He keeps Penfold in his position and significantly under funds our squad (whilst milking advertising)... so is he knowingly sealing our relegation fate. Genuine thought. When we get relegated and the fan base melts down...as the old saying goes... there’s no such thing as bad publicity....
no I genuinely don’t think he wants us to go down, that said he doesn’t care enough to do anything about it. Think he’s just happy to roll the dice and see what happens with the min amount of investment and effort
He's never wanted us to, but is so utterly out of his depth he can't avoid it. I've said it elsewhere, if you're going to run a club on a Championship/League One budget, that's where you'll end up. You can't employ just ONE senior exec and then expect transfers to 'just happen'. Ashley sees it as simple. And it maybe SHOULD be simple. But it's not. There's agents, crazy TV money, etc., but Mike's world is based purely on profit, loss and breaking even as a bare minimum. There's no room for borrowing, there's no speculation. He doesn't go out with Sports Direct, borrow £50m and open another hundred stores in the hope of being marginally more successful. Football is simply lost on him, he's got no idea what he's doing and doesn't have the humility nor character to accept the mistakes and fix them. It's too much effort. I don't think he's a hateful man, just not a very clever one. He had one barrow-boy idea which took off - sell cheap ****, cheaper than anyone else, to people with no money. Look at his other ideas - Sports Direct mug? It's ****ing laughable, but he's already too wealthy so doesn't care. Zero hour contracts, fights with MP's, allegations of sweat shop sourcing, and the whole "say nothing or you're sacked"....it's just a crap shop, but the UK is a crap country, so it works. Genius? Nope. Just so obvious even a moron like Ashley can come up with it. Borrowed the money from the Bank of Mum & Dad, ffs, no business plan for him. Just a crappy high street shop in Maidenhead with permanent "everything must go" stickers in the window and the REAL British people bought it, hook line and sinker. The second thing here is Mike operates in one way - with trusted friends in high positions. Look at his son in law, J. Barnes, K. Bishop, D. Llambias, T. Jimenez, D. Wise, J. Kinnear......and L. Charnley. All promoted vastly above their station, because of how much Mike values trust above a) intelligence, and b) experience. Without bringing in the proper resources or support you are destined to fail, which is what we are doing. I genuinely think he believed Rafa would solve everything. Hence why we smashed our pay structure to bring him in. But Rafa has no say on how the cheque is spent or what is written upon it, hence we have no new training facility, no wide scouting network, no new players. By extension, Charnley operates how Mike wants. He keeps the balance sheet healthy. He does what he's told. He says nothing, he rocks no boat. The blame lies at Sky's door, or the PL's, or Man City's - it's THEIR fault the money's crazy, it's not Lee's fault he can't get players in. If your aim every year is 17th, you're merely one place from complete failure. That's us. Preparing to fail, expecting the worst. It's right back to the days of McKeag - I'm not entirely convinced there's a John Hall waiting to save us this time.
Newcastle United have gained instant promotion as Champions, twice. Ashley now believes it doesn't really matter if we get relegated as we'll easily come back. This new era of being a yo-yo club and simply making up the numbers in the Premier League is hard to accept. Everything is in place at Newcastle United, yet Ashley simply refuses to attempt to compete. Benitez made it perfectly clear when he stated that the Premier League is totally changed from two years ago, and I thought it was telling how he said that you have to decide if you want to compete or not. Ashley decided long ago. Clearly.
Really hope the fans for once for the good of the club walk with their feet as I believe it's coming into season ticket renewal time this or next month
They really have to show their contempt because when you are treated with contempt like they have you really do need to reciprocate
IF we stay up, and IF this season's money gets spent in full to improve the squad then it's fair enough, we will be back on some kind of even keel and meltdown can be avoided (and chucking in the season tickets). But if there is relegation and/or squirrelling away of the Premier League money again then I couldn't blame any fans for saying "sayonara". Many will still hold out hope for a takeover and I can't blame them for that either. Most will go back just because they enjoy it and want to support the club.
Ashley doesn't want us relegated, but his business model, which he stubbornly sticks to, leaves a lot to be desired. It is the wage structure which is crippling us as much as anything. We can't compete for players because he wants the club to be as profitable as possible and that means being tight on wages. It's ****ing suicide.
We really are a disgrace of a so called football club. If I were a fan of an opposing team I’d want to see us drop like a stone ASAP to no longer blight the EPL landscape. Comedy club, horribly run by horrible bastards.
Definitely not. I think its a stupid notion to be honest. It just costs more money and we would always be at risk of not bouncing back too. If he wanted to be relegated he wouldn't have given us all the clubs money to use. He just needs the two guys below him in the chain to start doing their jobs better. One in particular.
I have this fantasy where I wrap as much of my fingers as I can around his fat throat and just squeeze and squeeze till he stops struggling
Of course Ashley doesn't want us to get relegated - its costs him money. He loses out to the tune of at least 50million if that happens. However I think he feels that splashing out serious amounts on players is too big a risk to take to try and stay up. He is worried he will get burnt again like he did in 2015. It could end up with him splashing out 50mill and then not securing his extra 50mill for staying up. What baffles me though is if he really wanted to sell the club for top dollar then it is imperative we stay up. It makes absolute business sense to invest in the playing side now to go from the supposed 250mill that AS wanted to the 350mill that he wants. Or at least bring in good quality loan players to get us through this season. Don't see why any opposing fan would want to see us drop through the leagues. We are a crowd puller when we are in the Championship and a generous donator of points to the opposition at SJP when we are in the Premier League. Think it is important to the PL that there is a NE team in the mix and it doesn't look like the shower down the road are going to be there any time soon.
Yeh - but it wouldn't be because we are badly run as ACS implies. I suspect that there is less spite towards us now that we are not capable of competing, although fans have long memories.
A lot of talk on boycotting games banging around yet again. That has absolutely sod all to do with anything and just makes things worse. I despair at the stupidity of people - but then any society that allows someone like Mike Ashley to rise to the rank of billionaire is bound to be a little dim. It basically comes down to - Ashley won't sell if we go down. Charnley won't leave if Ashley's in charge. Nothing will change if Ashley remains. The club has ONE chance to get rid - stay up. We MUST stay up, then he will sell and go. So for all the anger all of us feel, the only solution is to support the team like its' never been supported before. To go to every game like its the cup final and we're against Man City, to KNOW we're not only the underdog in every match, but also KNOW that we're the worst team in the division and support them without condition, through the misplaced passes, sliced clearances, backwards play and the missed chances. The away fans do it, and I think the away record justifies this stance, but I think the biggest thing the City of Newcastle could do is do everything it can to get SJP back to something to be proud of.
