I was just wondering how Newcastke fans currently feel about their owner Mike Ashley. I had a friend who was a big Newcastle fan and he HATED Mike Ashley for ages. The fact that he started selling off young tallent (James Milner etc) was a big factor in this.
As far as I remember there was a time when the relationship was very bad. Mike Ashley receiving abuse at matches etc, leading to him trying to sell the club. Fans protested against him quite a bit.
Wonder weather the feelings there now are the same, after all this evening they are playing in Europe?
Do you think this kind of turn around would ever lead the city fans to accept Sisu? Not talking about Europe here, but a return to the championship for a start...
As a childhood Newcastle fan, I can confirm the bitterness toward him early in his reign, but these days I never hear a bad word said about him, even the stadium re-naming was over-shadowed by the success on the pitch. Football fans are all fickle. It can take one result to adore a player, one season to forget all of the wrong doing by a club. When Pardew was appointed, I was mortified, Chris Hughton was loved for what he did, but a season and a half later, we call him 'Pardiola'.
Mike Ashley has done well, pumped huge amounts of interest free cash into the club. They almost broke even last financial year, with much help from the Carroll money, and the wage budget cut in half. He is doing what an owner should do. Leave the football alone, leave it to a manager and some backroom staff like Derek Llambias
As a childhood Newcastle fan, I can confirm the bitterness toward him early in his reign, but these days I never hear a bad word said about him, even the stadium re-naming was over-shadowed by the success on the pitch. Football fans are all fickle. It can take one result to adore a player, one season to forget all of the wrong doing by a club. When Pardew was appointed, I was mortified, Chris Hughton was loved for what he did, but a season and a half later, we call him 'Pardiola'.
Mike Ashley has done well, pumped huge amounts of interest free cash into the club. They almost broke even last financial year, with much help from the Carroll money, and the wage budget cut in half. He is doing what an owner should do. Leave the football alone, leave it to a manager and some backroom staff like Derek Llambias
It was the fact that the commentator called the arena "the sports direct" that got me on that line of thinking. People on here have been suggesting that city fans are soft and that other fans would have run SISU out of town by now. However with some success even the beloved St James's Park being renamed has been swallowed by the fans?
I think perhaps us fans are just as fickle wherever you go...
Everyone hates the name change ,it may have looked over-shadowed to the rest of the world, but it wasn't in Newcastle. No one in Newcastle calls it anything other than St' James'.
No one likes Mike Ashley, but he's not really done a lot to grumble about of late. As soon as he does something they'll start on him. There's no loyalty. (I'm Geordie bird who lives in Newcastle).
Fans are fickle though. After the match on Saturday I was telling my other half that we were moving somewhere abroad with an awesome football team so that our kids won't have to go through the pain of watching Coventry go from winning to drawing yet again. On Tuesday I was trying to convince him to move back to Wyken so I can get a season ticket and go to every match with my pop-in-law. I'll stick with them through thick and thin, but sometimes you feel better about it than others.