Devastation on Strawberry Place... and then some hope
THE 24 hours that straddled Saturday’s encouraging win over Bournemouth summed up the state of Newcastle United perfectly.
A club that looked in serious trouble 42 days before that Bournemouth victory continues to confound expectation. What had looked like a crisis six weeks ago now looks like a quiet win for those, with Managing Director Lee Charnley preaching the message from the top, who answered frantic exhortations after the 5-0 at Leicester with assurances that level heads would prevail at St James’ Park.
There are several competing narratives at play in this Newcastle season: a squad affronted by the suggestion that they were totally reliant on Rafa Benitez have hit back, illustrating why one United insider reckons this group’s character might be worth six-nine points.
And a Head Coach who was embattled from the moment he walked in has proved that he is not the re-incarnation of the latter day Joe Kinnear that Ashley appointed (or even the hapless Steve McClaren) but is rather more competent than that. The long-term answer or a fitting successor to Benitez? Time will tell, but results of recent weeks should at least silence some of the more shrill social media voices.
Bruce could yet come unstuck and the club’s seven point cushion on the drop zone is easily eroded. But these wins should inject some balance into the narrative: he has bought time and is doing a better job and making more progress than McClaren, who the most uncomfortable comparisons were drawn with, ever did.
It was impossible not to marvel at the electricity when Allan SaintMaximin got on the ball on Saturday, either. Newcastle’s recruitment remains a bone of contention but one thing that former Chief Scout Graham Carr recognised was the importance of players who, in his own words, “can get Geordie bums off seats” – and his successor Steve Nickson saw that in the man Nice had tired of.
We were warned of Saint-Maximin’s
inconsistency by French observers – one journalist over the channel compared him to a Gallic Ravel Morrison at the pre-season friendly with St Etienne – but the pressure of being the man to turn around Newcastle’s season seems to have motivated rather than cowed him. He looks supremely suited to life in England and the black and white main stage, on and off-the-field.
And yet there are 5,000 missing supporters who will point to what happened on Friday in Jesmond’s Mansion House as evidence that missing those moments is a price worth paying to register their deep disenchantment at the way the club is being run under Ashley.
Friday’s D-day on Strawberry Place plans for a £120million development that will change the landscape around St James’ Park was a fait accompli. In truth, the fans – and there were more than a thousand – who registered opposition to them probably knew this had come too far down the line to block a process that was started when Ashley sold the land for the modest amount of £9million.
The decision to sell was splashed over the front pages in 2015 and it has been an ongoing issue raised by the Newcastle United Supporters Trust and concerned fans. Ashley has never spoken about it, the club have never assuaged the concerns of supporters (it is an Ashley issue, they have previously said) and getting answers has been historically difficult.
So there was element of powerlessness felt by the club’s fans when the development was voted through by the council. They, and the developers who have signalled a desire to work with the NUST to make the plan more acceptable and say they paid market rate for the land, have said concerns about possible ground expansion are unfounded and that they cannot influence how Ashley distributes the money made from the sale.
But it was irreversible decision taken by an unaccountable owner who has never made an attempt to explain the motivation or reasoning behind the sale. While the expansion issue is played down by the Trust these days it is land, argues Alex Hurst of the NUST, that could be used for a museum, club megastore or fanzone development.
At the very least, he argues, future owners might have ambitious plans to match what is going on elsewhere in the country with stadium and corporate developments. Instead Newcastle’s owner has gone down a different route.
“I think this decision will linger in the history books longer than the relegations,” Hurst says.
They’re now looking at other options. “We must reiterate that there is only one man to blame for this situation. Most football clubs are buying land around their stadium to safeguard its future, for commercial purposes or for stadium improvement works,” they said in a statement. “Strawberry Place could have been used to develop a Newcastle United hotel, museum, commercial development, fan area or other commercial development for the benefit of Newcastle United while safeguarding St. James’ Park.
“Instead the lease has been sold on, with one man making a multimillion pound profit. That money could, and should, at the very least, have been reinvested into Newcastle United Football Club.”
It was a statement that captured the difficulties of believing in Newcastle at the moment. There are good people on the ground at United – lots of them, as we witnessed at the brilliant Foundation dinner last week where United was at its very best – but Ashley’s presence means mistrust is the default for many.
But it is not so cut and dried. On Saturday there was a performance to fan the flames of hope. This, ridiculously, is the club’s best start to a Premier League season in five years – better, after 12 games, than either of Benitez’s two campaigns, which – although many have forgotten now – were largely played out against a backdrop of frustration and toxicity and of a man who seemed to be permanently wearied and angry at the club’s machinations.
It wasn’t fun but Saturday, for 65 minutes at least, was. If you could forget about the man who casts such a long shadow, you’d think they were building something at Newcastle. But Ashley is the asterisk against any upward momentum.