Managerial Merry Go Round – Again ?

I write with a heavy heart. How that for a dramatic beginning eh ?

Todays mood of reflection, and dejection at yesterday’s performance caused me to sink a few more than usual last night. I’m not one for booing, never have been and never will be, and I think the booing minority should be run out of town, but this is a club that is not going to get back into the top 4 or so with the current manager.

It really pains me to say this. I’ve stuck by the appointment of Roeder for various reasons. One being that he deserved a crack at it – and call that misguided if you like – but I believe that. We have been down the road of appointing trophy winners at Newcastle. They got us to a couple of FA Cup Finals, not too bad, but with what they inherited and have been allowed, should have done better. In principle, there was logic behind giving the job to an ex captain of the club, on the basis of trying something different, that may have worked. And it might have. It’s not going to though, not now. It’s time to replace Roeder, sadly, and accept that he’s had his chance.

I remember thinking this about Arthur Cox though, and suddenly it all clicked and he came good, and what he had been working for stood in front of us. I would dearly like this still to happen, and its the main reason why, during the course of the season, that the improvement that we showed for a brief period was encouraging. It’s all back to square one after yesterday though. A few weeks ago, we were looking at fixtures against Wigan, Smoggies, Charlton and Man City as a springboard to get into the UEFA spot. We have taken 1 point from that little lot, and failed to score a solitary goal in all of them.

Worse still, we haven’t played well, or looked capable of beating these teams.

He has done alright. He has worked quite well with limited resources. I think this – now – not because the season has gone stale and we have had a bad run, or even on the back of the last 4 shit results. It isn’t down to his buying record either. Martins cost 10m quid and is alright, his goals have saved us from being relegated and following the injury to Owen, we needed someone to do this, despite his limitations. It isn’t the purchase of Duff either, because buying a quality player for 5m quid with his best years in front of him is hardly a crap buy, it has only became so because for some reason we don’t know he hasn’t performed like the player that he was when Chelsea bought him from Blackburn. Our problem is finding out why this has happened, and if we can rectify it. If he has a personal problem of some sort, or any problem which is going to prevent him playing like this for us, then we have to sell him and try to get our money back. Thats football, he isn’t the first player not to settle at a club and he won’t be the last.

I don’t believe that nobody else wanted the job, in fact I think its a load of bollocks to be honest, but I think Roeder was given the job with the best of intentions and it was looked on as a calculated risk. But 99% of appointments by most clubs are precisely that, we took the biggest one we’ve made in our history – arguably – when we appointed Keegan 15 years ago.

Like many supporters who saw Roeder play for and captain Newcastle, I held him in high regard. Watching him react to the pressure he is now under, and hearing some of the things he is saying, is painful. I don’t want my memory of him to be ruined by hanging on until things become worse, so I hope he goes now.

The club has a big summer ahead. They have to look for a manager, I’ve no doubt that they have a little black book with names in, well now is the time to target these names and the man they want the most and go for him, within reason, you have to accept that an illegal approach is in fact, er, illegal, and we don’t want to get points deducted or owt like that do we ? Like our cockney friends the hammers for signing 2 players illegally, hehe.

Get down you cockney bastards, and stay there.

I digress. Back on topic.

Who to bring in ? Well, as Alex Ferguson is clearly out of the equation, why not Wenger ? If he is out of the equation, then Roy Keane

Aye, you get my drift….. we may not get the number 1 choice, but we have to target a proven manager. Oh dear, Dalglish was a proven manager with a track record second to none.

Here we go again, all aboard the NUFC managerial merry go round.

So who is it to be then. Who are the 2 people who turned us down in the past I wonder ? Will Fred go for one of them and give him another chance ?

Is Alan Shearer hovering in the backround ? Does he have influence ? How much ? Is he really a manager in waiting ?

Personally, when Bobby Robson left, I said on here that I wanted Big Sam. I still do. He may not be the best manager in the world – and yes of course if I knew who that was and thought we could get him then I would – but I think he would bring new methods to Newcastle, we all know how much attention he pays to modern fitness, training and medical techniques.

What impresses me the most, and always has, is not just this but the fact that he has players at Bolton who have been cast off by other clubs for various temperament and personality problems, or players who have ability but need “managing”. You know, the thing that Souness couldn’t adminster, so he just chucks them out of the club instead. This is important for a club like Newcastle. None of these players ever want to leave Bolton, and none of these players express anything publicly about him, fall out with him, in fact they all look like they would run through brick walls for him. He is in total charge of all his players.

On the playing side, he has been at Bolton for a long time now, and season by season they improve. He’s a stayer. What he does is long lasting. The momentum of the Keegan years is over, the last remaining player from it retired last year too.
We have came a long way since Keegan walked through that door, and it happened so fast people with justification sometimes claim that it was a new foundation built on sand, and was insustainable, but the time has arrived for this club to put down some good solid foundations, a new direction.

There is no guarantee that Allardyce will repeat what he did at Bolton. He may get it spectacularly wrong, but I doubt it. He would be my choice, among the British managers anyway.

One last thing also – if he is one of those 2 managers who turned the club down – then its irrelevant and he should be asked again. I would, because he is my choice and because I would put the club first. If the current chairman, board, major shareholders etc can’t also put the club first and write him off on the basis that they have been turned down, then they should go too for the simple reason that they are not putting the club first.

I am not against giving them one last attempt to get the right manager, because if they get it right, they would back him and we would be successful. By far the worst scenario is to appoint the right manager and lose him through having a board that chickens out of competing with the other top clubs.

Maybe Alan Shearer is next in line. If he is, and he is the next Brian Clough then we are made. If he is the next Terry Butcher we are buggered. Whoever they choose, it is their last chance, and it is too, because if they get it wrong this time, the ground will be half empty again in 2 years time.

by LeazesMag

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