We knew that the new signings would be existing players coming back from injury and having them available, we knew the new signings would be the ones bought in January (even though we were promised an overhaul), we all knew from JFK’s comments that we weren’t in a position to spend without a plan being proposed.

Alan Pardew; “One or two of the younger players need to improve. They haven’t produced what I wanted, so they are going to have to work harder or will have to leave”.