Nixon in China

It is now more than 10 days since the 2011 Summer Transfer Window closed (how tempting was it to use the “slammed shit” cliché there?), with Newcastle United, managing only to get a full back and third choice keeper “over the line,” despite the blatant need for another striker and centre back in the squad, which was the situation going back as far as last January and the sale of Andy Carroll. In the aftermath of another round of broken promises, failed rhetoric and empty words, the club has issued nonsensical and contradictory statements referring to  claims that both long term and short term targets had been sourced, approved and approached, only for the deals to fail over unspecified details (for example; the players didn’t want to come, the clubs didn’t want to sell or, more likely and as yet not confirmed, these potential deals were further examples of the smoke and mirrors chicanery that the current owners of the Magpies have gained an unenviable reputation for). In short, the squad is in exactly the same position, numerically, it was at the end of last season; Nolan, Barton, Enrique, Kuqi, Routledge, Campbell and Forster (the latter two temporarily) have all left the club, while Cabaye, Ba, Marveaux, Abeid, Obertan, Santon and Elliott have joined. Rest assured though, the supporters have no less respect for Alan Pardew than they had in the first place. The start to the season is proving to be tactically astute, even if he still comes across as a smarmy bullshitter in all his utterances to the press and fans.

While the initial moves to sign Czech keeper Petr Bolek were quickly abandoned, causing Lee Ryder to refer to this no-deal as “The Third Defenestration of Prague” (not really…), we did end up with Rob Elliott from Charlton. He may be a fine keeper and no doubt we will be seeing Frazer Forster eventually signing permanently at Parkhead and it seems clear that Steve Harper’s time on Tyneside coming to an end, whether he was actually injured or just sulking around August Bank Holiday weekend (I was astonished Chris Hughton didn’t try and take him to Birmingham I have to say), I still wonder whether there was any need to buy Elliott with both Soderberg and Jak Alnwick there to provide emergency back for to the admirable Tim Krul? Obviously the other purchase, Davide Santon (the straight replacement for Jose Enrique which still leaves the squad in the threadbare state of having only a single experienced left back on the books, whatever Shane Ferguson’s potential may be) arrives with a great reputation, though so did Alessandro Pistone many years ago. However, fair play to Santon, he went down to QPR, didn’t get off the bench, flew back and still turned out for the Reserves in their 6-0 twatting of Norwich the next afternoon. That shows a bit of dedication.

I know nothing of Santon; I also admit to knowing nothing of the other targets with whom we were linked; Modibo Maiaga's morganatic Magpie marriage may have been the most likely arrival from the names bandied around on Sky Sports and Twitter, but I am as ignorant of him as I am of the other alleged targets Mevlut Erdinc, Papiss Cisse, Eric Mououngui, Andre-Pierre Gignac or Bryan Ruiz. Thankfully the Twitterati Brains’ Trust was able to put me right about Ruiz; an anonymous opening 45 minutes for Fulham against Blackburn consigned the £11m striker to the “shit” category, so it looks like a bullet dodged there then. Of course it doesn’t prove anything of the sort, it just shows the idiocy of the foolish and fanciful short term memory loss clowns, who spend days hunched over lap-tops, work PCs and smart phones, blasting out their ill-considered, vacuous opinions via Twitter and message boards, or even blogs (but not this one of course; like Yohan Cabaye, I’m Nietzschean ubermensch!).

Frankly, it is a difficult call whether the owners or the fans of Newcastle United spout more bullshit. The cyber loons provide a constant low dosage drip feed of on-line inanity, while the owners serve up intermittent banquet sized chunks of dogshit doggerel.  Recently, as an apparent attempt to deal with supporter unease after the failure to “land the big name target man the whole Geordie nation were crying out for,” The Chronicle managed to get Llambias or some other hapless drone to give bland, platitudinous responses to a dozen bland, platitudinous questions that had been voted by on line participants as “the burning issues you the fans demand answers about NOW.” Clearly there was no chance of a face to face chat, in the way Chris Mort used to wine and dine certain fans a few years ago, nor could the journalists even get an audience with Llambias, much less a freebie all you can eat Cantonese buffet and striptease with Ashley. Perhaps they could have used Alan Smith or James Perch as spokespersons; after all, they’re doing nothing else at the club these days.

As a result of the minimal thawing of the PR permafrost on Barrack Road exemplified by evasive and / or shallow responses to dull, repetitive queries, both sides can go through the farcical charade of adopting the posture that an era of détente, unseen since the Nixon Mao summit of 1972, has been ushered in by the repeated use of “the owners remain committed to driving Newcastle United forward” in half a dozen different ways, like a Cameron press release set to music by Michael Nymon. Whether or not Ashley donates a symbolic Ling-Ling to NCJ Media after this pantomime or not, I still distinctly get the feeling the owners are taking the piss out of the club, the fans, the region and the players. Why else would our squad be so criminally weak in so many areas? We need a striker, a creative midfielder, as well as a centre half and a left back and we have done since April 2010 when promotion back to the Premier League was assured.

And yet, and yet, this miniscule amount of communication is a start isn’t it? In certain other areas of the web, Newcastle fans, off their own bat and without any form of mandate, sent unbidden emails to the club, replete with pointlessly confrontational questions that would never be answered in a month of Sundays. While wondering about the wit of composing emails that will be deleted seconds after they were opened, I’m presuming this approach and the argumentative content I’ve alluded to were not done with any remote intention of starting a dialogue with the club, but to portray the questions in the role of Alpha Confrontationalists, as a kind of hub or Mecca for absolutist nay-sayers who will never have any truck with the current ownership.  Such behaviour, to my mind, is the stock in trade of the message board cyber warrior, whereby anonymous tough guys attempt to cause maximum outrage from minimum effort. Frankly, they are more of a stain on the club than Ashley, Llambias or even Nile Ranger! I’m not saying these questions were of the same stamp, but the tactics come from the same manual.

Personally, and I may be naïve in this, I’m burning a candle of hope in the name of Newcastle Fans United, a loose amalgam of participants from various blogs, messageboards, fanzines,  supporters’ groups and other interested parties who meet up once a month, the first Monday generally, in the Irish Club to discuss how best to try to get opinion heard. The motivation to start this group was the abject failure of NUST to do anything much from April 2010. While “Yes we Can” was a wonderful idea, the whole organisation has become a moribund irrelevance in the last 18 months. This may be an opinion shared by huge sections of our support, but it doesn’t mean Newcastle Fans United are representing every section of the support just yet.

Clearly NUST, or more accurately the committee, believe they have their own legitimate part to play in the long war and don’t wish to be involved. Unsurprisingly “The Mag,” which remains resolutely apolitical, is still closely linked to NUST, though I don’t believe any formal links between the two entities have been forged. Biffa, the maverick behind the glorious www.nufc.com is very much of the Groucho Marx position and keeps his own counsel. While Steve Wraith and his superb fanzine “Toon Talk” are prime movers behind Newcastle Fans United, the third and final NUFC fanzine, Mickey Edmundson’s excellent “Black & White Daft,” which has a clear aim to concentrate on the history of the club mixed with humorous articles, is sympathetic to the cause rather than active in it. It would be excellent if all these diverse groups came and joined us. Unity is strength of course!

What is Newcastle Fans United about? Well, at present a Mission Statement (based on the Shakespearean maxim that “brevity is wit”) is being worked on. Basically, it’s like the TUC of NUFC support; a massive range of opinions and different interest groups (everyone’s welcome, providing they subscribe to our basic principles) come together on a regular basis, discuss the supporter issues of the day and pass these comments on to the ownership, via veteran campaigner for a more democratic Newcastle United, Malcolm Dix. As opinions and attitudes vary from those boycotting the club, to hard-core away travellers and from Ashley sympathisers to rabble rousing smart arse mavericks like myself, there is no way we can ever hope to get an overwhelming consensus of opinion on any given matter.

However, and this is the beauty, that doesn’t matter. We are raising issues that are important to the fans and asking for replies. Unlike some, we don’t demand an insight in to club finances, wage structure or future transfer targets and we aren’t out to pick a fight. Neil Mitchell, ex NUST leading light and a regular fanzine writer, was charged with submitting 4 questions to the owners via The Chronicle; this he did, with wit, with subtlety and with craft. They obviously remain unanswered, but I bet you they made the owners think!

Here’s an example of how Newcastle Fans United might work. At the end of last season, the singing section in Level 7 was dispersed, ostensibly because of a need for an extended family sector, but probably because it was the main source of anti-Ashley singing. Their representatives were strung along by the club with vague promises of a mass relocation to Level 4. It didn’t happen and so now all the half-pissed, shoe-waving, charva Poznarnia are scattered about the ground, behaving at the Arsenal and Fulham games like they were still in their own Private Idaho. As a result many regulars who’ve sat in the same seat for 20+ years have to deal with these teenage tyros standing up all game. In many cases arguments took place, in others, blows were exchanged.

In Newcastle Fans United, some support the youngsters and their right to break ground regulations; I don’t personally as I go to games to watch football not act the giddy goat. However, we all recognise this situation is of the club’s making and they can put it right, if they choose to. Hence, a confrontational approach to Llambias may say “Why don’t you admit you were spiteful in dispersing the L7 singers and let them gather up there again, instead of picking on them?” This will get you nowhere, whilst a more reasoned, inclusive comment along the lines of “Newcastle Fans United recognises the problems caused by the reintegration of former L7 habitués in to the body politic of SJP. Would it not be possible to satisfy the requirements of all sides if they were allowed to congregate in one defined area from the next available match, with a firm undertaking not to breach ground regulations?”  It may seem like collaboration, but I’d rather see compromise than conflict if it means getting some kind of dialogue going. We have to show willing and they we are not Ashley Out with no second thought about what happens next.

We may be naïve and nothing may come of it; certainly I’m vehemently opposed on ideological grounds to the proposal to pass on freebies engineered by Fiorentina tickets to members of the Armed Forces. That said; the Newcastle Fans United tent is one I intend to remain inside for a while yet. I remain optimistic pressure can be brought that will bring Francisco Jiminez Tejada back home to where he belongs.