Louis Spence's Premier League Preview || Newcastle Nightmare

NEWCASTLE NIGHTMARE - 5-2-08
Louis Spence

Let me start by saying that, unlike a lot of Boro fans, I do not dislike Newcastle United. If any of the North East teams are playing in Cup matches or in Europe (no, don't laugh) I will always support them over the other side.

I also like Kevin Keegan thus far. He had a phenomenal playing career. He was voted PFA player of the year and was twice selected as European Footballer of the Year. His record reads 225 goals scored in 655 games which includes twenty-one from sixty-three England appearances.

His managerial career reads better than he is sometimes given credit for.

Taking over the Geordies in 1992, he got promotion to the Premiership in his first year. In his subsequent four years at the helm they finished third, sixth, and runners-up twice. The season after he resigned, they ended in thirteenth place. Little wonder then that the fans revered him.

After Keegan was installed, and with the euphoria still at a stroke-inducing rate, came the announcement that shocked the whole football world, including it appears, Mr. Keegan. Dennis Wise, who lowers the rateable value everywhere he goes, was appointed Executive Director on a salary purported to be three times the amount he was being paid as manager of Leeds United.

This is the vulgar person (man is not a word that springs to my mind) of whom Alex Ferguson onced said: "Could start a fight in an empty house."

I personally find him utterly loathsome. He was given a jail sentence (later overturned on appeal) for assaulting an aged taxi driver. In 1999, he was accused of biting an opponent in a Cup Winners Cup match.

Later, this lovable cheeky chappie, this one continued insult to manners and decency, went on to smash the nose and jaw of fellow player Callum Davidson who was just trying to break up a fight between Wise and another player. His playing career was inevitably littered with suspensions. He couldn't see a belt without hitting below it.

Can anyone truly believe that Keegan would have approved of this appointment?

To me, they are chalk and cheese. One personified everything that was good about the game and the other is Dennis Wise. If the owners of Newcastle thought they had pulled a fast one with this "jobs for the boys manoeuvre", I think they are in for a rude awakening.

For a start, the job handed to Keegan was a very difficult one. The team he has inherited has some awfully overpriced, overrated and over-age players.

Keegan came in at a time when their fixtures were at their hardest and rumours of unrest were emanating from all quarters. He has "walked" before and there is no earthly reason, if only for his own sanity, to think he will not do just that again.

The fans of this club must wonder what has hit them. Now I for one do not go along with this idea that the Geordies are all wonderful, loyal and faithful supporters. I can remember back to crowds of well under 15,000.

Nevertheless, like all football fans paying the high prices we do these days, they deserve better than these money men playing their little games with something as sacred as a football club.

Newcastle will do very well to finish in the top half this season. They need root and branch surgery. They have not shot themselves in the foot with this appointment so much as just blown their brains out.

Mark my words, this is not a soap opera but a disaster movie. It will end in tears. The good guy who has been betrayed and put in an invidious position must be wishing the clock would go back a couple of months.

Already Keegan is claiming Newcastle deserved to win the Sunday derby match against the Boro, which is patently not true as most independent spectators will testify. Delusional assertion brought about by the pressure to right the wayward vessel that is Newcastle United methinks. This one needs a dry dock and a major overhaul.

Quit while you're behind. There's no way your new colleague will. Power corrupts but lack of power corrupts absolutely. Et tu Brute. A word to the Wise is all it takes...

Louis Spence

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