Kitman

I only ever remember Foot as a wurzel gummidge looky-likey, whose delivery and intonation was so bad, his sentences were almost nonsensical. I recall hearing him speak on the telly and he made 'the' and 'and' the most important words in his sentences. he looked and sounded completely mad, although my Dad said he was a very clever bloke (he also referred to him as a 'communist traitor' mind you!). His disastrous image in his latter days may well be responsible for the rise of Blair and Cameron, media savvy soundbite politicians more concerned with their poll ratings than policy. Doesn't matter what you say, as long as it sounds good and you don't look as mad as a box of frogs.

Is there any indication Ashley still wants to sell up?

As much as I admire your positivity CT, all Ashley et al have done this season is show they can run a championship football club pretty well. But it's not much to be grateful for considering we were a PL club when they took over. It would be nice to think we're on an upward arc, but given they made such a mess of things last time around, I think I'll wait and see.

I don't think Caulkin's article adds anything to the debate actually.

No, but theres so many baa'ing sheep in this thread its like a stoning from Monty Python. We all know the History that started under Fat Fred (for leazes), looked canny for a bit with Mort and then blew up having rushed in Keegan. And we all know the heap of mistakes made since. But, unlike some on here I dont hold Ashley solely responsible for everything thats gone wrong or dismiss every statement that is made simply because of the past. Ashley tried to copy Tottenham, tried to put a structure in place and was very badly advised by poorly qualified people (Llambias). But the past is the past and this season is going in the right direction (opposite to what most on here were predicting early doors). Hughton has been backed and the GOAL this year was to get promoted. That looks as though it may happen and we will see what comes next. But constantly moaning on does fuck all for the club. At times its like a fucking Ian Paisley convention. Life moves on. I think people are entitled to criticise when LLambias tries to spin the past to make the regime look good. The main reason we're moving forward now is because he took the club a long way backwards. I refuse to be grateful for that.

I think you're onto something here. There ought to be a tramp's rate card for this sort of thing: Front doors of SD shop - 5 Inside the shop - 10 Over the shop merchandise (excl toon tops) - 20 In Ashley's office - 100 Front doors of Ashley's house - 150 In Ashley's petrol tank - 500 On Ashley's food - 750 In Ashley's face - 1,000

You have a warning from the StopSpam Organization I feel dirty

I hope you said after he'd finished "And now my work here is done, muhahaha!"

no shit, he's a fucking awful ventriloquist as well. The negotiations must be interesting Glazier spokesman "We're not reducing our asking price for the club." Orville "You take your asking price and shove it up your arse!" Harris "I'm sorry about my little green friend, he doesn't represent my clients. He's not been sleeping well you know...."

I don't know what he expects to achieve with this claptrap. Does anyone believe their lies anymore? He'd achieve more by keeping his mouth shut and getting on with it.

As the saying goes, when he opens his mouth it's to change feet

Sad but true I reckon

This. Can't stand him, never rated him, he's with the perfect club imo.

Indeed

Yeah, I find that a bit daft. Although if he was going bald and grey it would explain the loony hairstyles

And is also a highly unlikely outcome, that's the problem. The ridiculous statements from Llambias prove that Ashley has learnt fuck all. As others have said, if Ashley admitted that LLambias is a know nowt tosser, sacked him immediately and appointed a professional CEO who actually knows how to run a football club (and I don't mean Ridsdale), it would be a start. Persisting with that casino creeping twat is one of his bigger mistakes imo.

If you own 100% of a company and loan it money on favourable terms, you are bearing all the risk and reward of that loan- really it is equity. Its a more tax efficient way of doing it and puts you into a stronger claim on the assets in event of administration or liquidation, but whether Ashley creates more shares in the club or puts it in as a loan the effect on the business is broadly the same. A buyer valuing the business would do so on the basis that these loans are nil and would factor the lower debt figure when valuing the club. You would always assume that shareholder loans would be dealt with as part of the overall sale price. Considering the amount on-loaned from SJHL to NUFC the loans are worth more than NUFC as a business unit (ie NUFC is negative equity) and it's hard to see that situation being resolved any time soon. So Ashley can't expect the loans to be repaid for a lower value of his shares- he'd have to be paying someone for taking the shares off him in that scenario! Your post is quite hard to follow, but I think I can see what you're saying now. If the value of the club is less than the shareholder loan, then no purchaser is going to repay the loan and buy the shares. I can follow that (if I've got that right); in my post above I was assuming that the worth of the club would be more than the shareholder loan, so you just repay the loan as part of the deal to buy the shares. If the shares are worth less than the loan, then any purchaser would demand that it's capitalised or written off as part of the deal, I can see that.

You've lost me there, Matt. I assume these are real loans that Ashley has made to the club? It makes no sense to write them off and boost the net worth of his shares - surely it's much more tax efficient to have the loans repaid to him and accept a lower price for the sale of his shares? Even if the shares are worth less than the sale price, he'll get a bigger capital loss that way...... Please explain what you mean.

So prospective buyers are going to expect Ashley to write off 100million? unfortunately that is the true cost of Newcastle United, Shepherds overspending followed by relegation doesn't come cheap. When/if we are bought out we will have large debts to MA. It's quite simple. Any prospective lender would repay the debt to Ashley - Ashley would most likely require this as part of the sale. No-one would expect the loan to be written off. The money to repay the loan could come from the club or the buyer, but obviously the club would need replacement funding from somewhere if it repays the loan. This sort of issue arises all the time with buying company shares, it's nothing unusual. If the debt is repaid the interest rate on the debt is irrelevant. The key question is same as it ever was - is the price demanded by Ashley for his shares reasonable or is he taking the piss?

So does Wayne Rooney. I refuse to believe that none of the big European clubs that all the players have played for have Doctors that wouldn't have picked up on this. Most of the article seems to be heresay to me. I assume the doctors can only tell so much from non invasive tests. I agree about the hearsay and I don't think the article's credible in the extent of its claims; however I wouldn't be surprised if a few years were knocked off in some cases by unscrupulous agents to make a player look like a world beater. I doubt it's limited to Nigeria (or Africa for that matter) either.

Don't suppose you could say I'm gonna get a blow-job tonight, cudya? Then again, thinking about it, I don't really want one It might also depends on who it's from.......

I miss Stevie. At this point he would have produced a half pager of attendance statistics since WWII to prove all Spurs and Everton supporters are cunts......

Maybe a bit exaggerated but I can believe the gist of this. Martins always looked way older than his official age to me.

Can't say I'm disappointed at Owen's situation