So is his 'genius' a myth? One of the big things he is meant to do is research a players mindset to ensure they have what it takes for the PL. Judging by the attitude of some of our foreign imports I'd suggest he forgot that step in his recruitment drive. He seems to dine out on the Cabaye and Debuchy returns on investment still... Which is a worry. Why he persists with the French market is beyond me. I for one have changed my views about the bloke and quite frankly I'd rather have Alan Carr in charge of recruitment right now....
There doesn't seem to be too many recent finds who we can be really happy with. I like Perez, but his best years may be ahead of him. It might a case though of any decent player being made to look poor with McClaren's 25% possession gameplan style.
Cabaye Debuchy Janmaat Mbemba Perez Gini See- even a Mackem can count his good signings on one hand. Him and Ashley are the two constants at our club so if fat Ash isn't going I think Carr should. The **** has too much power.
And this is why his status for 'finding hidden gems' is a myth... These were already, well known, established, international players. Mbemba and Perez, now they are two quality signings that I suspect wouldn't have been on anybody else's radar as serious targets. He has simply raided the French market while prices were still low. He found the right market, at the right time. Totally different to finding hidden gems.
To be fair, even Mbemba was on the radar following some impressive CL performances for Anderlecht. Several Italian clubs were after him. Perez was also linked with Valencia and Sevilla before we stepped in. I think with Carr it's a case of his contacts alert him to someone that others are watching. If a reasonable name is watching then Carr assumes that 'they must be good.' Marveaux and Liverpool is a perfect example. He has close relationahips with several of Europes more well known football agents as well. The guy is simply a fraud with a lot of contacts.
I'd like to look at the **** the he has found. The list is endless....../ your going to get lucky on some occasions but some of the money we have spunked on basically gambles is beyond a joke. The end is near I fear. When you gamble you always lose over time and that time is this season.
People said Ashley stopped us doing a Leeds. Guess what? We are doing a Leeds. We will be a mid-table Championship club next season. The only difference is that we will have a healthy bank balance that means **** all in the world of football and sport.
This is a very good article, I think he has found more good players than bad (Just). See what y'all think! http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/spor...newcastle-uniteds-transfers-2010-how-10643160
We may as well have his son picking our new players!! At least he may use, the much under-rated, "seems like a nice boy" scale.!!
Just looked at that list. I'd say tiote has become a failure. Hatem was a failure. Cisse has become a failure. Haidara is a failure. Colback is a failure.
Thing is we can't blame Carr for players becoming a failure. Ben Arfa was a success until he got on Ashley's Bandwagon to Greggs, Cisse still has a good goal return although he does love being offside. Haidara was a player brought in to improve and hasn't enough. Colback was good enough initially and appears to have regressed. When we go to buy players it's always as a replacement. We don't look to get decent depth in and to be honest our financial model probably means we can't afford to have too many "purple players" on the bench. This means that if we have to replace a Cabaye, we have 1 chance to get it right which is never going to happen all the time (same with other teams). The other problem that we as fans have is that we don't have enough information about how the scouting decisions are made. We can all agree that we need some PL experience brought into the team in January Question is how much power does the board have? Does it have to bow to directives from Ashley? Is it in fact Penfold deciding everything with Carr and Tufty having ceremonial board titles or do they all agree that ligue 2 French players are the way forward? Clearly the only way to fix this situation is to get rid of the entire board and start again with experienced footballing personnel. not glorified tea makers.
need to venture away from france like .. good scandinavian player , or geman etc not french all the time
He's done no better a job than your average layman could considering the circumstances. Having said that, how many good players has he identified as targets who Ashley & Charnley/Llambias have let go because of price, preferring to be outbid by much less powerful clubs financially speaking or not going for them at all? You can get on the managers' backs, the players' backs, the coaches' backs, Charnley's back and Graham Carr's back, but everything comes back to that fat, odious, jumble sale owning, pile of evil blubber that is Mike Ashley. He sets the transfer blueprint and Carr has to work to it.
Orrrr...and this is a new concept so brace yourselves...a British player! Although basically I fully agree. Somehow those sort of nationalities seem to fit into our game a bit easier. Just kind of get on with it better.
This is more or less bang on. If we apply severe limitations to the structure, so the rest will fail. What I cannot get my head around is of the 8 or 9 years Ashley has been here, we've had one good season. Every other season has been poor, at best, disastrous at worst. We had talk of five year plans, only for Mort, Llambias and Irving to all leave the sinking ship. Still we persevere. The incredibly limited Alan Pardew wouldn't stick it out. Still we persevere. John Carver chosen by the same idiots failing everywhere, nearly takes us down - still we persevere. 7 wins in the whole of 2015. Still we persevere. It's inexplicable, really, because Ashley cannot WANT to fail, even if he hates the area. Thing is - and this is extraordinary - we are hard work to own; he could sell this club for around £200m, retain some SD interest via a part of the loan then comfortably purchase Everton, valued at £200m and surely easier to keep up than our shower. Why doesn't the fat fcker pi$$ off to Merseyside?? He is such an insufferably, inexplicably baffling individual. Who were we in a previous life to deserve this bloke?
You'd think the penny would have dropped by now, wouldn't you? I'll paraphrase Keegan yet again, "the first thing you need to know about Mike Ashley is he knows nothing about football".
He gets £100m+ a year from sky, and unlimited advertising of his disgusting company which would cost him an arm and a leg in the real world. Unfortunately, we're stuck with the horrible feccer.
Seriously, you really would if not for one simple fact - our owner owns shops. Shops that appeal to basic football fans. The Premier League is a billboard for 1 billion people every week, each of whom is an existing or potential Sports Direct customer. End of story. There is one thing that will make him sell, and I wonder if he sees it coming; in the Champions League, they have a set sponsor list. It's what makes it so lucrative, only certain sponsors can be seen at matches - as per the Rugby World Cup, you may recall the blissful sight of all SD posters being covered to make room for official sponsorship. It's entirely possible that the Premier League, to retain it's commercial appeal, will embark upon the same guidelines. If that's the case, he couldn't just plaster SD wherever he wanted - he'd have to PAY the PL to do it. At this point, he starts to have to spunk some of his precious MASH cash. It would presumably be a bidding war as well, space would be limited, there'd be a premium for it. At that point, it starts to cost HIM (NUFC couldn't pay for MASH advertising) money. A lot of money. With no guarantees on profit. I think this is the zenith he's keeping an eye out for. Sod the club, the fans, the league, Europe - none of that matters. It's free advertising this bloated goon wants.
