CHELSEA v NEWCASTLE STAN COLLYMORE If Benitez goes then all hope goes with him
CONTE: I’M HONEST AND I HATE FAKES
THREE months ago the outlook was rosy for Newcastle fans.
Mike Ashley was on his way out, Amanda Staveley and her big-bucks backers were on their way in, and Rafa Benitez was finally going to be handed a transfer kitty befitting his and the club’s status in the game.
That would give him the encouragement to sign a new deal and, in turn, push the club back to the levels they were in the heady days when Tino Asprilla’s hat-trick was helping them to Champions League victory over Barcelona.
Yet here we are, 12 weeks on and with just four days remaining in the transfer window, and none of that has come to fruition. Instead, the future looks distinctly like the past.
And that best-case scenario has been replaced by a worst-case one which has neither Staveley nor Benitez anywhere near St James’ Park in the summer, and deeply unpopular Ashley the last man standing.
The problem with that for Ashley is that Newcastle supporters were given a taste of what might have been and they liked it. But now it’s a bit like TV show Bullseye – “Just look at what you could have won”.
Unless Ashley ploughs in some serious dough this week, there will trouble ahead on Tyneside.
Genuine
Yes, he has already pushed the button on the deal to sign Kenedy on loan from Chelsea and, yes, Islam Slimani is another who could be added to the squad. But adding a player Chelsea don’t want for the next five months and another Leicester City don’t want at all is hardly the major surgery the Newcastle squad so desperately needs.
By my reckoning, and I’m talking ability-wise rather than form here, Toon have only two players who would be genuine performers in the top half of the table week in, week out... and they are Jacob Murphy and Matt Ritchie.
So the addition of winger Kenedy and frontman Slimani, hardly Premier League sensations, does not even constitute minor surgery – it’s more of a sticking plaster, really.
I’m certain Newcastle fans would much rather they were signing their own players, men who want to be at the club for a few years, rather than picking up cast-offs.
Anybody is better than nobody, don’t get me wrong, but bringing in loanees until the end of the season is not a longterm solution. Ashley is wealthy enough LUIS ENRIQUE is a leading contender to become Chelsea’s next manager. The former Barcelona and Roma boss is at the front of the Blues’ thinking with Antonio Conte’s reign coming to an end. Enrique is ahead of other candidates Diego Simeone and Massimiliano Allegri for a summer appointment. Enrique left Barcelona last summer when his contract expired after winning La Liga and the Champions League. Conte is fighting battles at Stamford Bridge, unhappy at the club’s transfer activity – including recruitment and sales. to make the signings Newcastle need, despite his protests that he can’t compete with the sovereign wealth of some clubs.
He certainly has enough dough to be putting Newcastle in the top eight, which would more than pacify the supporters for the next couple of seasons.
Ashley is raking in £100million a year from the Premier League alone.
Do Crystal Palace have the money Ashley has got?
No, yet they still have Wilfried Zaha, Christian Benteke and Yohan Cabaye in their ranks, the sort of players Newcastle so sorely need.
Benitez knows this as well as anyone and it won’t be pleasing him.
And the fact he’d have no trouble walking into two or three of the biggest clubs in Germany, Italy and, not least, Spain means he’s probably already looking at jobs that will be coming up on the continent in the summer. r.
Benitez is a manager who likes kes to run things right across the club, from m the youngest kid to the oldest pro. Benign dictators, I like to call them.
And while I don’t think managers should have that sort t of control at clubs the size of Liverpool (Rafa’s old outfit), at Newcastle I think he should be given it.
Ashley is still fighting him on that front, though, and if the Spaniard does end up leaving in the summer – or before – then who will the owner turn to?
Most managers worth their salt would probably look at the e battles Benitez has had and tell l Ashley, ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ if he were to offer them the job.
For all of the big old clubs like ke ANTONIO CONTE has warned Chelsea he will NEVER be silenced and will always tell the truth – whatever the consequences. The Chelsea head coach has got himself in hot water this season with frank statements in press conferences before and after matches. A high-profile and drawn-out spat with Jose Mourinho ended with Conte Newcastle, Everton, Leeds, Nottingham Forest, or Derby, recapturing the glory years is getting more and more difficult.
It’s 10 times more difficult for managers and owners at those clubs than it is for those at, say, Watford, West Brom, Palace or Bournemouth.
But Newcastle have an ace up their sleeve in the shape of their manager, who won the Spanish League title with Valencia and the Champions League with Liverpool before going on to lead Chelsea and Real Madrid.
He is the man to guide them back to the top.
A win against Chelsea in the FA Cup today, followed by more signings this week, will alter everyone’s mood on Tyneside drastically.
We’ll have to wait and see what Ashley’s move is in the coming days but if it’s a wrong one then trouble – more
trouble – lies ahead. calling his rival “a little man” and left Chelsea embarrassed.
Now, his vocal frustration at the club’s lack of success in the transfer market – and moans about his paperthin squad – have led to reports he may be axed at the end of the season.
But the Italian has warned he will never change.
“I’m this way,” he said, ahead of today’s clash against Newcastle.
“I’m not a diplomatic man, I think you can see this. Whoever knows me, knows I’m not a diplomatic man.
“But, at the same time, I’m very honest. If you’re fake, you always try not to tell the truth. I hate fake people.”
Conte insists he has no regrets about anything he has done so far at Chelsea – whether that is decisions made on the pitch or comments made off it – and defends his record at the Bridge. “No regrets, no,” he said.
“When I look at what we have done at Chelsea, I’m really proud because I think we are doing fantastic things.”
But with reports of strained relationships behind the scenes, particularly with key transfer negotiator Marina Granovskaia, it does mean there may be plenty more spats ahead.
So would Conte be outspoken, even if it ended up costing him his job?
“This is a good question,” he said, after initially laughing. “But I answered you before.”