Talksport presenter forced to apologise for Newcastle United comments
With the odd exception (hello Mick Quinn), Talksport does continually scrape the bottom of the barrel.
One of the truly terrible presenters/reporters is Ian Abrahams (AKA The Moose, AKA Hopeless).
On Monday, he launched an embarrassingly over the top juvenile attack on Newcastle United, and even worse, Newcastle Upon Tyne and the overall region (see below, an article written by Dean Wilkins yesterday).
As well as Newcastle fans calling him out on this, the West Ham supporting idiot found himself being slaughtered for his stupidity by pretty much every other Talksport presenter, via social media.
Fans of numerous other clubs also came to the defence of Newcastle United and especially Newcastle Upon Tyne as a City, even Sunderland fans(!) when it came to saying our brilliant City is a class place to live/visit.
Tuesday morning has seen Abrahams/Moose give a grovelling apology, no doubt ordered by his Talksport bosses, as even they must have been embarrassed by how he went on.
He tries to save a bit of face by telling those who ‘were just rude and abusive’ to have a good look at themselves regarding their conduct.
Maybe the Talksport loser should do that to himself when he looks in the mirror each morning.
Ian Abrahams (AKA The Moose, AKA Hopeless):
“I have spent some time and read the constructive criticism of what I said yesterday about Newcastle and it’s Football Club.
“I was clearly wrong about what I said about the City/area, but maintain attracting a big crowd doesn’t equal a big club.
“I appreciate the constructive and well put comments pointing out the errors of what I said.
“For those who were just rude and abusive, I suggest you look at how you put across your arguments in future.”
The Mag – Monday 24 September 2018 – Article by Dean Wilkins:
Are Newcastle United a big club?
Like a scab you can’t stop picking and making bleed, it was difficult to switch off this daft nonsense on Talksport.
We (Newcastle United) ended up with Jim White as our great defender, whilst Danny Murphy and a real loser called ‘The Moose’ (otherwise known as West Ham fan Ian Abrahams, who is useless even by Talksport standards as a presenter/reporter).
The ‘debate’ is given below between the three of them…but the very fact that they are (as usual) talking about Newcastle United, might answer their own question as to whether NUFC is a ‘big club’, whatever that is.
Funnily enough, Danny Murphy admits that he has now changed his definition of what a big club is, because his previous idea(s) had ended up not fitting in with something he’d wanted to say, so he’d ditched a regular full stadium so he could now include Aston Villa as a ‘big club’.
It is great with all of these filling air time debates, by the way they speak you would think everybody was walking around Newcastle City Centre stopping any stranger to remind them that NUFC fit in as a ‘big club’.
It is an ideal subject of course for something like Talksport as there is no definitive answer, so it can be a never-ending debate…
Success is supposedly an integral part of being a big part but of course that comes and goes for clubs all the time.
At the minute you have Manchester City with the most expensive and probably best quality squad in the world, they won the Premier League last season setting records on points and goals, yet hilariously they can’t fill their stadium in the Premier League or Champions League. Are they a big club? PSG have the second most expensive squad in the world and just like Man City, they were the beneficiaries of a roll of the dice, whereby they got people taking over the club with access to massive wealth, and via that are now said to be big clubs.
Back in the day, Monaco were very successful, ridiculous funding provided to build the team despite only having a handful of fans.
As a generalisation I would say that to be any kind of a big club you do need at least two things:
Having lot of people who really care about what happens to the club – including those people don’t necessarily get to matches at that moment in time.
Then also, being a club that neutrals take an interest in and talk about.
Newcastle United get two big fat ticks on those two factors but sadly everything else is out of our control.
In the raffle for new owner, we sadly ended up with Mike Ashley, somebody who sees only as the advertising arm for his retail empire.
Newcastle have a decent sized stadium and a manager with an excellent CV, another two factors which you can throw into the big club mix.
However, it is all a non-starter, in terms of success, when you then have an owner that not only has no interest in the health and success of his football club as a separate entity, but actually works against it being successful.
I’m quite happy if anybody wants to say Newcastle aren’t a big club because it is meaningless, though obviously the ‘Moose’s’ infantile comments about Newcastle as a place, are equally annoying/laughable.
A Talksport ‘debate’ as to whether Newcastle United are a ‘big club’?:
Ian Abrahams (‘Moose’):
“Everybody keeps telling me what a big club Newcastle are, like Leeds, at least Leeds have at least won the title in the last 30 years – Newcastle since I was born have won nothing, not a thing.
“Since colour television was invented…zilch. Absolutely nothing.
“So when Jim (White) says Newcastle are re a big club, they get fifty two thousand, yeah well what else is there to do in Newcastle?
“Some smart Alec on Twitter sent me a link to Trip Advisor about what there is to do in Newcastle; I looked at it, there’s one art gallery and a few parks to walk around.
“Whoopee, I won’t go to the footy, I’ll walk around the park.
“Yes they get a lot of people through the gate, I’m not denying that but that doesn’t make you a big club, when you get 52,000 people through the gate, when there’s practically nothing else to do on a Saturday afternoon.”
Jim White :
“They are a big club.”
Danny Murphy :
“You are correct Moose, regarding what you have said.”
Jim White:
“Hang on Dan, are Newcastle a big club?”
Danny Murphy:
“Newcastle are well supported but they’re not a big club,”
Jim White:
“What?!!”
Danny Murphy:
“They’re a team that yo-yos between the Championship and the Premier League. How is that a big club?”
Jim White:
“I am absolutely flabbergasted.”
Danny Murphy:
“I got mullered for saying Villa weren’t a big club, I had to retract a little bit, they have been a big club because they won the European Cup and they’ve competed at the top of the Premier League in my lifetime, so actually I was partly wrong there.
“What I meant was, and why I never felt it was a big club, was because every time I went there the stadium was never full.
“So I’m contradicting myself because if the stadium is full, it creates a big club atmosphere, but actually I was wrong about that because the stadium being full or not doesn’t constitute being a big club.”
Jim White:
“So what does constitute a big club?”
Danny Murphy:
“Success and worldwide support does.”
Ian Abrahams:
“Last time I checked, you don’t go to Spain and see people walking up and down the promenade and beach wearing Newcastle shirts. You do with Liverpool and Manchester United, you even do with Rangers and Celtic.”
Jim White:
“You see people wearing Newcastle shirts, yes you do.”
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