No great breakthrough again with any substantial news available today … though Louise Taylor of The Guardian summarises pretty neatly where we’re at – click here – I wonder how many managers have to have written guarantees from the owners of clubs that pretty much insure them against their lies. This is Mike Ashley’s spivvy Newcastle United unfortunately.
The Star has it that Man Utd will make a bid for Sean Longstaff in the next couple of days. Its certainly true the bush-radio on Tyneside has been buzzing with news Longstaff will be soon subject to a bid from Old Trafford, if the bloke in the North Shields chippy who works with Sean’s brother’s mate’s cousin can be relied upon. Click here. The Telegraph has a similar story but they all borrow from one another so they could all be equally right or wrong – click here.’ Also some stuff about United offering Longstaff a new deal to stay at SJP – click here. We’ll see if they’ve left this too late and whether the lad is convinced to stay at a club that finds it so difficult to tie down a world class manager who wants to stay. Or whether its a flimsy attempt to con fans at least they tried to keep him.
United is also being linked with Liverpool’s Harry Wilson who has been on loan at Derby this last season but who might want to play in the PL (there’s a good chance he might be if The Rams do a good thing and beat Vile in the Play-Off final). We’re being linked but so are six others and those looking at him aren’t exactly from the stellar end of the league which kind of illustrates where we are with Mike Ashley – click here
Friend of TRUE FAITH and all round good bloke and excellent writer, David Conn, The Guardian has completed a very interesting breakdown of PL club finances and it is a sobering analysis of just how far off the pace we have become with clubs at the top end of the PL under Ashley. We have twice the attendances of Brighton and Southampton but make only marginally more money at the gate than them. We do make quite a bit more than Everton who have left us behind buying up players however’ – click here
JUDAS KISS’
Interesting piece in The Chronicle featuring former club owner Sir John Hall explaining why he sold United – though not really why he sold it to Ashley, other than that he gave him the money for it. The piece again features an attempt from Hall to paint himself as a local benefactor who bankrolled the club as per Jack Walker at Blackburn when he absolutely and clearly did not. The piece again fails to point out that Hall took’ shed-loads of money out of United after he floated the club on the stock-market in 1996, a move which led to forcing Kevin Keegan out of the club. The article also fails to detail how Hall was ready to sell the club to two hedge-funds, either Polygon or Belgravia, which would have been potentially disastrous. Those deals didn’t happen because the interested parties did do Due Diligence, though its a stretch to believe Ashley bought United on a whim – there’s plenty evidence to suggest he didn’t. There’s also little in the article to explain why Hall waited until Shepherd was laid up in hospital to do the deal or why he didn’t conduct more analysis of Ashley’s motivation and ambitions for United beyond using it as an advertising hoarding for his minty shops and seek an alternative buyer. Anyone would think he sold United to the first shyster that came along. Hall might want us to think that all of the football played under his ownership was super-fantastic-brilliant – it certainly was not as those who were in SJP to see us tank under Dalglish, Gullit and later Souness would testify. Hall would be better keeping quiet and counting the money he took from the club – click here
HEEDSTART FOR HAPPINESS?’
Mark Carruthers, a valued contributor to TF has been moonlighting at the Mackem Echo and has some, what appears to be good news regarding a fan takeover of Tyneside’s second club, Gateshead FC – click here – Fair play to Mark, as well as a committed Mag, he is also one of the best writers on the non-league scene in the NE but given this is a Geordie club we’re talking about, its a little bit disappointing Gateshead’s local paper, the Chronicle, couldn’t have recruited him to write for the paper read by the vast majority of the town’s citizens rather than the enemy’s rag. Anyway, a significant fan-owned Geordie club is a very attractive option for those reviewing whether they want to continue to be mugged off by Mike Ashley.
MACKEMS
Oh and finally, some words about our dear friends down the road. Regular TF readers will recall pieces this fanzine carried regarding the takeover at Sunderland at 12-months ago, when we pointed out the money behind Donald and Methadone was actually money the club already had coming in from the PL in the form of parachute payments and that the two bluffers weren’t putting any of their own money in. It was as we said at the time, a leveraged buy-out. But they wouldn’t have it and went mental, particularly via social media where their heads fell off spectacularly and no doubt will again. Anyway, it seems we were right all along as this piece in The Mail today confirms – click here’The article alleges that a member of the Roker Report Podcast team who interviewed (that is probably putting it a wee bit strongly) Donald and Methadone ended up getting a job with Sunderland but we can’t confirm that. We might suggest however, the analysis of their club’s ownership and financial transactions has been less than robust but that’s only an opinion we hold.
As ever, the real entertainment in these situations is to be found on the swivel-eyed, tin-foil hat-wearing pages of their quaint message-board, which is indeed home to outlandish conspiracy theories which normally involve The Mags (natch). This latest news (to be fair it’s not much more than we were pointing out at the start of last season) has generated predictable responses which range from outright, unquestioning denial to encouragingly, the penny starting to drop that their club has been had-off of a load of money by a couple of snake-oil salesmen. Poor Craig Hope of The Mail however, appears to now become the latest folk-devil on Wearside so best watch out for the digital version of pitch-fork carrying, lantern swinging peasants coming his way with all manner of lurid accounts of his private life etc. Craig can look after himself we’re sure. Anyway, the fun starts here.
TRUE FAITH, NEWCASTLE UNITED FANZINE’
