The others get all the glory . But I thought Albert was one hell of a footballer. Asprilla joining was the moment I thought you would win the lot so stuck in my head and Lee just worked his nuts off.
According to Martin Samuel kane is off to Chelsea. An idea that actually makes less sense than him joining the Moonies and quitting the game...
Albert was ahead of his time, good defender but glided around the pitch like a ballroom dancer. Glorious to watch and hasn't been bettered at St James' until Woodgate's short spell.
Tino is often the reason given as to why we lost out on the title that season (it's Batty's introduction for me). Another player who was just a joy to watch.
Lee's an absolute hero of mine, but doesn't often get the credit ahead of the 'bigger' names.
Kane would be daft to join Chelsea when a move to Man City would see him win trophy after trophy, work with a world class coach and improve his game further. Plus he'd have the best chance of catching up with Shearer's record.
Couldn't agree more about getting a like-minded coach in after Poch, our biggest failure from Levy in his entire tenure has been to rip up what Poch put in place by appointing a polar-opposite in Mourinho.
Every new manager appointment comes with a risk, many, many factors to consider but if the appointment doesn't work out there is still a consistency to the philosophy that underpinned unprecedented transformation at the Club. You just look for another with that can make small changes and tweaks and the theory is there should still be some consistency with performances even if a hire didn't work out. It beggars belief.
That period of Wise and his Youtube player compilations, along with Joe Kinnear were a truly mindblowing inept period. It gives us fans the genuine belief that we could step out from behind our computers and do a far better job ourselves.
There is something unbelievably broken at Newcastle, I get that all that can be lumped onto the Chairman and rightly so, he's a twat but the feeling is nothing in place throughout the entire structure of the club on any level of the infrastructure feels like its even at a mediocre level.
There other clubs with far fewer resources and history that are doing things much better. Whilst Southampton has never fully recovered from losing Cortsey, then Poch and then all their players, followed by Les Reid, there is still a sense that they have a far better infrastructure in place than Newcastle. Leicester, whilst cheating financial fair play to get them into PL have grown the Club brilliantly across all departments. The same can be said of Brighton and Burnley to I think.
Being in the Legaue to just stay in it means what resources are available are spent solely focused in the short term, living in panic every day just increases the chances of making bad decision after bad decision.
We've seen examples of clubs lurching from one style to another because the men at the top don't give due consideration to the football side of things. We went from Robson to Souness because we 'needed to sort the dressing room out'. We sharp became a very Souness side and lost the swagger we had under Robson. Same happened with Keegan->Dalglish, Roeder-> Allardyce, You've similarly gone from one of the most exciting, young teams in the league, to a fairly functional squad with a couple of stars in there. Stars who will surely leave, if Mourinho stays?
One thing I wanted to ask, if Kane does go, would Son, Alli, et al stay? Or would his departure start a bit of an exodus? Surely selling Kane is a tacit admission that the Chairman doesn't share their ambitions?
I think Ashley is the root of it all, and every poisoned branch is because of his contradictory nature. He appointed Charnley (a jumped up admin clerk) because it was easy and the bloke is toady lickspittle, he gifted roles and jobs to mates that they're not up to because he wants mates around regardless of competence, he's fallen out with club legends, managers, players, media, fans, all because he doesn't know what he's doing, but will only rely on people who agree with him.
Had he just found a DoF of some quality, that man could have kept us ticking over, brought managers and players into the club that would achieve the minimum targets year in, year out. Instead we've been justifiably laughed at for years.
He doesn't care about the club beyond it being an advertising vehicle for his tat, however he won't relinquish control of decisions to another. Either don't give a shit and back off, or do give a shit and get involved.