JaMoUsE

now been made favourites to win the league at 2/1 with west brom being moved out to 5/2

ive got sheff utd on my bet

George Caulkin I love Kevin Keegan, love him. I don’t love him because he has been attempting to wrest compensation from Newcastle United and I certainly don’t love him because I’ve got a Messiah complex (and it would be greatly appreciated if somebody, anybody, took notice of that). I don’t love him because he left the club at a difficult moment a year ago, nor do I love him because he has held his tongue since doing so. Before anyone gets any funny ideas, I love other football people, too. In no particular order, I love Niall Quinn, Steve Gibson and I ****ing love Peter Reid. I desperately love Sir Bobby Robson, I love Alan Shearer and I’ve got a feeling that I’m going to love Steve Bruce and Darren Bent. I’m pretty damn keen on Steve Harper and Gareth Southgate. I love Newcastle, Sunderland and Middlesbrough. I love my home. But this is a column about Keegan, who has been thrust back into the headlines recently. I loved him as a player, the belief that everything begins with hard work, the (Mag)Pied Piper qualities he demonstrated at St James’ Park. I love him because of his approach to football, the freedom he nurtured in his teams, the self-respect. When he returned as manager, I love it that the first thing he did was fumigate the dressing-rooms. After he dragged Newcastle off their knees, I loved 1992-93, when the side shimmered with neat, quick, triangular football and were promoted as champions. I loved it because Keegan urged supporters to gaze at the stars and believe anything was possible. I love it even more now, because so much of football feels hemmed in. I loved it that the glorious mania prompted rogue sightings of Roberto Baggio in Wallsend chipshops. I loved it when Keegan opened Newcastle’s training ground to fans and hundreds of them turned up. From a professional point of view, I loved it that he welcomed reporters to Maiden Castle every day, where they could tap players on the shoulder and, if they agreed, talk to them. From a personal point of view, I loved it because one of those players became my best man, even if our friendship lasted longer than my marriage. I loved hearing about Keegan’s powers of persuasion, convincing Robert Lee that Newcastle was closer to London than Middlesbrough and then moulding him into an England international. I didn’t care that his tactical prowess was mocked, because he made players feel like gods and somehow prompted them to overachieve. I loved his unshakeable faith in attacking football. I loved the headlong tilts at the title, the acquisitions of Les Ferdinand, David Ginola and Shearer. I wish that Newcastle had grasped the championship ahead of Manchester United, although I loved that season anyway and never winning anything but singing regardless is now ingrained as a defining feature of those born with a black-and-white lifetime sentence. I didn’t love it when he took his leave of Tyneside in 1997, although I understood it. In the space of five years, the club had been transformed beyond all recognition and in the rush to embrace the City, they would be transformed further. I never loved the Hall or Shepherd families, although like many people, I was blindsided by the ambition, the changes to the ground and convinced myself that the shares, dividends and salaries were forgivable. In the face of widespread bewilderment - including my own - I loved it when Keegan came back to Gallowgate in January 2008. Anybody who was present in the city on that heady day will have felt something similar; a veil lifting, eyes opening, hearts beating. It had not been that way for a very long time and this was a reminder that football could be fun, impetuous, beautiful, mad. For similar reasons, I loved it when Keegan said the following in an interview with this newspaper: “I want people to dream about their football club. They should, we should all be dreamers at heart. Some people are the opposite and say ‘we can’t do that’, but when you ask them why, they can’t give a reason. Well, I say, ‘Why not?’”. He talked about “unfinished business” and I think he believed he could charm and cajole Mike Ashley. I detested the way Keegan was treated. Having embraced Geordie sentimentality and appointed a man who dealt in dreams, Ashley strapped his manager into a straitjacket. He brought in Dennis Wise as executive director (football), roles were not defined with any clarity, Keegan was slapped down in public and ultimately left when - allegedly - players were signed without his approval. It was nonsensical and, this time, not in a good way. The last 12 months have not been kind to Keegan, but that is not his fault. When Sam Allardyce was sacked as manager, his contract was settled within days, but a dispute over whether Keegan resigned or was pushed has meant a long, bitter process. As Newcastle struggled and then suffered relegation, it was natural that some sympathy would swing against him, although he has not been able to speak out. He remained silent in the face of briefings against him. Keegan stood up for principle; managers should manage. The man Ashley hired might have been weathered by his experiences with England - I would term his decision to step down as honest, not weak - but he had always used his power as a bargaining chip (Freddy Shepherd claims to have letters of resignation from him framed on his toilet wall). For better or worse, he then stood up for what he thinks he is owed. What I hate is that a day before the Premier League arbitration panel which has been hearing Keegan’s case was due to break up and consider their verdict, a story leaked that Newcastle would be threatened with administration should their former employer win. Derek Llambias, the managing director, had already stated publicly that such a measure was not being considered and the timing felt both risible and transparent. A source close to the takeover saga at Newcastle (some doubt the veracity of ‘sources’ or ‘insiders’, but there are people who will only speak to journalists on the basis of anonymity - honest), insists that Keegan’s claim is not a concern within Seymour Pierce, the bank charged with handling the club’s sale, and that Barry Moat’s bid is ongoing. But 12 months on - four after their demotion - and suddenly administration is an issue! For all their heartening success on the field since August, Newcastle is still a club being run by men asleep at the wheel, full of contradiction and questions; a club where ‘Malaysian’ businessmen, who Seymour Pierce said had made no contact with them, can be shown around the ground, where Ashley and Llambias can heap praise on Shearer and then let him dangle. And too many other things, whether before or afterwards. I will love Kevin Keegan whatever result the independent panel come to. I will love him for reasons which Ashley and Llambias could never understand, because he gave uplift to Newcastle, hope and inspiration, he made a region sparkle and people smile. I do not, for a single moment, suggest that he is perfect, but his team came close to perfection. If circumstances ever allow it, I would love to think he’ll discuss it all. I love him because of something Robson once wrote. “What is a club in any case? Not the buildings or the directors or the people who are paid to represent it. It’s not the television contracts, get-out clauses or the marketing departments or executive boxes. It’s the noise, the passion, the feeling of belonging, the pride in your city.” He has human flaws. He might, indeed, have material interests. But Keegan always dealt in love.

only company still taking bets on next manager is www.betdaq.com and shearers 1/16!

The times, The Daily Mail, The mirror and The telgraph all had articles saying tomoro could be the day.... oh and it is the "end of the 'working' week"

Ker-Ching!!!!

My accumulator tonite consists of Peterborough Liverpool Sunderland Tottenham - tomoro Man Utd - tomoro £10 returns £164

peterborough are certs against our kids. 2/1 is free money

this match is an absolute home banker and at 2/1 its giving away money. We will play at least 5 kids

good luck mate its a worthy cause

on the topic of betting did any1 manage to get some money on paddy powers Newcastle to win away at cardiff 3 hour special on saturday morning before it was removed due to too much money going on it i presume? Nice little earner for me that was at 5/1

funnily enuff he sid he needed to see a reply as he had missed it and couldnt comment haha. At least hes consistent

total wanker hope they throw the book at him

2 adult blackpool away tickets for sale Sold

i think its decent regardless of how much i have paid i much prefer it when we have a bigger attendance and an atmosphere at the ground

Attendance: 22563 Joke really

useless tw@ts

glad i stuck a tenner on a huddersfield, spurs and blackpool accumulator now. should score for a tidy £300

stick all your money on hudddersfield now at 5/1

Sounds to me like Lee Ryders ITK is Redheugh n'all............

shouldnt stereotype really, All the trouble ive seen and heard was west ham fans being dicks.... Sure it will help the World cup bid no end - stupid pr1cks

has to be a bloke like......... Tests have revealed Caster Semenya's testosterone level to be three times higher than those normally expected in a female sample, BBC Sport understands. Analysis prior to the World Athletics Championships and the 18-year-old's big improvement prompted calls for a gender test from the sport's governing body. It was made public only hours before the South African, who has been backed by her nation, won the 800m in Berlin. A high level of the hormone does not always equate to a failed drugs test. But the news will only increase speculation surrounding Semenya, who arrived back in South Africa to a rapturous welcome on Tuesday. Semenya was welcomed by hundreds of well-wishers on her return to South Africa Hundreds turned out in Johannesburg to greet the teenager, who has stunned the athletics world with her performances this season. She ran a time of one minute, 56.72 seconds in Bambous in July to smash her previous personal best by more than seven seconds. She also broke Zola Budd's long-standing South African record and arrived at the World Championships as the newly crowned African junior champion. Then in Berlin she left her rivals trailing to win gold in a time of 1:55.45. Defending champion Janeth Jepkosgei was second, a massive 2.45 seconds adrift, with Britain's Jenny Meadows taking the bronze medal. Only hours before the race, it leaked out that the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) had demanded Semenya take a gender test amid fears she should not be allowed to run as a woman. It has since emerged that news of the test only became public knowledge because a fax was sent to the wrong person. Caster is like my child. I know where she comes from. For myself, I know Caster is a girl Semenya's uncle It has also been revealed that following the findings of initial tests, the South Africans were asked by the IAAF to withdraw her from the team at the World Championships. Since then, both her family and South African athletics chiefs have leapt to her defence, insisting she is 100% female. "Caster is a girl. I am not worried about that too much," said her uncle on her arrival back in South Africa. "Caster is like my child. I know where she comes from. For myself, I know Caster is a girl." Leonard Chuene, president of Athletics South Africa (ASA), has resigned from his seat on the IAAF board in protest against the organisation's treatment of Semenya. "It will not be fair for me to attack the IAAF as a council member and representative of South Africa. It is a conflict of interest," Chuene told BBC's Newshour programme. Chuene also asked that the issue be laid to rest. "We have not once, as ASA, doubted her," he said. "It's very simple - she's a girl. "We took this child to Poland to the junior championship under the IAAF. Why was there no story about it? She was accepted there. "No-one said anything there because she did not do anything special. She is the same girl." Testosterone levels can vary widely, which makes it hard to detect possible infractions. When analysis shows an athlete to have a raised level, they are monitored at regular intervals over a set period to establish what their underlying levels would be. That is then used as a marker for the future, so any sharp differences immediately stand out as suspicious. An analysis of Semenya's testosterone levels was carried out in South Africa and it is understood that this information contributed to the IAAF's decision to request the ASA carry out a detailed "gender verification" test on the athlete. Those medical tests are said to be ongoing, with the results not expected for several weeks. On Sunday, IAAF president Lamine Diack admitted the affair could have been treated with more sensitivity. "It should not even have become an issue if the confidentiality had been respected," he said. "There was a leak of confidentiality at some point and this led to some insensitive reactions."

Inglourious Basterds is class, really enjoyed it and im pretty hard to please with films

much rather have lovenkrands on a free. hes be very decent in the championship.

this stinks of timewasiting to just keep hold of the club until the deadline then taking it off the market