Two great legends - One sadly missed,, and another who will be.Gary Speed MBE: 1969 – 2011.
With the sad news on Sunday morning of the passing of the ex-Newcastle United midfielder and Wales manager, I thought it would be a nice gesture to post something that would give an opportunity for our readers to reminisce about Speed’s career on Tyneside.
I wrote the this article as a tribute to the great man about three months ago. After contemplating doing a series of pieces highlighting some of my favourite Newcastle United players of the last decade. Gary Speed was the first player that entered my head when I thought of the more recent legends who have graced the black and white shirt, so he was the first subject of my ‘Magical Magpie Legends’ pieces.
I have also included a video below, posted by youtube user “pbraddazz”. It is a video tribute to Gary’s six and a half great years at Newcastle United, from his signing by Kenny Dalglish in February 1998, to the time of his departure in July 2004. There is also another video of Gary Speed’s his final appearence on Saturday’s “Football Focus”, which was recorded only a few hours before his tragic death.
Howard Kendall you dirty old goat!Venue: St James’ Park, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Date: Sat 5th November, 2011. Kick-off: 12.45pm. Referee: Andre Marriner (Linesmen: S Ledger & A Watts). TV: Sky Sports 2 / HD2.
Hello and welcome to our preview for Newcastle United’s home clash with the “Toffees” of Everton.
Don’t forget that as per usual, I will also be doing our usual “what the managers are saying” review in the run up to the game, and also our regular “match banter” feature where you can make comments, share good streams for the game etc while the match is in progress. This should be going up around and hour before the kick off. Also as usual, we shall also be posting our report of the game some time after.
It’s always particularly hard to predict how a game will go against the Toffees at this stage of the season. Good team, good manager. However, they do seem to have a recent history of starting erratically in the early stages of the season, then finishing with a burst to either scrape into, or just miss out on a European place. If they started seasons they way they finished them, they would almost certainly have made the Champion’s League more often than that one time in 2005. Their start this season has been dire, and sees them currently lying in 16th. However it must be said that have had had some stiff opposition and some bad luck too so far.
Kevin Keegan: The Entertainer.Speaking in a recent interview (here and here) on his “Entertainers” side of the 1990s, ex Newcastle United manager, Kevin Keegan, suggested that his own “Entertainers” side of the ‘nineties were the vanguard for current attacking teams such as Barcelona, Manchester City and Manchester United.
Speaking on the eve of a reunion last weekend with a Liverpool team who produced a nailbiting 4-3 classic which is still mentioned over fourteen years later, plus an “impostor” in the side who goes by the name of Alan Shearer. The Mighty Mouse started with a classic Keegan quote saying:
“Everybody said at the time we couldn’t win the league playing like that. Unfortunately they were proved right.”
Then adding:
“We should have won it, we just couldn’t get over the line. If you look at football now, Barcelona, Man City and Man United are playing like that now. The centre-backs and full-backs bomb on now and I think if we’d won the league like that, then there would be teams playing like that before now. We were ahead of our time.”(more…)
Craig Bellamy: Controversial as ever.Newcastle United old boy, Craig Bellamy, has a long and insightful interview on American site ‘EPL Talk.’
Given while Bellamy was in Orlando, Florida last month, coaching the youngsters at the 2011 Disney Soccer Academy, it covers quite a few topics from Bellamy’s time in the game. This included recollections of his five years at Newcastle (including a spell at Celtic on loan), and working with then manager, Sir Bobby Robson. This section has been transcribed for your reading pleasure below. As usual, Bellamy pulls no punches, accusing the Newcastle United fans for playing a big part in the Sir Bobby’s exit from the club, and saying that there is “no chance” he would ever play for Newcastle again because “there is no one else to play for up there”.
EPL Talk:“Lets talk about Newcastle United. What was was your greatest memory of playing there?”(more…)
As Given’s first 5 years at Newcastle came to an end, the 2002-2003 season began with United qualifying for the Champion’s League first group stage after a comfortable 5-0 aggregate win over Bosnia and Herzegovina’s FK Željezničar.
At the season’s start, Sir Bobby Robson had decided that he was going to alternate Given with Steve Harper for our European matches, a decision which did not bode to well with the Irishman:
“Personally I’m not adjusting very well to being in and out every week, I’d rather play in every game. But I’m not the manager and I don’t pick the team. It’s his decision, but I was very disappointed when I first found out. Hopefully he won’t do it too often. I don’t think you can keep alternating between the keepers for very long, but I don’t know what will happen.(more…)
