A Month Of Saturdays: April 2014

As Newcastle fans we're well accustomed to being grateful for small mercies. Last month, that meant not having a fixture on April Fool's Day, in light of the disappointment, disaster, embarrassment and farce that had befallen us on the first days of the previous three months of the year.

All the same, off the back of thumpings by Everton and Southampton at the tail-end of March (the latter perhaps getting revenge on us on behalf of their fans, whom we'd ripped off back in December), we knew the calendar was only delaying the inevitable, and sure enough on the 5th we were battered again, 4-0 on our own turf. That the defeat was to the worst Man Utd side in living memory, one shorn of both Shrek and Robin van Persie, only added to our woes - as did the painful realisation that it was April and the Mackems had scored more league goals at St James' Park in 2014 than we had. NUST's concern that proposals to flog off land around the stadium might hamper any future expansion plans looked increasingly misguided - who in their right mind would want to go and witness this sort of drubbing every fortnight if they hadn't already forked out a small fortune for the privilege?

If we thought our woes might possibly be at an end, though, we were sorely mistaken. A trip to Stoke is never much fun in any context, including a footballing one, and at the Britannia we duly lost in comically ignominious circumstances to a mishit cross from a left-back who hadn't scored for six years and who at one time came close to becoming a Newcastle player.

At least hope was close at hand, though, in the form of a visit from a Swansea side scrapping among themselves as well as against malingering relegation fears. Desperate for a goal after notching blanks in four consecutive reverses, we finally got one courtesy of Big Lad. But first-half injuries to his fellow forwards Papiss Cisse and Luuk de Jong left the Silver Fox's adventurous three-pronged attack somewhat blunt and the Swans capitalised on our inability to add to our lead, Wilfried Bony rewarding the visitors' dominance with an equaliser just before the break before tucking away the winner from the spot at the death.

Afterwards, the Silver Fox claimed he could have "stopped that goal" had he been on the touchline rather than in the stands serving the final game of his ban. However, that presupposed that he could make a difference and that the players would be inclined to listen to anything he had to say - presuppositions that were made to look fanciful by the (HBA-less) team's next performance-in-inverted-commas away at Arsenal, a 3-0 defeat disguising a huge gulf in class and (more worryingly) application that gave the Silver Fox the unenviable distinction of becoming the first Toon manager to lose six consecutive Premier League games.

He wasn't alone in seemingly being unable to motivate the side, though; the pathetic lack of effort on display at the Emirates indicated that Wor Al's stinging criticism of the players' lack of effort after the Man Utd match hadn't been heeded either. It's quite incredible that people capable of inspiring a young disabled child to walk for the first time can't be inspired to do anything other than stroll around themselves. At the start of the month I'd pondered what we could learn from Everton and Southampton, managing to narrow it down to six things; by the end of the month the answer would have been a simple "Everything"...

Sadly the chances of anyone at the club learning from anything are about as slim as the chances of the Lone Ranger going a month without attracting the attention of the police. A case in point was Lee Charnley's statement on being promoted to managing director, which, in its reference to signing "one or two players per year", strongly suggested that the harsh lessons of the last two transfer windows will go unheeded. It doesn't take a genius (or Big Lad, for that matter) to understand that significant acquisitions are imperative.

No doubt that if Spidermag returns to St James' Park in the summer, he'll be hailed as being "like a new signing". A shame that during his loan spell at Norwich he did nothing for the job prospects of the man who gave him the escape route. Our commiserations once again, Chris. A manager sacked due to an unpalatable sequence of results, players underperforming, signings failing to live up to their billing, and tactical cluelessness - one wonders whether the Silver Fox had a nervous eye on what happened to his Toon predecessor down at Carrow Road...

While the futures of both the Silver Fox and Spidermag may be up in the air, Mehdi Abeid is set to return to the club with a Greek Cup winners' medal - and, if rumours are to be believed, Fraser Forster might do likewise with a clutch of Scottish titles and tales of memorable Champions League nights. Experiencing such nights at Newcastle any time soon would be about as likely as seeing a horse spectating at a football match - or, rather, less so.

A Month Of Saturdays: March 2014

So January kicked off with a disappointing 1-0 defeat to West Brom, and 1st February saw us slump to a painfully humiliating 3-0 loss to the Mackems. What would the first day of March hold in store for us? A victory at Hull, as it happens - and a handsome one at that, 4-1, with Moussa Sissoko bagging a brace. Sadly, though, it wasn't the margin of victory or our sudden rediscovery of how to score goals that made the headlines in the Sunday papers. Oh no. Instead, the back pages were dominated by images of our manager headbutting an opposing player. At least we finally got to find out what it takes to get us up first on Match Of The Day, I suppose...

"Headbutting" should really have inverted commas above, as to describe it as such is to exaggerate any aggression in either the intent or the execution, but it nevertheless was hardly becoming for someone in the Silver Fox's position - someone whom senior players are supposed to respect and to whom young players are supposed to look for guidance and leadership - and did absolutely nothing for our permanently fragile public image.

The club's reaction was swift and decisive; he was fined £100,000, issued with a formal warning about his future conduct and ordered to deliver a written apology to Hull and Steve Bruce (an apology later accepted), but retained his job. (Perhaps Jabba and company were anticipating he wouldn't need to be pushed and would just jump, as reserve team manager Willie Donachie had in similar circumstances the previous month.) The FA's own punishment, when it came, was hefty: a seven-match ban (the first three of which were complete stadium bans) and a £60,000 fine. It could have been even more severe, though, given the media hysteria surrounding the incident, and indeed would have been had the club's damage limitation tactics not been appreciated by the panel.

Those who surmised that the whole affair would undermine the Silver Fox's authority and ability to motivate or discipline were vindicated at least in part when we next took to the pitch. He may not have been allowed inside Craven Cottage, but he'd had a whole fortnight to work with the players since the Hull game; but, while bottom-of-the-table Fulham may have been in a parlous state themselves, we were in no mood to deny them the easiest three points they'll get all season on an afternoon when absolutely everything was abysmal with the exception of the weather.

The loss through injury of Mathieu Debuchy and Loic Remy hadn't helped our cause, of course, and they were both to be sidelined for the month's remaining fixtures too. Remy's absence in particular was a huge blow, given our alarming inability to find the net without him. At least Papiss Cisse assumed goalscoring responsibility when we took on Crystal Palace at St James' Park, in what proved to be a carbon copy of the Villa match - us dominant without being especially dangerous against poor, unambitious opposition, and only emerging with a 1-0 victory courtesy of a strike deep into stoppage time.

Three days later, when Everton were the visitors, we arguably played better, only to be undone by a superior side in a rich vein of form who weren't about to be distracted from their mission to track down and overhaul Arsenal in the fourth and final Champions League spot. Ross Barkley's goal was a peach, too, even if he was assisted by some woeful defending.

The following fixture away to Southampton had been billed, somewhat less than thrillingly, as the Battle For Eighth, but from first whistle to last it was no contest. In what was an uglier spectacle than a caricature of Peter Beardsley, Jay Rodriguez notched his second and third goals against us this season as he sought to enhance his claim to a place on the England plane to Rio in the summer, only for those hopes to be dashed by a long-term injury sustained in the Saints' next match. The game ended 4-0, though it could have been many more, and we travelled back up to the north-east with spanked arses sorer than those of the Toon fans who had cycled down to the south coast in aid of charity.

The examples set by both Southampton and Everton could teach us a great deal, I argued, though whether the Silver Fox will be around much longer to learn those lessons was fast becoming the subject of some speculation. If I were a betting man (like, say, Dan Gosling), I'd be inclined to wager that the man now permitted back into stadia on matchdays is living on time that's so borrowed Cisse might actually score in it.

Our woes in front of goal were only thrust further into relief by the fact that our two loanees at Rotherham, James Tavernier and Haris Vuckic, scored no fewer than three times each over the course of the month and fixtures against Notts County, Brentford and Bristol City. Tavernier isn't even a forward - and neither is Perchinho, Wigan's improbable matchwinner as the Latics beat Man City in the FA Cup for the second successive season.

With Adam Campbell still at St Mirren, we do at least have one potential star striker of the future currently at the Silver Fox's disposal. Adam Armstrong, along with Freddie Woodman and Lubo Satka, has signed his first professional contract and made his first-team debut from the bench against Fulham, briefly providing a spark to our otherwise moribund attacking play.

Our problems aren't confined to goalscoring, of course - we're also incapable of defending. (A seriously toxic combination, that.) But there could be good news on that front too - or should that be Good news? Centre-back Curtis Good made an impressive debut for Australia against Ecuador in London, though succumbed to an injury well before the South Americans completed a remarkable comeback victory from a three-goal deficit.

But even if there are reasons to be optimistic about the future, that optimism relates only to the team, rather than the fanbase. As Adrian Tempany argues in general, but also with specific reference to Newcastle, the average age of football crowds is pushing steadily upwards, young people apparently abandoning the game in their droves due largely to the hefty cost that being a supporter incurs. I can't speak for all clubs, but - given the pathetic performances from our players, the shameful example set by our manager, the level of ambition shown by our owner and his board, and the general apathy among our fans - it's little wonder that teenagers are turning their backs on ours.

A Month Of Saturdays: February 2014

If January got off to an inauspicious start with an opening-day defeat at the Hawthorns, then February was infinitely worse.

Newcastle supporters woke up on the morning of 1st February with a groggy head, the result of a transfer window hangover. Not only were we still reeling from the sale of Dreamboat, we were also coming to the realisation that, a few half-hearted bids having failed, our apparent solution to the problem of how to fill the gaping hole in our midfield was Dan Gosling, recently returned from an unspectacular spell at a Blackpool side in freefall in the Championship.

In days gone by, a visit from the Mackems would have been just what the doctor ordered in these circumstances, to raise our spirits - not now, though, as we somehow slumped to a second consecutive 3-0 home defeat to the Great Unwashed. That first humilation, encapsulated forever in the image of Paulo Di Canio's touchline kneeslide, could arguably be written off as a complete freak, so this recurrence was even more deeply upsetting - as was the fact that boyhood Toon supporters Adam Johnson and Jack Colback scored two of the three goals. Luuk de Jong made what was, by his own admission, a disappointing debut and the only vague positive was that this time around trouble was minimal and police horses remained unscathed.

I concluded my match report by looking for crumbs of comfort going forwards: "Last time we were beaten by the Mackems, it was the catalyst for a superb November during which we recorded notable victories over Chelsea and Spurs. Next up for us are the return fixtures against both, so here's hoping this defeat has the same effect." No such luck, as it turned out. The trip to Stamford Bridge saw an improved performance, but we were still no match for a club with the top of the table in their sights and, in Eden Hazard, a world-class player in exceptional form. Worse was to follow a few days later, as we were battered 4-0 by a side for whom St James' Park has in recent years been a very unhappy hunting ground - this, though, was like shooting fish in a barrel.

So, three straight league defeats, with no goals scored and ten conceded - far from ideal. Little wonder that we, like his chum Mathieu Debuchy, spent the enforced break due to our early FA Cup exit pining for Dreamboat, though in truth we were also pining for a defence worthy of the name and the return from suspension of our one serious goal threat, Loic Remy.

When our on-loan French forward did pull on a black and white shirt again, against Aston Villa, he was a free man in the eyes of the law as well as the FA, the rape charge against him having been dropped. Nevertheless, he still took to the pitch shouldering a considerable burden - that of ending our embarrassing goal drought. Thankfully he was up to the task, our best player on the day who, having hit the post two minutes before full time, kept his cool to grab the winner with the whistle practically between referee Martin Atkinson's lips. Perhaps he's taking over the role of last-gasp saviour from Papiss Cisse - who, rumour had it, was interesting clubs in Russia and Turkey.

Despite an improved display that at least demonstrated tenacity and determination if not abundant quality, the victory was only papering over the cracks. That's what made Little Saint Mick's Torygraph article, published prior to the Villa win, so infuriating. The talk of "crisis" was coming from the media rather than the supporters, but that didn't stop him from having another pop at the people who helped pay his exorbitant wages while he lay on the treatment table for months at a time thinking of England. His view that, because we were comfortably in the top half of the table, there couldn't be anything to complain about was myopic in the extreme.

Many grievances of the sort Little Saint Mick tried to explain away or ignored entirely were aired at the Fans Forum meeting - the club's perceived lack of ambition, the sale of Dreamboat and bungled attempt to secure a replacement, the ban on NCJ Media, the value of the Sports Direct branding plastered all over the stadium - but the answers given were rarely convincing or satisfactory. Certainly not enough to dissuade those supporters already contemplating a boycott of the club shop, matchday facilities or indeed everything to do with the club - though the announcement of the annual accounts was accompanied by a veiled warning that such actions would harm the club rather than the owner.

The Fans Forum did bring news of a couple of positive developments, though, in the shape of Gael Bigirimana's appointment as Equality Ambassador and the club's formal commitment to the Football v Homophobia campaign. At least we appear to be taking corporate social responsibility seriously - though of course the positive PR can't do any harm.

Another candle in February's gloom was James Tavernier's shortlisting for League One Player of the Month for January. He may have missed out on the accolade, but it was nevertheless testimony to the fact that he and hopefully we are reaping the rewards of his loan spell at Rotherham - a spell that was extended until the end of the season. Haris Vuckic will be there to keep him company, while defender Curtis Good signed up for a stint with Dundee Utd. When the trio return to Tyneside in the summer and resume playing for the Reserves, it will be under a different manager, Willie Donachie having resigned following reports of a post-match bust-up with defender Remie Streete.

But of course the Scot wasn't the highest-profile departure from St James' Park in February. The news that JFK was no longer a leech on the club's payroll was greeted not so much with dancing in the streets as with relief and renewed anger that the appointment was made in the first place. A second pathetic transfer window in a row precipitated the parting of the ways - a classic case of every cloud having a silver lining. Initially it was reported that JFK had resigned, but the implication that he might have the decency to fall on his sword didn't ring true and sure enough the Silver Fox, whom JFK had frustrated and infuriated, soon let slip that the board had given him the boot. At the Fans Forum event club representatives confirmed that the director of football role will remain vacant until the summer, when it'll be re-evaluated and then either filled or scrapped. JFK, meanwhile, finds himself where he belongs - on the football scrapheap, alongside people less deserving of such a predicament, such as Terry McDermott and Derek Fazackerley.

Sadly, sacking JFK didn't signal the fact that common sense was finally pervading the decision-making process at St James' Park. Whichever bright spark it was who came up with the idea of the #AskTayls hashtag on Twitter must have been horrified when, inevitably, it was hijacked and abused, often to comic effect. One wag enquired of Saylor: "If you were a footballer, what would your preferred position be?" The mauling by Spurs had a few more Twitter users questioning his abilities in rather less tongue-in-cheek and rather more forthright fashion, prompting him to turn tail and quit the social network.

By contrast, Little Big Lad stayed to face the music, offering a one-word apology: "Sorry". At least someone at the club was prepared to say it - and, as February just went to prove, at Newcastle Utd it needs saying on a regular basis.

A Month Of Saturdays: January 2014

In a month that saw an unlikely alliance between Newcastle and the Mackems burst Northumbria Police's "bubble" match proposal for the derby, it was perhaps fitting that our own bubble should burst. While the last two months of 2013 brought a host of memorable three-point hauls (Chelsea, Spurs and Man Utd in particular), we won just once in January - a largely slick, clinical and professional victory over relegation-threatened West Ham that owed everything to the performance of Dreamboat. Unfortunately for us, his display wasn't just a delicious slap around the chops for Fat Sam - it also served as a convincing audition for the onlooking PSG and the match ended up being his swansong in black and white.

The two clubs then engaged in the customary transfer tango. PSG made a cheekily low initial bid, our polite refusal tacitly invited an improved offer, the Ligue 1 leaders promptly returned with one that met our valuation, and by the time we next kicked off, our influential midfield talisman was in Paris nearing the completion of a £20m move. In an instant Paul's hopes of "a quiet month in which we keep hold of our best players" went out of the (transfer) window.

According to Dreamboat's new coach Laurent Blanc, the prospect of Champions League football was what lured him back to his homeland, but whatever the reasons behind the move, it was depressingly inevitable - as was our failure to replace him before the window slammed shut. Despite his agent and father being adamant that a deal would go through in January, winger Remy Cabella remained with Montpellier, and we had to suffer the scathing mockery of his coach Rolland Courbis. Our approach for Clement Grenier, meanwhile, met with perhaps the most comprehensive rejection imaginable - his club Lyon turned their noses up at the fee, while the player's agent Frederic Guerra effectively produced a bullet-point list of reasons why his client was also opposed to the move. Perhaps someone should point out we could look further afield than France...

With Dreamboat in Paris ahead of sealing the deal, we played out an ultimately frustrating 0-0 draw at Carrow Road in which he could well have made all the difference in transforming one point into three. The frustration was only compounded by the red card received by Loic Remy, the only player in the squad to have scored more goals than Dreamboat, and the fact that an appeal against the dismissal and subsequent three-game ban was rejected while Norwich had Bradley Johnson's red card overturned for the same incident.

That meant the month was bookended by away matches which prior to kick-off looked like appetising prospects but in which we managed to register more sendings-off than goals. The new year had got off to an inauspicious start at the Hawthorns, where we were holding our own until Mathieu Debuchy's reckless lunge was rewarded with an early bath. West Brom were then able to heap on the pressure and we eventually succumbed to a late Saido Berahino penalty.

Worse was to follow in the form of yet another early FA Cup exit, Cardiff this time the beneficiaries of our alarming recent inability to make any significant progress in knockout competitions. We huffed and puffed to a barely deserved 1-0 lead, only for new Bluebirds boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer to introduce Craig Noone and Fraizer Campbell, both of whom promptly scored. Sod's law that the former super sub's first subs would turn out to be super, and that our own would have no reply.
 
No team that has just suffered three successive defeats, including two to struggling sides, would be thrilled to have to face Man City next, but to our credit we picked ourselves up and gave most people's champions elect a sterner examination than they might have been expecting. Admittedly we were behind early on, but only conceded the killer second in stoppage time, while pressing for the equaliser our play deserved. We would have had one, too, had Mr T's stunning left-footer not been ruled out for a ridiculous offside decision from referee Mike Jones, prompting fury from the fans, bafflement from the pundits and touchline banter between the Silver Fox and his opposite number Manuel Pellegrini that might have made JFK blush (almost).

The sequence of losses was brought to an end by the visit to West Ham, which saw us score three times, but generally we found goals hard to come by in January, drawing blanks in three of our five games. That made the long-rumoured arrival of Luuk de Jong - and on the terms we wanted (a loan rather than a permanent deal) - very welcome, even if some cynical fans might have questioned the wisdom of signing a second out-of-form striker from the Bundesliga. Here's hoping he understands the offside rule better than Papiss Cisse, at least.

The Dutchman was the only new face, and in addition to Dreamboat we waved goodbye to someone once labelled as one of the best players in the Premier League by Lionel Messi (in fairness, he's only little and probably can't handle his drink). Spidermag may only have hooked up with former manager Chris Hughton's Norwich on loan, but the Tyneside chapter of his career does look to be over. By contrast, Curtis Good will be hoping he can secure himself a future at St James' Park by impressing at Dundee Utd in much the same way as other young Toon loanees are doing at St Mirren and Rotherham. As Millers fan Michael Stevens reported, James Tavernier in particular is delighting crowds down at the New York Stadium, and having a buccaneering full-back waiting in the wings might help to convince Debuchy not to lose his head quite so often.

That was a rare positive, though, in a month that ended with our squad smaller than it had been at the start, JFK living up to his billiing by .com as director of fuck all, Dreamboat turning out for PSG against Bordeaux, Remy suspended, goals hard to come by and no cup run to look forward to. Still, at least we had the fillip of an overdue victory over the Mackems to look forward to at the start of February...

A Month Of Saturdays: December 2013

Round these parts the festive season is usually about as welcome as it is among turkeys and A&E workers, as messy as an office party with a free bar and a bouncy castle, and as enjoyable as watching the Mrs Brown's Boys Christmas special while trapped in a telephone box with a chronic farter suffering from a sprout addiction. And yet, for once, we had what could be justifiably described as a merry Christmas.

Not that it got off to the best of starts, mind. Facing a Swansea side with one win in eleven attempts was like receiving a beautifully gift-wrapped parcel - but subsequently losing 3-0 to them was like opening the parcel and discovering Keane's greatest hits album or a shit inside. Things could have been different had either or both of our reasonable penalty shouts not fallen on deaf ears, or had Jonjo Shelvey been dismissed for dipping his bonce in Mathieu Debuchy's direction, or had the Frenchman not had the misfortune to bundle the ball past Tim Krul for the crucial second goal. But it wasn't to be our night - a fact underlined by a traumatic flight home which petrified even John Carver. One can only speculate as to what Mr T made of it (if he'd regained consciousness from his drugged milk, that is), but it may turn out to have been good experience for Iron Mike if he ends up heading to Rio with Woy's boys...

Only three days later, though, we were in full Christmas party mode. The reason why champagne corks were popping, crackers being pulled and intimate body parts being photocopied? The small matter of a first victory at Old Trafford since 1972. Finally, after 41 years, Santa had read our wishlist and dished out an early present. Noting the vulnerability of our opponents (a shadow of the former selves) and scenting blood, we did a thoroughly professional job on them, Dreamboat's second-half goal the difference. Admittedly we rode our luck at times - Patrice Evra hit the post, Mini V survived a penalty claim, Robin van Persie had a header disallowed - but the win was deserved and could only have been sweeter if the fuming, bug-eyed Scot in the dugout had been Taggart rather than David Moyes.

Southampton's visit to St James' the following weekend couldn't help but be a bit after the Lord Mayor's show, the ensuing draw a slight disappointment given the Saints' recent downward spiral and our exploits at Old Trafford, especially as we had taken the lead. Aside from another goal for Goofy - his fourth in consecutive home matches - the game was notable largely for the injury-time fracas sparked by Morgan Schneiderlin's aggressive challenge on Massadio Haidara which saw the number of personnel from each bench sent to the stands mirror the scoreline, goalkeeping coach Andy Woodman subsequently hit with a charge of improper conduct.

There was nothing remotely improper about the players' conduct in our next fixture, a trip to Selhurst Park. Showing scant regard for Crystal Palace's revival under Tony Pulis, we recorded a fifth successive away victory over them with ruthless efficiency. The Black & White & Read All Over match report was filed by friend of the blog Tim, who took delight in some improper conduct of his own, quietly slipping in the epithet "hairy passage"...

Even with everything going swimmingly (us sixth at Christmas, and the Mackems bottom), I couldn't help myself from worrying about Loic Remy's goal drought - so the loanee's brace in the Boxing Day battering of Stoke came as something of a relief, even if he did also miss a penalty. We may have romped home 5-1 in the end, Goofy scoring on home turf once again and even Papiss Cisse getting in on the act (albeit from the spot), but we endured a very sticky opening 40 minutes and only triumphed thanks to our opponents' indiscipline. Our old foe Mark Hughes was as guilty of this as his two red-carded players Glenn Whelan and Marc Wilson, the pantomime villain coming across as more of a pantomime dame when he chucked his coat in the air in disgust and flounced off to his seat up in the stands.

Sadly, the final fixture of the year ended in narrow defeat, Arsenal's Olivier Giroud doing the damage that his numerous compatriots in black and white couldn't quite repair - not even Goofy, who drew a blank in a home match for the first time since October. There was no disgrace in losing to a side clawing its way back to the top of the league, though, especially when our performance deserved better, everyone apparently acutely aware of the considerable competition for places.

No doubt through gritted teeth, Wor Al acclaimed that result as an instance of the Gunners winning ugly in his capacity as a Match Of The Day pundit - a role which he expressly prefers to the prospect of management, having dipped his toe in those murky waters with us back in 2009. One old boy who did take the plunge in December was Olivier Bernard, though with the purchase of Durham City he's seized the challenge of club ownership rather than management. Also back in the North East was Shay Given, turning out on loan for the Smogs in their hour of need.

Just don't put any money on ASBO doing likewise for the Mackems in January - "It wouldn't be right", he declared. Still, if we can go to Old Trafford and win without really having to break sweat, and if Cisse can find the net in a league match, then frankly anything's possible.

A Month Of Saturdays: November 2013

Let's be honest: not even Michael Chopra would have bet on last month turning out well for us. We staggered into November off the back of an early League Cup exit and, much worse, a second successive defeat to the Mackems, with nothing to look forward to other than heavy beatings at the hands of Chelsea and Spurs. And yet we came out the other side with four wins out of four, accolades for our manager and goalkeeper, and a real and renewed sense of belief that this season could be more 2011/2 than 2012/3.

With the benefit of hindsight, though, there were signs in that cup defeat by Man City that our fortunes might be about to change. We more than matched the Premier League's biggest spenders for 90 minutes, only succumbing to their superior quality in extra time. Failing to take our chances against top-quality opposition was not a mistake we were about to repeat when Chelsea rocked up three days later. Level at the break, we pushed on in the second period, goals from Goofy and Remy securing the first and arguably most impressive of our November victories, not least because it came against in-form title hopefuls. (Plus there was the added satisfaction of normal service resuming on Wearside, with the Mackems tumbling to defeat in farcical circumstances.)

Even with that result under our belts, though, many no doubt felt that claiming maximum points at White Hart Lane would be beyond us. And it would have been, were it not for the repeated and sensational interventions of Tim Krul. The whole side worked manfully to frustrate Andre Villas-Boas' men, but it was our Dutch goalkeeper who did most to protect the fragile early lead given to us by Remy, earning himself that Premier League Player of the Month award in the process.

Our gathering momentum might have been stalled by the international break, but even that ended up working in our favour. Our French contingent returned to Tyneside buoyed by triumphing in their World Cup qualification play-off against Ukraine - no mean feat given the first-leg deficit they had to overturn. And they weren't the only members of our squad looking forward to Brazil next summer. Mr T's Ivory Coast also qualified (albeit at the expense of Papiss Cisse's Senegal), as did Nigeria. Big Lad may not have had a hand in securing the Super Eagles' passport to the World Cup personally, but he nevertheless featured prominently in their friendly draw against Italy, setting up their first and scoring their second.

Any fears that the fortnight's holiday from club football would prove damaging were dispelled within two minutes of kick-off against Norwich, Remy scoring for the third successive game - and, most remarkably, from a corner. Goofy added a second, and with Big Lad apparently under the impression he was playing against the Mackems, we should have cruised to victory over Chris Hughton's side but conceded a goal ten minutes from time, resulting in an uncomfortable and nerve-wracking finish and a palpable sense of relief at the final whistle.

Another banana skin was successfully avoided on the final day of November, West Brom dispatched by the same 2-1 scoreline. The match was memorable chiefly for a marvellous winner and goal-of-the-month contender from Moussa Sissoko, smashed into Boaz Myhill's top corner from distance, but the fact that we once again scored from a flag kick, Goofy on target again, also merits a mention.

While the negative tactics of the second half against the Canaries were questionable, and the Spurs victory owed more to Krul's instinct and inspiration than to managerial nous, the Silver Fox was nevertheless overall a deserving recipient of the Manager of the Month award. The Premier League weren't the only ones queueing up to give him a pat on the back - Mike Williamson did too, understandably delighted to find himself back in the first-team frame.

The victories over Chelsea and Spurs caused the Guardian to sit up and take note, highlighting statistical evidence suggesting we've abandoned last season's hoof 'n' hope in favour of a more cultured and sharper passing game. That such a change has taken place with Big Lad replacing Cisse as the focal point of our attack is all the more remarkable. My own analysis, meanwhile, credited the sequence of wins to a return to form (and fitness) for our key men, and to a shift in formation to a more conventional 4-4-2.

So, what are we aiming for? What were our initial targets for the season, and should we now be revising them? Some took the Silver Fox's pronouncements about the benefits of not playing midweek European ties as evidence that the club hierarchy regard European qualification as undesirable. If so, then Jabba and chums are even more idiotic than I'd thought - we should always be aiming as high as possible, moving to strengthen and reinforce the squad if and when necessary. It's the only way we'll retain players like Dreamboat, who appears determined to enjoy European football elsewhere if not with us.

Already on the move in November were James Tavernier and Haris Vuckic, both sent out on loan to Rotherham. If JFK pitches up at a Millers match, here's hoping someone points out to him the players we already own...

That buffoon's continued employment was one reason why it wasn't a perfect month. Another was the extension of Jabba's assault on anyone who dares to question his actions or authority, with NUST suffering a similar fate to the local press, finding themselves barred from the recently resurrected fans' forum. Contrast that with the amicable and mature way Port Vale resolved their dispute with local paper the Sentinel. Sadly, there seemed to be little chance of common sense breaking out on Tyneside - as ever.

Mind you, that went for some of our players too. Saylor's ill-advised attempt at "banter" on Twitter was deemed offensive by some, and resulted in a slap on the wrist and a reminder that tweets are public. If Jabba really wants to make improvements to the way the club is portrayed, he could start by insisting JFK and our players undertake more extensive media training.

A Month Of Saturdays: October 2013

Holding court on the Sky Sports sofa during October's international break, the Silver Fox was remarkably (perhaps foolishly) candid about his employer: "He loves football but he sometimes can't understand how it works and it confuses and upsets him, and when he is upset he does things that aren't brilliant for the football club". Essentially, then, the sporadic irrational and idiotic decisions that Jabba's made during his ownership of the club can all be attributed to temper tantrums.

And, as if to prove the point, Jabba promptly made another such decision, banning the Ronny Gill and its sister papers the Journal and the Sunday Sun in a fit of pique over their reporting of the Time4Change protest march which took place prior to the Liverpool home game. The objection wasn't to the coverage per se but to it allegedly being disproportionate given the relatively disappointing turnout of disgruntled supporters. All the same, to issue an outright ban was petty and childish, and once again made us look like a laughing stock and him like a ludicrous little dictator determined to try imposing his will on things beyond his control.

Jabba seems not to understand the concept of independent reporting and journalistic integrity, believing instead that the media should simply parrot the party line and pretend everything's rosy. If that's what you want, then go to the club website. There were, of course, no complaints when we garnered coverage and plaudits in the press for our pioneering work to reduce ticket prices for away fans (work which did indeed merit applause despite the fact that a Football Supporters' Federation campaign and a £200,000 sweetener from the Premier League were needed to get things moving in the right direction). You also have to wonder, if Jabba's so serious about how the club is represented, why he continues to employ the one-man PR disaster zone that is JFK - or allows players to tell the French media, in thinly veiled terms, how JFK has spun lies to both the press and supporters.

Of course, the press ban was just another embarrassment heaped on top of a second consecutive derby defeat. The Mackems needed our bogeyman in their dugout, a champion in the Vatican and a spectacular late goal from loanee substitute Fabio Borini to beat us. Divine intervention? Not from where we were sitting it wasn't - more like misery compounded by the knowledge that, with the scores level at 1-1, we had looked more likely to sentence the Great Unwashed to a fifth successive home defeat than to hand them their first three points of the season. Thankfully, at least no horses were punched and there was no repeat of April's violence on Tyneside - violence which ensured our fans finished at the summit of last season's Premier League arrests table.

It may have seemed a distant memory by this point, but the month had actually begun in encouraging fashion. A relatively comfortable win at Cardiff, the result of a supreme first-half display (not something that could have been said about our previous match, at Everton), was certainly not to be sniffed at given that Man City had already fallen victim to the now red-shirted Bluebirds.

For Loic Remy, scorer of the matchwinning brace in south Wales, October was an eventful month. Off the pitch, he ticked the box marked "Road traffic incident/offence", as all Newcastle players seem to have to do, while on it, five goals in three games secured him a start in France's friendly against Australia. Dreamboat also celebrated a return to the side, scoring in a 6-0 spanking of the Socceroos, but both players had to be content with a seat on the bench alongside club colleague Moussa Sissoko for les Bleus' final World Cup qualifier against Finland. Of our French contingent, Mathieu Debuchy was our only starter in that fixture. Just a shame for the right back that his first Toon goal was to come in the loss at the Stadium of Shite.

As well as giving an unexpected insight into Jabba's habit of lashing out, the Silver Fox's Sky Sports appearance was notable for his admission, in language not dissimilar to that of the English Defence League, that "we are starting to get filled up with too many foreign players". So it was a timely moment for a born-and-bred Geordie to score in black and white for the first time since Wor Al's penalty against the Mackems in 2006. We may not have held out for a win against high-flying Liverpool - not that surprising, given that MYM's red card left us a man light for more than half the game - but Paul Dummett's impact as a substitute was just one reason to be cheerful about a very valuable and hard-earned point. It may have resulted in the offer of a new contract on improved terms - but then came the Mackems and Dummett's partial culpability for Steven Fletcher's fifth-minute opener.

Three days after that trip to the Dark Place, a measure of pride was restored by the League Cup meeting with Man City - though the ultimate outcome was, unfortunately, still a premature exit from the competition. We took the game to our more illustrious opponents and indeed created the better opportunities, only to succumb to the sucker-punch in extra time, City returning home victorious.

They weren't the only ones making the journey from north-east to north-west in October, with forgotten man Dan Gosling swapping one Wonga-branded shirt for another when he joined Blackpool on loan. He soon set about endearing himself to the locals, too, by scoring against Blackburn in the Lancashire derby. However, the former Everton man could probably score a hat-trick every weekend between now and the end of the season and still stand less chance of forcing his way back into the frame at St James' Park than Jabba has of reading a glowing personal tribute in the Ronny Gill...

A Month Of Saturdays: September 2013

On the evidence of September, a fair way to describe Newcastle would be "cheap" - both positively and negatively.

On the one hand, the club continues to offer the cheapest day out in the Premier League (as defined in the BBC's annual Price Of Football report) - and indeed a cheaper day out than the majority of Football League outfits.

On the other, we were confirmed as the only club in the division not to spend a penny over the summer, with JFK later bemoaning a transfer window "in which the value of players was grossly over-inflated and the demands of agents likewise". Because, of course, that's never been the case before and never will be again... Our sole signing Loic Remy was a loanee, while it subsequently emerged that penny-pinching attempts to move the goalposts had scuppered a deal for fellow French striker Bafetimbi Gomis - hardly ideal when our main marksman Papiss Cisse was playing as though the goalposts genuinely were moving...

Given our track record in previous transfer windows and JFK's boasts about his football knowledge and global contacts, it was a depressingly predictable outcome. The man who had declared with characteristically foolish confidence "Judge me on my signings" lay uncharacteristically low for three weeks after the window shut, only surfacing for the Hull game on the 21st, by which time he was presumably hoping that the fans' anger would have subsided. His column in the matchday programme was a shallow and pathetic exercise in self-justification (though arguably more sincere than the earlier official statement dubiously attributed to the Silver Fox, which also avoided a grovelling apology in favour of excuses and flannel, and concluded in preposterously upbeat fashion). Damien Comolli may have argued for the value of having a director of football (albeit in a different context), but in September JFK continued to do his level best to prove him wrong.

Predictable though our failure to recruit may have been, it was nevertheless a cause for disbelief for most, including NUST, who responded with a statement of their own. But if our inability or unwillingness to plug gaps and compensate for obvious deficiencies in the squad was incredible, then the revelation that our "scouting efforts" began "in earnest" on the first weekend of the month, just days after the window had closed and the opportunity to make any signings had passed, took the proverbial biscuit. Not that those "scouting efforts" constituted much, considering that for youth players at least we had adopted a policy of deliberately looking no further than our own back yard...

While foreign flop Romain Amalfitano was shipped out to Dijon on loan, the international break proved memorable for two players who did happen to be spotted in said back yard: Paul Dummett earned a first call-up to the senior Wales squad (though didn't get any game time) and Big Lad, at the age of 31, scored his first international goal for Nigeria, for whom he was now playing with the club's apparent blessing.

The break also saw Steve Harper's testimonial take place, during which villain of the piece Paolo Di Canio got a booting from ASBO, much to the delight of the crowd. Not long after that, the Italian got a rather more significant booting from Mackem owner Ellis Short, largely thanks to results but also partly to a habit of publicly criticising senior players that caused serious friction and mutiny in the ranks.

That the Silver Fox did much the same with HBA following the victory over Fulham seemed to pass without much comment. Our mercurial Frenchman was safe in the knowledge that he'd produced the goal that had beaten the Cottagers, though, and responded to the criticism with a brilliant performance as we beat Villa in our first match of the month, prompting him to claim he was targeting the Ballon d'Or award. Ambitious, perhaps, but laudably so.

Also catching the eye at Villa Park was his compatriot Dreamboat, whose move to Arsenal had failed to materialise - something to do with some chap called Ozil, you'd suspect. Dreamboat's performance was that of a man keen to both begin rebuilding his reputation with the Newcastle fans (to whom he subsequently apologised) and force his way back into the French national squad, from which he was omitted for the September fixtures.

Of course, after such an encouraging display on the road, we were always destined to fall flat on our complacent faces when entertaining a newly promoted side that travels worse than the Titanic. Remy notched his first two goals for the club, but that was scant consolation for the atrocious defending and staggering lack of creativity that allowed Hull to win with relative ease.

Thankfully there was a marked improvement when another Yorkshire side visited St James' four days later, Leeds dumped out of the League Cup 2-0. Cisse looked stunned to have headed his first goal of the season after superb build-up play from Dummett and Little Big Lad down the left, and Goofy swept in a splendid second. The reward, if you can call it that, was a tie with Man City.

Sadly we weren't able to carry that momentum into our final league match of September, instead slipping to another worrying 3-2 defeat. On this occasion our conquerors were Everton, who ripped us apart to race into a 3-0 half-time lead. While a peach of a strike from substitute Dreamboat and a poacher's finish from Remy may have pegged the Toffees back, the damage had already been done and the goals only really served to restore some pride.

Having pride in the club generally speaking would be nice - but as long as JFK remains in situ, we'll have to make do with feeling acute embarrassment.

A Month Of Saturdays: August 2013

Last month I was bemoaning the apparent difficulty of getting a transfer deal "over the line". When something is proving extremely difficult, there are essentially three options: redouble your efforts, quit or cheat. We went for the latter, opting to pursue a player we'd already come close to dragging "over the line" in January, only for him to decide to trouser a load of cash by hitching a ride on 'Appy 'Arry's Relegation Bandwagon instead. Facing the prospect of a season in the Championship being overlooked by French coach Didier Deschamps, Loic Remy didn't need much persuading to make the move to Tyneside that he turned his back on seven months earlier. He clearly has a firm grasp of the significance of the striker's role at St James' Park, even going so far as to arrive injured and with a court case already hanging over his head...

It's just a shame that we were doing 'Appy 'Arry a favour, lightening QPR's ludicrously heavy wage bill, rather than poaching Remy from under his nose. After all, that would have been sweet revenge for the way he gazumped us for the Frenchman in the first place - and we already owed him one for helping to unsettle Demba Ba by widely broadcasting the terms of his release clause. Incidentally, it was no surprise, given Chelsea's apparent policy of signing every attacking midfielder under the sun and playing a lone forward, to see Ba linked with a return to the club that only sold him in January. Presumably those in the club shop will have been rubbing their hands in anticipation - a quick and easy job applying letters to the back of replica shirts as well as an opportunity to shift more of that strawberry syrup they got in. Not that everyone even remembered who Ba was - the Torygraph's Luke Edwards seems to have forgotten about him ever turning out for the Toon.

Nothing transpired, though, and the arrival of Remy to relatively little fanfare was our sole piece of business in August. JFK - someone we WOULD like airbrushed out of history, Luke - might have blithely claimed that everyone was singing from the same hymnsheet, but in reality the Silver Fox was acting the naughty choirboy, repeatedly chirping about the need to strengthen in the face of the official party line that suggested (laughably) that the squad was sufficiently strong as it stood. It seemed the one-man PR disaster was once again on a mission to see how deeply he could offend us, not only insulting our intelligence with that comment but also taunting us peasants with talk of private helicopter rides en route for a cosy get-together on Jabba's yacht off St Tropez. Needless to say, he offered no explanation for the fact that the get-together was organised to discuss planning and strategy and yet took place in late August.

By that point, our Premier League campaign was already underway. The pre-season fixtures had concluded with an arguably full-strength side coming perilously close to losing to Rangers of Scottish football's third tier, and a draw at home to Braga. The latter match might have taken place on National Football Day in memory of Sir Bobby Robson, but the game itself was nothing to get excited about, the Silver Fox later whining about the lacklustre tempo typical of Portuguese teams but failing to explain why we'd elected to play three of them.

An opening weekend defeat at Man City was hardly unexpected, though the manner of the thrashing was no less disspiriting as a result. I'd obviously tempted fate by hoping the "secret formula" would elude our hosts. Manuel Pellegrini's men hit the ground running, flexing their muscles as title contenders and showing off some of their expensive summer imports. Tim Krul was superb while all around him froze like rabbits in headlights, but couldn't prevent a 4-0 deficit. Our misery was completed by an injury to Spidermag and a red card for Saylor. Nice to see him getting both his blatant penalty-area handball (not spotted) and impetuous dismissal out of the way in the first fixture of the campaign.

One game in, then, and already Paul's prediction of a ninth-place finish was looking decidedly optimistic. The inauspicious start to our season wasn't helped by the fact that Dreamboat had been unsettled by a £10m bid from Arsenal - "derisory" according to the club but enough to turn the player's head, with rumours suggesting he'd refused to play at Man City. Going on strike? How very French. Hardly the most edifying behaviour from a man we'd earmarked as a future club captain.

The Silver Fox was spouting nonsense when he suggested Dreamboat's absence was a critical factor in our loss to Man City, but it would have been a valid point with respect to our goalless draw with West Ham, when creativity was in desperately short supply. I'd caricatured Fat Sam's mob as limited hoof-merchants in my season preview, but we can consider ourselves lucky to have escaped being beaten at home by them for the second season in succession. Even without Rocky they created enough opportunities to win - though it was us who struck the post and skied a sitter in the dying minutes.

We were in need of an ego boost and the League Cup victory over Morecambe didn't really provide it. Big Lad and Little Big Lad may have ultimately made it a night to remember for the Ameobi family, but we had to endure several hairy moments before that, as our hosts made a mockery of the gulf in status and Dan Gosling twice cleared off the line, thereby making his most significant contributions in a black and white shirt (not that that's saying much).

Against Fulham the following weekend, we were within four minutes of drawing a blank for a fifth home game in a row, stretching back to the spring. Thankfully, though, HBA had other ideas, popping up with a spectacular trademark strike to earn us a deserved three points if not the enthusiastic gratitude of his manager. It also meant a third clean sheet in a week, albeit against mediocre opposition - a welcome sequence given how easily we'd been sliced apart by Man City.

While Dreamboat remained on Tyneside, making his first appearance of the season from the bench against the Cottagers, the club's youngsters were scattered to the four winds. Michael Richardson signed for Accrington Stanley, Mehdi Abeid hooked up with Panathinaikos, Conor Newton went back to St Mirren (this time without Paul Dummett), and, after featuring in a U21 fixture that didn't offer us much hope for the future, Adam Campbell swapped St James' Park for Brunton Park. Not that all the loan deals we struck lasted the course - James Tavernier managed just two appearances for Shrewsbury before hobbling back to the North-East with metatarsal knack.

One player who did leave permanently was Brad Inman, Crewe for once buying in rather than selling a promising youngster. The Aussie soon came up against a familiar face in League One, the Lone Ranger scoring as Swindon, the saps who in their infinite wisdom have decided to give him an umpteenth chance, ran out 5-0 winners over the Railwaymen. That goal came three days after his first for the club, which helped to give 'Appy 'Arry a bloody nose. Haven't I always said how much a fan of Ranger's I am? As for QPR, it was slightly upsetting to see that Danny Simpson broke his scoring duck for his new club almost immediately - just our luck that he'll now turn out to be prolific.

Down the road, Sunderland players seemed intent on burning bridges (much to our obvious amusement), but ours were more keen to build or at least repair them. Some supporters were sceptical of Papiss Cisse's motives for kicking up a fuss about the Wonga shirt branding, so his decision to invite fans to his house for barbeques and games of pool and FIFA could be seen as an olive branch or an act of contrition. Meanwhile, Sideshow Bob made friends with the Pope, the pair bonding over a mutual love of San Lorenzo. A wise move on the part of our captain - we may yet need to rely on divine intervention...

A Month Of Saturdays: July 2013

Prime minister? Bomb disposal expert? The Lone Ranger's lawyer? All undoubtedly tough jobs, but if we learnt anything in July it was that the toughest job in the world is actually to get "something over the line". Time and again we were told this was being worked on intensively, and yet nothing transpired. That "something" seemed to be a planet-sized boulder.

The person doing the talking was invariably the Silver Fox, who did at least mix his metaphors up a bit when he talked about getting "down the road" with something instead. In fairness to the manager, he was under constant pressure to enthuse about progress that hadn't been made, and his pronouncements had the dual function of (supposedly) reassuring and placating us fans desperate for news of incoming reinforcements while also chivvying along those responsible for making the deals happen.

And when I say "those responsible", I really mean JFK, the man who swanned into St James' Park for a second time bragging about all his connections and contacts. He's proving to be a magnet all right - if you remember that magnets repel as well as attract. At the same time as attracting nothing but ridicule to the club, he's contrived to repel even those close to him, his old mucker Mick Harford turning down a backroom role in favour of a glamorous position as Millwall assistant manager...

In July, experienced pros Steve Harper, Perchinho and Danny Simpson all left permanently, with Shane Ferguson and James Tavernier temporarily switching allegiances to Birmingham and Shrewsbury respectively, and yet our only addition was a 17-year-old teenager (French, of course, and already sporting the club's official haircut) whose signing had nothing whatsoever to do with JFK, though he's probably tried to take some credit. If the Silver Fox's nose was somewhat put out of joint by JFK's appointment, then you'd imagine his view of his new boss would have been growing dimmer by the day during July.

Not that player recruitment was the Silver Fox's only headache last month. The rumblings of discontent emanating from Papiss Cisse in relation to wearing the new Wonga-branded shirt came to a head with the striker missing out on our pre-season trip to Portugal, and for a while it looked as though we might never seen him flagged offside in black and white again. But then came tabloid revelations that were, for once, welcome, exposing our number nine's habit of occasionally visiting casinos. After apparently consulting various religious teachers, he backed down - but you have to suspect that the newspaper article had a hand in the swiftness with which the dispute was eventually resolved.

Soon afterwards, Cisse was back to doing what he does best and most naturally, smilingly finding the back of the net in an encouraging 2-0 friendly win at St Mirren. That was our fifth fixture of the pre-season; we'd already triumphed once against an SPL side, beating Motherwell 4-2, before a morale-sapping 3-1 defeat to Rio Ave and a 1-1 draw with Pacos de Ferreira in which skipper Sideshow Bob lost his cool and received a red card for throttling the home side's scorer.

Scorer of both our goals in Portugal, as well as the only strike at Blackpool when we returned to Blighty, was Big Lad. In July, rumours of his international career with Nigeria being over as soon as it had started proved premature, with the striker eagerly welcomed back into the fold only a few days later. The expiry of the gentleman's agreement between player and club that enabled this to happen suggested that he's no longer regarded as a hugely significant member of the squad.

Mr T, on the other hand, still is - though the Silver Fox may have misgivings about his state of mind (well, more misgivings than usual) given that he's up on fraud charges shortly and is determined to deny them. (At least the manager no longer has to take any responsibility for the actions of the Lone Ranger, who was charged with rape and, rather than getting fitted with a tag, very thoughtfully had his name tattooed on his face so he'll be even easier for the police to identify in future...)

With the lack of signings and the farcical appointment of JFK over his head, the Silver Fox could be forgiven for thinking he's being hung out to dry. Certainly it's hard to see him (or Llambiarse, King Kev or Wor Al for that matter) agreeing with the Sports Direct employee who gushingly described Jabba as "a brilliant boss" in a profile piece that appeared in the Independent. The club's owner has always acted ruthlessly and unilaterally (bringing JFK back being just the most recent and starkest case in point), so it was something of a surprise to learn that a revamped fans' forum is being launched with the full involvement of the club. Might he actually be about to start listening?

A Month Of Saturdays: June 2013

Nearly six years into his reign as owner of our club, Jabba remains something of a mystery man. What do we actually know about him? That he can down a pint very quickly indeed. That he's really a Chelsea fan (not the Spurs supporter as had been rumoured). And that, just when everything appears to be going swimmingly (or at least all is quiet and tranquil), he seems compelled to make controversial decisions calculated to cause chaos and provoke outrage, much like a boy jabbing at a wasps' nest with a big stick. Previous instances of this tendency have included undermining King Kev with the appointment and subsequent backing of the Poison Dwarf, and the announcement that St James' Park was to be rebranded - but last month he really outdid himself.

The re-employment of JFK was an extraordinary move and a cruel joke even by Jabba's exceptionally high standards. Our first reaction was to check the date - nope, 1st April had long gone - and then to cling to the hope that the club's silence on the matter was telling and that JFK would follow up the revelation by claiming that the Premier League is secretly run by lizards. Incredibly, though, what had seemed like the ravings of a delusional old duffer were eventually substantiated by the club, who confirmed that he had indeed been appointed director of football. While sides split the length and breadth of the country (and beyond), we were left to wonder whether Jabba had been following events down the road with interest and decided that having our own egomaniacal lunatic buffoon in residence would be the best way forward.

JFK kicked off his first spell on Tyneside with that infamous inflammatory press conference - not a charm offensive, just an outright offensive - but this time around his media strategy appeared to be different. Rather than bombarding hacks with more four-letter words than a Quentin Tarantino movie, he instead opted to bamboozle them with a barrage of lies and baseless self-aggrandisement like someone outrageously embellishing their CV. He exaggerated the length of his managerial tenures at other clubs, he insisted he has the ear of every big-name manager around, he claimed credit for the signing of Tim Krul. Every day seemed to bring new nonsense, and the press pack was left astonished by such brazen bollocks.

If Jabba's decision to bring JFK back was aimed at stirring things up, then it was soon fully vindicated. The mulleted fuckwit swung into St James' Park with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball. Within two days he'd upset a whole host of players by mispronouncing their names or, in the case of Little Big Lad, confusing them with their much older siblings, and Llambiarse had quit, apparently hastily and in disgust. As the sobriquet he earned indicates, we were often critical of our outgoing managing director's words and actions but nevertheless remain appreciative of some of the work that he accomplished behind the scenes, and it was telling that Jabba seemed to have no compunction in infuriating and then waving goodbye to his erstwhile trusted and loyal deputy. Speculation inevitably followed about the futures of Graham Carr and the Silver Fox - now the second-longest-serving manager in the Premier League, but for how much longer? - but the former appeared to want to stay (and to think we had him down as a man of astute judgement).

Alan Shearer, treated with criminal disrespect following our relegation in 2009, voiced his disbelief at JFK's return in the press and immediately suffered the indignity of being mocked by the subject of his criticism and having the bar bearing his name rebranded without any consultation whatsoever. A minor news story, perhaps, but it nevertheless demonstrated Jabba once again showing scant regard for history and sentimentality, instead ruthlessly exerting his authority.

Even before the news of JFK's improbable return had broken, Dreamboat sounded dissatisfied and unsettled, hopeful that his agents would be busy engineering him a move away from Tyneside (perhaps either to Man Utd or newly promoted Ligue 1 Flash Harrys Monaco). You suspect he can't now get away fast enough - just as Sideshow Bob is no doubt kicking himself for committing to the club for another season just before all the upheaval, despite having a clear yearning to go back to his native Argentina with San Lorenzo. Papiss Cisse and Mr T were also reported to be disgruntled, though for them the cause wasn't so much mooted big-money moves or JFK's mangling of their names as the fact that, as practising Muslims, they're uncomfortable with having to wear the new Wonga-branded shirt. (That decision was another one of Jabba's pokes of the wasps' nest, and sadly not one likely to be reversed, despite the fact that a clear precedent now exists.)

While we'd part with any of that quartet with a heavy heart, the same can't be said of Dan Gosling, Mehdi Abeid or Romain Amalfitano, all of whom arrived with high hopes and yet whose impact has been negligible at best. A BBC article in June revealed how shockingly few homegrown youngsters are coming through the system and getting first-team opportunities in the Premier League, but in truth they still need to be good enough and on the evidence we've seen Abeid and Amalfitano certainly aren't.

So much for potential outgoings - what about players coming through the gates that were, it turns out, neither legendary nor iconic? Talk of ex-Mackem Darren Bent and central defender Douglas persisted, other names reportedly in the frame were Derby's Will Hughes and Reading's Alex Pearce, and clubs published their released lists which, rather like the reduced section in the supermarket, seemed to offer a broad range of rotten fruit and veg and a few expensive luxury items that were well past their sell-by date - slim pickings, in other words.

But, despite JFK's claims of his international connections and eye for a player, no new additions of any kind were forthcoming. Instead we had to face up to the fact that we were inching ever closer towards the new season and a lovely opening-day obliteration at deposed champions Man City with the squad unimproved, the manager undermined and the director of football doing nothing but wreaking havoc and spinning yawnsome yarns about his talents. If this is all part of your masterplan, Jabba, then you're one hell of a strategist.

A Month Of Saturdays: May 2013

Fresh from a 6-0 home hiding by Liverpool and with rumours of dressing-room division rife, we went into the final month of the season seemingly in a headlong plummet towards relegation. It was clear that urgent action was needed if we were to avoid a repeat of the 2008/9 campaign.

The first step was to silence those rumours of discontent within the camp (discontent which allegedly had a Francophone clique pitched against the rest - so much for improving Anglo-French relations..). So it was that both Mr T and Papiss Cisse were wheeled out before the media to flatly deny the claims. Not that one of the prime sources of the story was present to hear the denial - the Torygraph's Luke Edwards having been banned by an evidently furious Silver Fox. A justifiable and legitimate course of action in the face of irresponsible and inaccurate journalism or the behaviour of an increasingly desperate man feeling the heat and a club infuriated at having its dirty laundry hung out for public viewing at the worst possible moment? We couldn't be sure.

The quotes served up by Mr T and Cisse may have felt scripted, but it was on the pitch that the players needed to do their real talking. In that respect, then, and in the context of the Liverpool catastrophe, a battling goalless draw at West Ham was significantly more convincing. It was no coincidence that the much-needed shut-out was achieved with captain Sideshow Bob back in the side, leaving old boys Fat Sam and former housemates Rocky and Kevin Nolan frustrated. And yet it could have been better had Cisse not been unjustly denied another yet another goal, and those elusive two additional points looked like being costly when results elsewhere went against us. Mercifully, however, our luck was about to change.

You'd probably have got put in a straitjacket if, back in August, you'd claimed that arguably the two most important goals of our season would be scored by Swansea's Dwight Tiendalli and Chelsea's Frank Lampard. But that's exactly what happened, with first Tiendalli condemning Wigan to a dismal midweek defeat and then Lampard scoring twice the following Saturday to overturn a deficit against Aston Villa and break Bobby Tambling's club record in the process.

The upshot of those results was that a win at already relegated QPR would be enough to secure our Premier League status. Fail, and we didn't deserve to stay up. Typically we did it the hard way, conceding a penalty that the Hoops' money-grabbing striker Loic £emy duly fired home, before digging deep (and profiting from some awful defending) to come from behind and then having to cling on after Rob Elliot was sent to get the bathtaps running early. As it turned out, Steve Harper was the calming influence we needed, and we saw out the remainder of the match to cling to the precious three points.

Elliot's dismissal handed Harper the unexpected opportunity of one final 90 minutes for the club he had served (albeit sporadically) for twenty years - if the scriptwriters of Mr T and Cisse's rift denials were paying attention, they'd have been nodding along in appreciation. In an ill-advisedly candid interview after the QPR win, a relieved Silver Fox announced that he didn't care if we got walloped by Arsenal, a statement he soon attempted to retract or at least claim as being, "of course, a joke". As it turned out, not only were we not walloped, but we actually played with a commendably high tempo and plenty of gusto in a spirited first half. It was only in the second period that the Gunners' class told - not to mention the fact that our players' minds were half on their holidays while our visitors were fixated on grabbing the final Champions League spot ahead of their bitter rivals. Laurent Koscielny's goal was the difference, and we never looked like mounting a recovery as the season petered out.

That was the cue for the post-mortem to begin, an examination of the many reasons for our dismal showing: injuries, loss of form, transfer dealings, tactics etc. Ultimately, though, I suppose the critical thing is that we ended up above the dotted line (and the Mackems) whereas three other sides - QPR, Reading and Wigan - didn't. The latter are our bete noire so it was with considerable glee that we waved them off to the Championship. There was equally a sizeable measure of Schadenfreude in seeing 'Appy 'Arry - the man who did so much to publicise Demba Ba's release clause - fail to save QPR and in speculating about the fact that their finances might now be on the verge of going into meltdown. When we were still sweating on survival ourselves, reports suggested that we too might be staring a similar fate in the face - thankfully, we never got to find out if the rumours of our idiocy were true.

The task now is to put in the essential groundwork to ensure that we don't find ourselves in the same predicament again next season. Mark Hughes famously declared as much of QPR last May and has been made to look very foolish indeed. Paul outlined what's required, proposing some additions on the coaching side of things as well as identifying holes in the first-team squad that need to be filled. A new central defender seems to be one of our priorities even if Sideshow Bob does stay, and Douglas would fit the bill (though Agent Bramble, recently allowed to flee the Dark Place, wouldn't). Potential new recruits certainly won't have any excuse for not being able to locate St James' Park, voted the league's most easily accessible ground...

There were some hints, though, that in looking to the future we're also aiming to promote from within rather than just simply buy from without. Having made considerable impact on loan at St Mirren, best Buddies Conor Newton and Paul Dummett were both rewarded with the offer of new deals, and goalkeeping coach Andy Woodman was effusive in his praise of Jak Alnwick, set to be understudy to Tim Krul and Rob Elliot now that Harper's disappeared into the sunset.

While most players jetted off for scarcely deserved stints on sun loungers, Raylor made the trip to Colorado to Richard Steadman's treatment table in the hope that the magician can cure him of his recurrent injury problems and save his career. I presume that by now there must be daily flights direct from Newcastle Airport to Steadman's surgery.


The fact that silly season was well and truly upon us was confirmed by the appearance on the Sports Direct site of a report that we'd held discussions with Shrek's agent and were preparing a bid (not for the first time). The story was swiftly retracted as complete fabrication and an apology issued, but it was significantly more plausible than a side contriving to finish sixteenth the year after finishing fifth. As usual with Newcastle Utd, though, truth is stranger than fiction.

A Month Of Saturdays: April 2013

This time last year we were scoffing at T S Eliot's suggestion that "April is the cruellest month". Twelve months later, we've sobered up and, surveying the wreckage of a Europa League campaign and a headlong plunge towards relegation domestically, have to concede that he may well have had a point after all. Just about the only person connected with the club who might beg to differ was Brad Inman, part of the Crewe side victorious in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy final...

The quarter-final draw for the Europa League pitted us against a side with one of the most formidable domestic records on the continent, but we refused to be overawed by Benfica. Though eventually going down 3-1 on Portuguese soil to the better team, we had nevertheless stunned our hosts by taking the lead, and it could have been so different had two Papiss Cisse efforts found the net rather than the woodwork and had Davide Santon and Saylor not committed heinous errors which were duly punished.

That left us requiring a 2-0 victory at St James' Park a week later - and we came agonisingly close to pulling it off. After a cagey opening period, we came out all guns blazing in the second half, grabbed a goal through Cisse and pushed vigorously for the second. Like villainous megalomaniacs always do with James Bond, we had our opponents right where we wanted them, only to allow them to wriggle free at the last minute and deal us the fatal blow - in this instance, an equaliser from Salvio. It wasn't to be, then, but there was no shame in our two-legged defeat and the efforts of the players certainly couldn't be faulted.

The two Europa League ties sandwiched a league fixture against Fulham which seemed destined to end in a disappointing goalless stalemate, only for Cisse to reprise his role as stoppage-time superstar, scoring a home winner well beyond the 90th minute for the third time in a month. Cisse bounded into the crowd, the Silver Fox threw himself into the arms of nearby supporters and the team leapt up the Premier League table into 13th.

We went into the derby three days after that Europa League exit, and while there were concerns about fatigue, I suggested that we'd "go into the game safe in the knowledge that we've just given a far better side than Di Canio's rabble a serious fright". We had, but Di Canio's rabble proceeded to give a weary, disjointed and gutless Newcastle side much more than just a serious fright. The second of the three goals the Mackems scored without reply came from the boot of boyhood Toon fan Adam Johnson - clearly a double agent - and was celebrated with a touchline kneeslide from the Italian loon, footage of which is likely to haunt us as much as that of Ronnie Radford's goal.

Before the game Newcastle fans had been warned not to perform Nazi salutes towards Di Canio, but as it turned out it was their behaviour afterwards that brought the club the most unwanted media attention, a small mindless minority choosing to take their frustrations out violently on their own city and - in one case - a police horse. They'll all end up in the dock, with any luck, but one Toon supporter found himself as a member of a jury charged with determining the innocence or guilt of a Mackem - and sensibly confessed to his prejudices.


As for the players, a positive reaction was essential and, in the first half at the Hawthorns at least, we got it. Goofy gave us the lead and we were well on top until half-time - at which point the Baggies were shaken out of their late-season mid-table torpor by ex-Toon man Steve Clarke, changed things around and spent the second period pressuring our fragile defence which, mercifully, only cracked once.

Liverpool were next up, and I made the grave mistake of suggesting that we could "take comfort from Suarez's absence" following his ban for biting Branislav Ivanovic: "They may not be a one-man team, but they're not far off it. It's up to us to capitalise and save our Premier League skins." Words that didn't so much come back to bite me in the arse as came back and swallowed me whole. The 6-0 humiliation was our worst defeat on home turf for 87 years, and the display the worst I could recall since Black & White & Read All Over began. The players were hopeless and gutless, the tactics clueless. It was an utter embarrassment. Two home games on from that Fulham jubilation, had the Silver Fox thrown himself into the crowd he'd have been torn to pieces.

Our St James' Park thrashing by the Reds recalled a similar pummelling in the 2008/9 season, not so much raising the spectre of relegation as helping to make it flesh and bone. Indeed, deja vu was persistent throughout April - whether it was the news that Raylor may be out for another year with a recurrence of his cruciate knee ligament injury or that the lone Lone Ranger had been found guilty of assault. Nothing went right - not even going against every fibre in our bodies and willing a Mackem win over Villa on the grounds that it would be beneficial to our chances of staying up. A 6-1 battering later and it was evident that we're not the only side in the North-East who simply cannot be relied upon.

All of which meant it was grimly fitting that One Direction should have chosen last month to visit our training ground - after all, we only seem to be going in one direction too, and it isn't up.

As desperate as it got, though, I personally retained a sense of perspective throughout. Becoming a father for the first time will do that to you. Bill Shankly was wrong about football being more important than life and death, you know - though I appreciate that might be less of a consolation to you, dear reader, than it is to me come 19th May.