in a week where there has been multiple problems with referees not being able to control players, making huge mistakes on the field, where players have assaulted other players and where managers have incited crowd problems with their behaviour football's world governing body has nothing to say but to ban a stupid item of clothing that no self-respecting man should wear anyway.

A level playing field

At the weekend Ryan Taylor was sent off in the game against Bolton. A rash, two-footed challenge over the ball on Elmander saw the midfielder get his marching orders from referee Chris Foy. And rightly so, it was a needless, potentially leg-breaking tackle. Everyone in St James' Park knew it was a straight red, you could tell that from the gasps from all four corners of the ground.

Meanwhile down at the JJB stadium Wayne Rooney was caught on camera deliberately elbowing James McCarthy in the head in an off-the-ball incident. Similarly to the gasps at St James' Park, the crowd at Wigan also gasped. But far from a red card, referee Mark Clattenburgh put his arm round Rooney, shared a smile and gave a free kick. Indeed from the video evidence it is clear that Clattenburgh hadn't seen the incident at all. He was clearly looking at the ball when Rooney jumped to elbow McCarthy. Had he seen the incident, then Clattenburgh would have, should have stopped the game immediately, but it's only when he hears the shocked intake of breath from the crowd that the whistle is blown.

After the game, Manchester United's manager and coaches were quick to jump to Rooney's defence. Mike Phelan commented that he didn't want to see a witch-hunt, Sir Alex Ferguson claimed that there was nothing in it, and that the media would see to it that Rooney would be "electrocuted or something..." However the rest of the football supporting world knew that the incident would probably be swept under the carpet, come on this is Manchester United after all!

Come Monday, the FA were allegedly left powerless to take further action as Clattenburgh claimed that he had mentioned the incident in his match report and felt that he had taken appropriate action. Unlike incidents in the past where players such as Ben Thatcher have had punishment imposed retrospectively for similar incidents, Clattenburgh's insistence that he was right has left Rooney free to play Chelsea tonight and in the next 2-3 games that he should have missed. The FA claim they are unable to take any further action, however under section 77 (b) of Fifa's disciplinary code states that "the disciplinary committee is responsible for

b) rectifying obvious errors in the referee's disciplinary decisions;"

So the FA are able to act if they want to, but they seem scared to offend Sir Alex Ferguson and his cronies. How dented would Manchester United's title chances be without Rooney in the squad? Especially as they are due to play Chelsea tonight? How furious would Sir Alex Ferguson have been if the incident had seen James McCarthy deliberately elbow Wayne Rooney? I'm more than certain that Fergie would have been berating the fourth official, storming over to Clattenburgh at the break and appearing all over the media to complain about how unfair the system is.

It's not the first time that the FA and referees have showed preferential treatment to one of the "Big 4" clubs. Earlier in the season Blackpool were playing Manchester United when a clear-cut penalty was denied to Blackpool, similarly defender Gary Neville went unpunished when he should have been sent off against Wolves. Only a few weeks ago the FA were ready to make an example of Nile Ranger, who pulled out of the England U20 squad with a bad back. Threats were made to enforce Ranger to miss the next Newcastle match, but these were quickly shelved when the FA realised that Manchester United's Chris Smalling had dropped out of the England U21 squad also and so were unable to single out the young Newcastle striker for punishment.

Referees are no better. In the Manchester City game earlier in the season Nigel De Jong made a shocking tackle on Hatem Ben Arfa which broke both bones in the young lad's shin. Ben Arfa is still out of action, De Jong did not receive a booking. In the league cup final Lee Bowyer was brought down, and should have received a penalty early on for Birmingham City against Arsenal, but the referee did not give the spot kick as the linesman incorrectly flagged that Bowyer was offside. Had Arsenal gone on to win the game 1-0 then the Birmingham City fans would have had no problems in complaining about the incident which was ignored.

As a supporter of a team that includes the notorious Joey Barton it's easy to complain about refereeing. However, I'm not asking for referees or the FA to be lenient to players who deserve to be punished for their actions. Just make it a level playing field for all of the teams and not just the "Big 4" who seem to scare the FA into ineffectuality.

Not worth the paper it's written on

On Friday we Newcastle fans awoke to the news that Cheik Tiote had put pen to paper and signed a new 6.5 year contract. I for one was over the moon at the news. Tiote has been phenomenal for Newcastle this year, his 35 yard wonder-goal against Arsenal crowning his debut season for us. Stats show that with Tiote in the side we have won 42% of the games we have played while without him we have only won 12.5%.

However, some cynics have pointed out that it doesn't matter how long a contract he has signed, he'll be off in the summer if we get a decent offer for the Ivory Coast international. It's hard to argue against them, as Andy Carroll is an all too recent reminder that players are loyal to whoever pays them the best wages.  Even youth players display little loyalty, with Ryan Donaldson putting a comment on his facebook how "anyone would do the same" as Carroll, just after the deadline day deal was completed.

All too often now players are orchestrating moves to ensure that their bank balances are well padded, with little consideration on how long left they have on their contracts. Cristiano Ronaldo signed a five year deal at Manchester United but was pulling on the Real Madrid shirt just over a year later. Glen Johnson was happy to sign a new deal committing himself to Portsmouth but a little over 8 months later he signed for Liverpool. In 2008 Stuart Downing put pen to paper at Middlesbrough in a deal which should have seen him contracted to his local club until 2013, but just a year later became Martin O'Neill's first summer signing of 2009 at Aston Villa.

Its really hard not to take the news of these players signing with a pinch of salt. As much as I would love to see Joey Barton and Jose Enrique committing themselves to Newcastle United for another 3-5 years each, it's difficult not to be cynical. I am in no doubt that even if Enrique signed a new deal and then Chelsea, Liverpool or Inter put in a bid for Jose that he would be on his way regardless of how long was remaining on his time here.

Newcastle fans have just been sent out their season ticket renewals. They have an option to secure their season ticket at a guaranteed price for the next 10 years. I'm not naive enough to believe that footballers have anything like the loyalty to a club that the fans have, but its disconcerting to have to decide whether to commit to your club long-term when you don't know if the stars who earn more in a week than we do in a year are prepared to do the same.

We are considerably richer than yow!!!!

Awww it's the stuff dreams are made of. Non-league minnows Crawley Town taking on the might of Manchester United at the Theatre of Dreams, a potential giant-killing on the cards and the biggest game in memory for their players and fans. We all love a David and Goliath fixture don't we?

However, the romance of the cup is soured somewhat if you look at Crawley Town's recent history. For me they are nothing more than, ironically, a poor man's Manchester City. As a Newcastle United fan I have watched, with undisguised jealousy, as Manchester City have used Sheik Mansour's considerable wealth to buy challenge for a Champions League place. For me it's like watching Michael Carroll, the 2002 £9.2 million lottery winner, as he publicly spent vulgar amounts of money unashamedly.

Crawley Town are the Blue Square Premier League equivalent of Manchester City. Back in 2006 the club were on the brink of extinction as they went into administration, with a debt of over £1.8 million. However they managed to stave off several attempts to wind-up the club with various rescue-packages, the latest being in February 2010 and they now sit in second place, and are on an 11 match unbeaten run in the league.

In July 2010 the Crawley Town co-owner, Bruce Winfield announced that all the clubs debts had been cleared by a consortium of investors. The club now have enough money in the bank to pay all fees upfront, and they are currently buying themselves out of non-league football. Matt Tubbs and Richard Brodie were the joint top scorers in the Blue Square Premier League and so Crawley Town bought both of them. Sergio Torres dropped down two divisions to join the club for a suggested fee of £100,000 and club captain Pablo Mills reportedly turned down league club offers of a contract to join them.

9,000 residents of Crawley are making their way to see the team play at Old Trafford. There are unabashed reports of the tickets being bought by people from the South East who support not the non-league Red Devils, but the global franchise which is Manchester United and who want to see their heroes. This can be backed by looking at the attendance figures for Crawley's home games which see an average of 1,800 through the gates. I'm sure that the Crawley Town directors won't mind as it all adds to their massive payday.

The West Sussex team spent more than all the teams in League 2 combined in the summer. Other teams in the Blue Square Premier simply cannot compete with that kind of spending and now, with a reported pay day of £1,000,000 from their day out at Old Trafford it is now unlikely that any club in League 2 will be able to compete with them financially next year.

Sit down, shut up!

It's the time of year when the season ticket renewal packs start hitting the doormats again and this week saw Newcastle United announce through a press release their plans for the coming season, and the longer term. Initially the noises were good. A pledge to freeze season ticket prices from next season for the next ten years. An extension of the family area. A young person's area for fans aged 18-21. A direct debit scheme to make the price affordable over a 12 month period. As for the most important thing in most people's minds, the prices, the club stated "Over 18's season tickets are being raised in price by £15..." but that covers a 12th man membership which is now to be automatically included. Excellent!

However what the club failed to make clear was something that affects directly about 3000 fans, but indirectly affects the whole ground. 

3 years ago, Mike Ashley decided to set up a "singing section" for fans who wanted to make a noise at the game. This area was situated in the "Leazes corner" and fans were moved from the Sir John Hall stand Level 7 and could join this area from other parts of the ground. This area has, arguably, been consistently the loudest part of the ground for fans who want to stand and sing. It was also the most affordable seat in the ground at £390 for an adult season ticket which made it an attractive prospect for the fans who had the least disposable income to spend. 

Lets not kid ourselves, St James' Park is no longer the fortress of noise and hostility that it used to be. The Tyne-Wear derby and the Arsenal comeback game are exceptions rather than the rule for blistering atmospheres at St James Park. There are pockets of fans, especially in the back of the Gallowgate and in the "Strawberry Corner" who like to make a noise, but the "Leazes Corner" has tried its utmost to create some kind of away-game atmosphere for the home fans. 

But the singing corner is being disbanded. The family section and the young person's section is being extended directly into that corner, and with away fans allocation being increased to 4000, it means that the fans who sit (sorry we stand) in that corner are being forced to move. It's hard to understand why a 4000 allocation is needed for away fans, especially when the likes of Fulham, Wigan, Bolton and Blackburn regularly only bring 2 men and a dog to away games. How wonderful are 3000+ grey seats up in the gods going to look?

It's impossible to not believe that Mike Ashley is disbanding his idea of a singing corner for no other reason than he has been getting dogs abuse from the fans based there for the past 3 years. Songs like "Get out of our club"and "I don't care about Ashley" and banners which read "Cockney rapist" have emanated from the Leazes corner. Ashley probably believes that by splitting up the most vocal fans will stop the negative chanting about him. However all it does is further alienate the owner from the fans. Some plans are being mooted by fans to develop a new "singing corner" in the Leazes corner Level 4, but how viable this is going to be remains to be seen, as Ashley has the final word on whether it will be allowed. 

However, not only are the "Leazes corner" regulars being displaced, but what wasn't disclosed in the press statement was that the people who are being moved now have to pay a higher price for their ticket. Those who bought a season ticket for the Championship season are getting a 10% discount on next year's ticket, but even with that, to move to any other part of the ground will see a season ticket price increase by at least £120 a year. So while other fans are getting a £15 increase, the most vocal fans, the fans who probably have the least money too are getting a £120 increase. It makes the decision to renew that much harder. Already one friend of mine, a lad who has had a season ticket for the last 12 years, has said that he cannot renew his ticket, he just cannot afford the price increase. 

The fans of Newcastle United have tolerated a lot from Ashley in his short tenure here, but they will not continue to be shafted by the owner. Mike Ashley is playing a dangerous game. Forget about players, they come and go, the lifeblood of any club is their fans.