Of course, Newcastle United are still riding high, still undefeated in the Premier League so far with Alan Pardew seemingly sticking steadfastly to an “if it ain’t broke, dont fix it!” philosophy in our Premiership campaign.
Obviously, when a team which should be nestling somewhere the middle of the table is actually third it’s hard to argue. As Napoleon Bonaparte once said (or wrote, I’m not sure), “Success is the most convincing talker in the world”. This is certainly true, at least for the moment, in Pardew’s case; though as we already know, he could blather for England anyway! However, even in the midst of success, there are always problems to be solved, and one of Pardew’s is how does he solve a problem like Hatem Ben Arfa?
He is undoubtedly one of the most talented players we have, on the ball he is almost certainly THE most talented. However, since finally returning from his double injury nightmare with his appearence against Nottingham Forest in the League Cup, he has only made four fleeting substitute appearences in the Premiership (out of six games). (more…)
When two new players were officially signed by Newcastle United on August 30th, most of the attention was pointed in the direction of a certain ex Internazionale defender called Davide Santon, who has been compared in the past to no lesser figure than Paulo Maldini by legendary manager, Arrigo Sacchi.
This ‘blog certainly wasn’t the least guilty in that regard, however, I aim to put that right now with a feature focusing on the other signing of that day, ex Charlton goalkeeper Rob Elliot.
Elliot joined another ex member of the Charlton staff, goalkeeping coach, Andy Woodman, in what is becoming something of a Charlton mafia at St James’, with Alan Pardew previously working with Elliot and Woodman as manager of the South London ‘Addicks”. Until his move, the 25 year old Elliot had been on Charlton’s books since joining them as a 17 year old youth player from non league Erith Town. However, on becoming a professional player in 2004, he spent three years out on loan at Bishop’s Stortford, Notts County and Accrington Stanley respectively. (more…)
In all the numerous striker targets Newcastle United were linked with and failed to “get over the line”, one name seemed to be something of an afterthought, though according to his current club, German Bundeliga side, Freiburg, Newcastle United actually did made a late bid for Papiss Demba Cissé which was refused.
Newcastle were reported to have bid around £7 million for Demba Ba’s 26 year old Senegalese striking teammate, though there didn’t seem to be any official confirmation of the amount, just that a bid was made. One thing which is certain though, he is worth quite a bit more than £7 million and his current contract contains a release clause of around £14 million. Though such release clauses, which are quite common on the mainland of Europe, are usually inflated in terms of the players real value, in this case it isn’t. (more…)
On the news of former Inter Milan defender, Davide Santon, to Newcastle United, I have trawled the Interweb for some more extensive videos of our new player. The ones I have posted above and below are merely a quick taste from ‘YouTube’. No less than 69 more videos of the player in action are available for download here. They encompass extended Santon action from the last three seasons and more.
Alternatively, they are also available here, either to watch on YouTube once again, or to download to your own machine using ‘megaupload.com’. It’s a Polish site, so click on ‘Zobacz’ to watch the streaming clips, or ‘Pobierz’ to download the files. (more…)
Welcome to the fourth in my small series of ‘blogs looking at Newcastle United’s new signings in the latest transfer window. In this episode, I will be looking at former West Ham and 1899 Hoffenheim player, Demba Ba.
I was going to write that this is the final of my little series, but like many other Newcastle United fans, I live in hope that the club will be bringing more players in before this transfer window ends!
Of course, much there has been much discussion on the subject of Ba’s knee, which has caused him to fail medicals at both VfB Stuttgart and Stoke City before he was signed by the Magpies. However, I have already probed Ba’s knee problem, which stemmed originally from complications arising from an operation on a broken tibia (the larger of the two bones connecting the knee and ankle) in this post. Here, I will concentrate on other aspects of his career so far. (more…)