NUFC – Gutter Press At It Again

Once upon a time Newcastle United were never off the newspaper front pages, you’ll have your own list but Andy Carroll, Joey Barton, Kieron Dyer, Titus Bramble and Craig Bellamy would do for starters.

It would frustrate supporters but you could hardly blame the papers a lot of the time, especially when players are going to court and getting found guilty of various crimes, particularly in Barton’s case.

However, today we have the Sunday People cobbling together a story to undermine our manager, players, the football club and by association, us – the supporters. One bit of advice if you haven’t bought it today, don’t!

The front page and a double page spread (at least that is the case in the north east edition) for an orchestrated attack on our football club and as I said, the fans.

The basic ‘story’ is that while the players were on their break in Tenerife they went out to a bar/nightclub, it was on the night of Tuesday 24th January, four days before the match at Brighton,

I think you’ll get where they are coming from with their opening paragraph;

‘Newcastle United fans who watched their team crash out of the FA Cup last night will be furious when they see these snaps’

Thanks very much but as a Newcastle fan I don’t need to be told by a newspaper that has never done us any favours, when I should be ‘furious’.

The ‘snaps’ referred to, show Alan Pardew and half a dozen players having their photos taken with punters in the bar. Funnily enough, the only people seen with a drink in their hands are Alan Pardew and Steven Taylor. The other players pictured are Simpson, Coloccini, Gutierrez and Best , none of them with a single drink in sight.

Hidden away in the story is the fact that it was Steven Taylor’s 26th birthday, so the only visual proof the newspaper have despite all kinds of claims is a long-term injured player having a drink on his birthday and our manager pictured with a bottle of lager in his hand.

There are claims that Alan Pardew was ‘steaming’ later, so why are there no photos? Especially in this age of most people having smart phones capable of taking perfect quality ‘snaps’?

They also refer to two players ‘sneaking away’ for lap dances but they don’t name them, funny that isn’t it?

The article also lists various drinks the players/manager bought but even admit themselves that some of these were for ‘girl revellers’. So they have no photos of our current available players actually drinking anything, I wonder why? Could it possibly be that almost all the drinks the players paid for went to the various punters in the bar?

This isn’t a blind defence of our manager, players, football club but if I am going to be ‘furious’ I have to be convinced anybody has done anything wrong.

Apparently we all should be furious because the players lost at Brighton due to this night out last Tuesday, then of course they do their usual trick of linking it with very old unrelated ‘news’, in this case Mike Ashley stripping down to his pants at a Sports Direct do. It gets worse/better, because they then list the Shepherd & Hall episode in 1998, the Dyer/Bowyer fight on the pitch in 2005 and even Keegan’s rant at Ferguson in the title run-in of 1996!! What the f*** has this got to do with last Tuesday night?

It’s funny how sunderland’s two best paid and highest profile players, Bendtner and Cattermole, use cars for trampolines on Stowell Street in Newcastle city centre yet it rates barely a mention, or when Bramble is arrested on sex charges he is labelled ex-United, rather than ‘current mackem’. You’d almost think there was an agenda.

Yes I am furious at the players that we are out of the FA Cup but I don’t think what did or didn’t happen last Tuesday night has the remotest connection. They played poorly for the last hour and certain players showed again they aren’t good enough to play for Newcastle United, plus we were missing what are probably five of our six or seven best players in Ba, Cisse, Coloccini, Tiote and Steven Taylor

The Sunday People have  made these gutter claims with nothing to back it up apart from photos of an injured player drinking and our manager holding a drink. Yes I am furious with our players for not winning a football match but I am much more angry at a national newspaper making an orchestrated attack on our football club, our city and us the fans.