This could be the longest post I’ve ever did on the Magpies Zone, but I assume that all these stuff are important enough to be highlighted, so all my friends here can read too. I will start with the Sun’s report saying “Keegan Wanted To Sign Beckham, Lampard & Former Gunner Henry.”
And just like most of the press always said, the Sun comes up with this report from a Newcastle insider who told The Sun, as I quote below:
Keegan is said to have asked Magpies owner Mike Ashley to fork out almost £200million on packages to land the three players. However, this audacious demand was firmly dismissed by Ashley, according to a source at the North East club.
Ashley was already known to have been told Keegan that he only wanted young unknown players that would have more biggest selling price and could give huge benefits to the club (this is rather questionable one) just like what Arsenal’s did.
And so below are the reactions for the article above from two of Magpies Zone contributor and friend, Clarky and Macbeth which I can believe as the truth behind the Sun’s report.
If the report were accurate then Ashley would indeed have been right. However, as in all aspects of man management, it would then depend on how Ashley dealt with the situation.
If KK’s target list was Lampard, Becks and Henry, the right thing to do would have been to sit down with KK, preferably over a beer, find out how serious he was, discuss the merits of each player, their cost and likely benefit to the club, and then be prepared to debate your own thoughts on transfer policy, for as long as it took.
The objective would be to do your level best to develop a course of action you could both buy into, which would almost certainly require compromise by both parties. If agreement proved to be impossible, and KK was just sitting there insisting the club buy Lampard, Becks and Henry, you would then have to make it clear that that was not going to happen, and discuss what that meant for his continued employment.
What you would not do is get some weazle surrogate to ignore the Manager’s list, buy a few players that he fancied and fit your preferred requirement, and then during the last day of the transfer window try to sell several players the Manager had insisted were important to retain, and sign two players the Manager had already indicated he did not want, in the certain knowledge this would cause the Manager to resign despite the fact he was otherwise doing a first-class job for you.
That would be called an abrogation of management, and would be the kind of thing done by a moral coward who was afraid to do his own dirty work.
-Clarky-
I can’t think of any instances where Keegan bought old players at the end of their careers for excessive sums.
When he had money he bought Ferdinand, Ginola, Warren Barton, Hislop, and Shearer. When he didn’t have money he bought Robert Lee, Beresford, Sheedy (for a tiny amount), Venison (for a small amount). He just didn’t do old, expensive players.
The Sun (!) article just looks like poor spin from the club to try and discredit Keegan’s judgment. It only takes one or two to start saying “no smoke without fire” for it to be the absolute truth by next weekend.
If it is a whispering game, expect a “friend of Keegan’s” to be quoted saying that Keegan wanted to buy Stephen Warnock for £2m but the club wouldn’t sanction it.
-Macbeth-