As has happened so often this season we begin this week where we left off last.  Pepperami planes. (Article) and (Article)  Michael Walker quality as ever in that last link there.  James Milner reckoned he didn’t notice.  Yeah, right!  (Article) I mean how do you not notice 30,000 cardboard darts flying from either end of the ground?  As we said last week, dull and, as an unusually inspired Luke Edwards wrote in The Journal “a damning indictment of Newcastle United’s season.”  (Article)  Bloody hell, he must have stumbled across John Gibson’s medication that’s made him talk sense recently, somewhere in the bowels of Thomson House.  And he doesn’t mention Kieron Dyer once, not even in passing!  Wonders never cease this season it seems.  Steven Taylor was one of the few to come away with deserved credit for this game.  (Article) and (Article). 

Speaking of giving the players credit, the aftermath of Palace finally led to the club doing the first sensible thing it has done all season.  Cancelling the usual “lap of honour” after the Chelsea game next weekend. (Article)   They are right to fear a worse response than last season’s when Wolves waved goodbye to the Premiership and we should have waved goodbye to SBR.  Facts, as John Gibson wrote this week, which are hard but simple tell the story of a poor season. (Article)

He touches on Shearer’s poor run of form in that article.  At the start of the week he was getting praise from Steve Harper of all people (Article).  By the time the Fulham game arrived on Wednesday he was back in the papers. This time because he was going to be “rested.”  (Article) The tabloids love that, as they are quick to use this as a sign that it is the death knell for a manager at St James’.  That of course is another popular myth created to use as a stick to beat us with.  (Like attendance figures in the 80’s – I know, I’m just leaving that one at that…).  I don’t have a problem with the idea of benching Shearer.  If he’s not doing the business he has to accept that sometimes for the sake of the team and indeed sometimes for his own good he may well find himself bench warming more often in his last season as a player.  We touch on this in the current issue of tf as well by the way.  (Issue 42; in all good shops now and some crap ones.  Even in Seaham.  Modesty forbids me from telling you who wrote the article in question.)  My only concern was yet again how it was handled.  Souness revealed after the unexpected victory in West London that Shearer had asked to be rested.  (Article) and (Article)  Just how pleased was The Lion with that being made so public I wonder?  Sometimes honesty is not always the best policy.

Anyway we got the win, which was nice.  Stand in skipper Boumsong was chuffed and eloquent in the press as ever (Article) and Shola was “Sho Relieved.”  (Article)  Miles leave that kind of headline to The Sun mate, please.  Darren Ambrose, meanwhile, put in another good stint and staked a claim for his future at St James’.  (Article) and (Article).

No sooner were we talking about Fulham as we were discussing another away trip, this time to the Scouse Makems, Everton.  Everton continue to over-achieve and would we swap positions with them?  (Article)  Of course we would.  I’d trade all our cup wins this season to be in pole position to return to Champions League football personally.  Apart from this discussion there were two other main talking points.  Firstly would Shearer be straight back in?  (Article)  Normally I’m all for keeping a winning side together but in this sort of game I would have had him back in of he felt up for it.  Hindsight is such a wonderful thing though and I’m not even going to try and be wise after the event!  Secondly, both Steven Taylor and Shola Ameobi were full of praise for former Newcastle Youth Coach and now Everton’s number 2, Alan Irvine.  (Article) and (Article).  I find it galling that over the years we seem to just let people like him go instead of recognising their potential in-house and promoting from within.  Especially when we find our players singing Irvine’s praises just a week after the mysterious departure of  “My Mate” Phil Boersema. 

Anyway, back to the same old shambles against Everton.  (Article), (Article) and (Article). And the same old excuses.  Yes this referee isn’t especially good, nor is he especially quick to give us anything.  But it is still the players who fuck it all up on the pitch, give away needless free kicks, don’t pick up their men at set pieces, concede countess goals close to the end of either half and who show outrageous indiscipline time and time again.  We were supposed to be sorting this out this season weren’t we?  Hmm. 

Transfer speculation gathered a pace this week.  Firstly Bowyer was on his way (Article), then the BBC, fooled by “The Hairdryer” in The Times (the clue’s at the start where it says 100% fiction…The BBC ffs!) (Article), reckoned he wasn’t and then all of a sudden he was again.  (Article).  So all clear on that then.  The Viana saga rumbles on with little sign of a deal being agreed (Article) and (Article).  Meanwhile Aston Villa became the latest club to be linked with a bid for Bellamy (Article).  Him and O’Leary deserve each other.  Mind you I can’t see him wanting to go there such is the high opinion he has of himself.  Also on his way according to the Sunday Sun is Robert to Roma.  Arriverderchi bonny lad..  As for ins I was so excited by the prospect of Souness bringing in yet another ex-Rangers player in Gregory Vignal (Article) No I was, really.  And I wonder are we really just about to swap one fat paddy for another?  (Article) and (Article).  I suppose if they both were at the club the pie bill would threaten the wage bill and damage the dividend. 

And so what else has caught my eye this week?  Michael Howard describing Blair and Brown as the “Dyer and Bowyer of politics” on Monday made me smile and cringe all at the same time.  (Article)  Smile because it’s yet another example of a politician trying to look “cool” by mentioning football and cringe because it’s another reminder of how far we’ve been dragged through the shite this season.  Finally I found German national coach and former Adidas “spokesperson”, Jurgen Klinsmann’s comments this week startling and at the same time frightening.   (Article), (Article) and (Article). 

And as we have just opened the largest Adidas superstore in Europe at St James’ Park, I start to wonder just how much influence “die Drei-Streifen-Marke” has over our club.  Will we be “encouraged” to sign Adidas sponsored players somewhere down the line?  If that had been so in the past we’d never have signed Shearer (Umbro) or Les Ferdinand (Nike), for example.  And is it because he is a “big name” Adidas brand seller that we defend Dyer so often when he should have been shown the door.  Indeed which does come first the football or the business? I wonder? (Ed - we all know the answer, Geordie!) It’s a question we’ve been asking here on Tyneside for a few years now. 
 

NM