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Benitez Or Pardew?

11 years ago
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These days it’s sometimes hard to find a Geordie who is still behind Pardew and thinks he should stay in the summer. I for one, look at this in two ways, If possibly someone like Rene Girard, Laurent Blanc or Rafa Benitez are lined up to replace Pardew, then yes I probably would be happy with that. But if they’re not available, then Alan Pardew should be given one more chance, even if someone like Di Matteo is available.

(To feature like James, send in your letters/articles for the magazine/website to contribute@themag.co.uk – write about anything NUFC related – past, present or future)

He got us to 5th last season, a lot of you now would say that’s a fluke, but it’s not. The Premier League is one of the hardest leagues in the world. Pardew was backed by the board, had very little injuries, and we had the slight bit of luck on occasions, whereas this season it’s completely the opposite.

Last summer, Alan Pardew would have made a plan for the forthcoming season. It would have been likely to include the likes of Mathieu Debuchy, Mapou Yanga-M’biwa, possibly Douglas, maybe Sissoko, Aubameyang or Remy.

Pardew no doubt went to Ashley and said ‘here are my plans, give me some money and we can improve the squad so it’s prepared for Europa League and the Premier League’.

Now considering Ashley and Llambias haven’t got the best football brains, they would probably have reacted with, ‘No, we finished 5th last season, so as long as we keep our best players and a similar squad to last year, we can finish around that area again this season’.

Obviously none of know for sure what did happen but would Pardew be that idiotic to think by keeping the same squad apart from releasing the likes of Lovenkrands, Best and Guthrie, to think that it would be strong enough to cope with the league and three cup competitions? I don’t think so. Also, do you really think Pardew wanted Amalfitano? Do you think he really wanted Anita?

Somehow Gosling got ahead of Anita on the bench against West Ham so that tells you something.

Then when January came around, we bought Debuchy, which was a good buy, Sissoko, another bargain, M’Biwa, a major bargain at just 6mil, previously rated at 18m. Haidara, who’s one for the future and Gouffran, who I thought was just a panic buy to try and replace Ba, as we were beaten by QPR to Loic Remy, and he’d have been some player for us if he came.

This has shown that Ashley has lacked ambition this season. But then you may ask ‘Ashley spent in January so surely that should improve results?’.

Maybe it should, if they actually had time to settle on Tyneside rather than being rushed straight into the first team – so now there’s a lack of communication, players not taking up their positions properly and not having the confidence to swarm the ball when we’re in possession to make a pass, rather than hoofing it up the field (Which I can guarantee, hoofball is not Pardew’s tactic, its simply so many French speakers and the team not gelling properly).

Pardew had to completely scrap this season’s plans and had to make a new one from scratch, without any additions to the squad apart from Anita, that would support both Premier League and Europa League.

People were worshipping Pardew last season, he got the team playing some fantastic, exciting football where we outplayed Liverpool and Manchester United, set the team up brilliantly to catch Chelsea on the counter at Stamford Bridge, to create one of the fiercest and devastating strike forces of Ba, Cisse and Ben Arfa and most importantly, bring Europa league football back to Tyneside.

If Alan Pardew is given another chance (Which he probably will as it’s claimed it would cost around £10million to sack him), and backed by the board, I bet you that fans will be singing the “Pardew is our king” chants again next season.

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