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Andy Carroll comes out and explains what did…and didn’t happen at Newcastle United

3 years ago
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Andy Carroll has been speaking to Alan Shearer.

The Newcastle United legend (Shearer!) talking to the recently departed from Newcastle United striker, in his latest big interview for The Athletic.

As you can see in the brief extracts from the interview below, Andy Carroll just the latest player to be left gutted by the miserable way that Mike Ashley runs the club, aided and abetted by the likes of Lee Charnley and Steve Bruce.

Andy Carroll says he is still desperate to get a new club despite not having sorted one so far in the two and a half months since his NUFC contract officially ended.

Newcastle fans certainly won’t be surprised at Andy Carroll explaining just how much of a shambles it was when it came to him leaving NUFC.

The clear message being the absolute lack of intelligent leadership at the football club, as well as of course, zero ambition.

As for long-term planning beyond the current season / transfer window….

Andy Carroll talking to Alan Shearer for The Athletic:

Was he surprised to be let go?

“Without a doubt, yeah,” Andy says. “I mean, 100 per cent I wanted to be there. I could have played more last season, I could be playing there this season. I’m not saying I should be playing every week, but I think I’ve still got something to give, to be part of Newcastle or any club. I’ve still got that hunger in me. But the manager makes his decisions. That’s what happens in football. He had his ideas and I wasn’t part of them.”

Unfinished business:

“There’s still unfinished business,” he says. “I didn’t really get a run out at Newcastle. I was in, I was out, I was in again. And I was fit all season. The stats say that for 43 games, I was available for 40 of them. I was training every day; I think I was in the top four in training throughout the year.

“I didn’t play as much as I wanted and I wasn’t even involved in as many games as I wanted, which is disappointing, especially with all the injuries I’ve had over the years. There’s no denying they kept me out at West Ham and Liverpool, but for the last two years, I’ve been relatively fit.”

Having signed a one-year contract in 2019 and then another year’s extension last season, did he ever speak to Newcastle about a new deal?

“We were talking and mentioning it,” he says. “I said, ‘What’s happening?’ and it was, ‘At the end of the season we’ll talk about it’ and that’s how it was left. At the end of the season, it wasn’t (talked about). I just kind of got the idea. There was no point in chasing anything.”

Final game:

Andy was an unused substitute for Newcastle’s final match of last season, a 2-0 victory at relegated Fulham. “After the game, it was, ‘Ah, I might see you, I might not, we’ll see what happens’, and then nothing happened,” he says. “We just got on the bus and left and I never saw them again. My contract ran out and that was it. I never went back. I’ve still got my locker up there full of my stuff. The kitman rang me the other day, so I’m getting it moved down.”

‘Contacted by The Athletic for comment, Newcastle state that there were conversations between Andy and Lee Charnley, the managing director, after that Fulham game and they refute Andy’s version of events.’

Whilst clearly Andy Carroll has been treated shabbily by Mike Ashley and Steve Bruce at Newcastle United, the important question for Newcastle fans now is: Would Newcastle United be better off with Andy Carroll in their squad now?

I think, for me anyway, that answer is clearly a big yes.

Callum Wilson is injured yet again and coming up to his 30th birthday, a striker with such a bad injury record who relies on pace so much, is very very unlikely to suddenly become a forward who rarely misses a game.

As fans we all recognised this in the summer and the absolute desperation for good quality cover to be brought in. Instead, Mike Ashley and Steve Bruce got rid of Andy Carroll and Yoshinori Muto with the owner refusing to allow any replacement strikers to be signed.

Last weekend, Newcastle were already playing without a centre-forward, as with Wilson injured, Steve Bruce yet again refused to give Dwight Gayle a single minute of Premier League football, which has been the case all season. Instead starting Joelinton (now 73 PL appearances and 6 goals) who played in a (as usual) non-threatening role towards the left.

With no strikers signed, it should have been a no-brainer to keep Andy Carroll as at least an option off the bench.

However, we saw last season that Steve Bruce had no intention or desire to play either Andy Carroll or Dwight Gayle. They both got only four PL starts each last season and Carroll didn’t get any PL starts after January 2021, both he and Gayle regularly ignored even when Wilson was ruled out.

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