Last season Newcastle were lauded for their European scouting operation after almost making the Champions League. This year a slew of other imports has resulted in a relegation battle. LFW plays the blame game.

Overview

Newcastle United has always been something of a bipolar organisation. Kevin Keegan's 1995/96 side crashing from a 12 point lead at the top into second place is typical of the peaks and troughs enjoyed and endured by the Toon Army in recent times: sign Michael Owen and find out he's crocked; bring Alan Shearer back as manager only to get relegated; put together one of the most attractive attacking side the Premier League has seen and ruin it by adding Tino Asprilla. But even by their schizophrenic standards, falling from the cusp of the Champions League to the brink of the Championship inside 12 months is some going.

A year ago things couldn't have been better. In just their second season after promotion Newcastle were right in the hunt for the top four until the very end and eventually qualified for the Europa League. Manager Alan Pardew, a man who never was short of self-assuredness in the first place, stood on the touchline looking ready to fellate himself if only he could reach – and who knows what went on when he got home? Owner Mike Ashley, previously the lard arse who stood with the fans and necked pints while his club crumbled around him, was suddenly hailed as a genius. Graham Carr, once a long-ball favouring manager scraping a living with Kettering, Northampton and the like, became the most well-known and admired scout in the land.

Between the three of them they'd apparently overseen a transformation of the club for the better.

Newcastle had been riddled with highly paid trouble makers for years, back to the days when team mates Kieron Dyer and Lee Bowyer fought each other on the pitch while Craig Bellamy watched on, probably wishing he'd chinned Bowyer first. Ashley stood up to the self styled player's committee he inherited : Alan Smith has since had to drop as low as MK Dons to find football; Joey Barton bitched and moaned his way through a dreadful year with QPR before they got rid of him too; Andy Carroll was sent packing to Liverpool with his Land Rover still smouldering on the drive and became a standing joke for his performance to price tag ratio before being loaned out to Wes Ham; Nile Ranger has been sacked Only Kevin Nolan can be said to have been any kind of success since leaving, and even he had to drop down a league initially to join West Ham.

Carr scouted for less boisterous characters with greater technical ability and lower wage packets from around Europe. Yohan Cabaye impressed at the base of the midfield, Davide Santon looked a steal at £5m given his early career form and still relatively young age, Cheick Tiote attracted interest from elsewhere initially and Hatem Ben Arfa scored spectacular goals. These players weren't exactly unknown – although Shearer infamously told Match of the Day viewers that he'd never heard of Ben Arfa – but Carr did a good job of helping Newcastle to build an attractive and competitive team while reducing the wage bill at the same time. Pardew was given an unprecedented eight year contract as reward for martialling his new-look troops so successfully. The LFW season preview said there was "no reason to suspect Newcastle will not perform as well again during 2012/13" and tipped them for sixth.

That has turned out to be about as accurate as this site's assertion that Swansea City would finish last this year. With two games remaining Newcastle are in prime position to be relegated if Wigan win both their remaining fixtures. The reasons for such a dramatic demise have been a source of much conjecture in the football media. Pardew, peering out from beneath what is now an inexplicable fringe, says his squad was simply too small to cope with the rigours of competing on four fronts. Newcastle took the Europa League seriously and advanced to the quarter finals, playing 14 games on the way, having reduced their squad number by six with ten sales/releases and only four purchases last summer.

Some have levelled a different accusation at the club. Pundits and writers, Gary Neville chief amongst them, have alleged that Newcastle have had too much of a good thing and become too reliant on Carr's scouting trips abroad. They signed six more French players in January taking the total in the squad to ten and fielded a team with just one English player for a recent 3-0 home humbling by Sunderland . There's talk of a lack of heart, a lack of understanding of the club culture, a negative effect on the dressing room. Pardew has been quick to fire back, saying the criticism is xenophobic, and the club has now taken to that most desperate of measures – banning newspapers for writing negative stories about a negative situation.

Looking at the performances, and more disturbingly the off the ball running and positioning, of French defenders Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa and Massadio Haidarain during a recent 6-0 mauling by Liverpool adds fuel to the fire. But hang on, when Manchester City won the league this time last year only three of their starting 11 on the final day was English. Surely it doesn't matter whether you're French, English or Barbadian - or care about playing for Newcastle or not - you know that you don't defend the way Yanga-Mbiwa did against Liverpool? Isn’t this all getting a bit Daily Mail?

Perhaps the answer is much less dramatic. Perhaps Newcastle are simply a midtable club that had a very good season last term and a very poor one this year. Last season Newcastle were unbeaten through the first 11 league games during which they fielded the same back four – Danny Simpson, Steven Taylor, Fabricio Coloccini, Ryan Taylor – in every single match. This season Ryan Taylor has played twice while Coloccini has suffered with personal problems and been absent from several games at the start and all of March and April. Papiss Cisse scored 13 goals from 14 appearances after a January arrival last season and this year he has only managed the same total from more than three times as many (45) outings. Demba Ba got 17 and this season managed 12 before heading off to Chelsea in January. What team wouldn’t struggle with the defence affected by injury, the top scorer sold and an extra 14 matches to play with a squad reduced in size by six players? The club and Pardew can be criticised for allowing the squad to shrink, and only covering a back four with a player as poor as Mike Williamson, but perhaps last season they profited from favourable conditions and this year they’ve suffered in poor ones.

Much is made of how well run Norwich City and West Brom are, and yet the former could be relegated this season and the latter is facing a difficult season next term judging by its form over recent months. But they wouldn't become badly run clubs with a relegation, and a season of struggle doesn't necessarily mean that Newcastle have done a lot wrong.

Interview

We’ve been bidding farewell to our regular Premier League contributors in recent weeks as QPR prepare to head to the Championship. There’s still a chance that LFW’s official ambassador for the Geordie nation (not a salaried position) James Harrison could be coming with us next season, so we’ll stick to the usual thanks for his time and move swiftly on…

What on earth has gone wrong? Why are Newcastle struggling after doing so well last season?

I think Pardew’s tactics are high risk and unfortunately we lost our get out of jail free card with Demba Ba leaving in January. It’s amazing how well he managed to cover up how much of a long ball team we are. When you actually look back to last season, you begin to realise a) how many goals he scored from long balls (e.g. Man U at home) and b) how much he dragged the team kicking and screaming to the fifth place finish. He was made to play out to the left and was still getting the long balls aimed at him. Whilst he wasn’t scoring, he was so dangerous he took two defenders with him at a time, thus providing space for Cisse and Ben Arfa.

The size of the squad with the European games obviously stretched us to the limit which didn’t help. Neither has nearly two seasons without a goal from a corner. If I were your defenders I’d boot it out for a corner the moment our players come in your half.

What do you make of the criticism, put forward by Gary Neville and a lot of the media, that one of your problems is essentially too many French players - not understanding the culture and the club not having the fight etc?

Gary Neville has a job to do and he's changed his mind about the French lads since we beat Villa so I don't pay much notice to be honest. Besides, are these French lads any worse than Danny Graham? A player who said he'd never play for Sunderland but now picks up a huge pay packet every week and still hasn't scored a goal? The culture has been sucked out of the club by Ashley anyway so I don't think you can blame foreigners for that either. What does worry me is cliques in the dressing room. Judging by the performance against Liverpool, one has formed and it’s against the manager.

Do you think you're going to end up coming with us?

With the greatest respect you’re a relegated team currently bottom of the table so if we don’t beat you then I would say we deserve to go down. If Wigan put two wins together our only other hope is for Norwich to lose by more goals than us over the two matches.

Is there any thought/bitterness that it might have been different had you been able to replace Demba Ba with Loic Remy as Newcastle wanted to? He's been excellent in a lousy QPR team.

Aye, there's massive bitterness from some about Remy. Most Toon fans see him as a mercenary who got his big pay packet. You can't blame him. I'd take double wages for six months if I knew I was guaranteed employment somewhere else at the end of it. Besides aren't all the players we've signed mercenaries? I can't imagine they've all been desperate to move to the north east of England their whole careers.

Presumably Pardew is on shaky ground with the supporters – do the majority want him gone and what potential replacements catch the eye?

I think most do want Pardew gone, although others think sacking him won't change anything. I had stuck by Pardew more than any other recent manager, largely due to our exploits last season.

The turning point for me (and many others) was the Brighton FA Cup game. I had watched us play awful long balls all season and largely assumed it was because our players were struggling and resorting to long balls against Premier League opposition in blind panic. In that game I noticed Vernon Anita was taking the free kicks and even if the ball was five yards inside our half, the entire defence went up and the ball was punted up for Williamson. The opposition all season have set up their line to this tactic 20-25 yards out, they clear their lines and counter, instantly putting pressure back on us. No-one can tell me a Dutch international who came through the ranks at Ajax thinks this is a good idea. It’s been the same all season and Pardew is obviously telling them to do it.

After the match Pardew laid all the blame at the young players door. There were a number of talented young players and four players with Champions League experience in the starting line-up. Yet the tactics were the same. They were like lambs to the slaughter. I’m not saying Brighton are poor, but with the talent we had on the pitch we should have at least put up a fight. For Pardew to not take any of the blame for that and lay into the young lads was unforgivable in my eyes.

Whether we get relegated or not, Pardew needs to go. The players aren’t playing for him; I don’t believe they understand or like his methods. He is a Championship manager with an international class of players who deserve better. Who we get in depends on what division we are in. If we stay up, Benitez will be free and has the ability to get more out of the likes of Cabaye and Sissoko. I think he’s done a great job at Chelsea despite all the protests. If we go down, we need someone with a track record of bringing teams back up. Di Matteo took us to the wire with West Brom when we came up so he would be a good bet.

Candidates for Player of the Year?

Coloccini without doubt. We're a different team with him in the side. It looks like he's off no matter what. We're really going to miss him.

And perhaps more pertinently, who are the weak links?

Cheick Tiote. He can’t pass, he can’t shoot, he can’t tackle, he can’t cross, he can’t dribble. What he brings to the team (other than yellow cards) I have no idea. I never want to watch Obertan play football again, in any shirt. Gutierrez has been very inconsistent this season, two good games followed by five bad ones and yet Pardew never drops him. The jury is out on Gouffran as well.

Whatever happens, a big summer of change surely needed ahead? What needs to be done if you stay up, and if you go down?

If we were to go down it wouldn’t be as easy as last time. We’re going to have a squad of about 15 players and all the acquisitions we made in January will be gone. If we stay up, we definitely need at least one new striker if not two, a central defender of Coloccini’s class and leadership as he looks ready to leave and a new central midfielder with more in his arsenal than Tiote. There also needs to be some thought as to what formation the squad will be built around.

Scout Report

Picking faults with Newcastle at the moment is rather like spotting irrelevant wankers on the Londoner’s Diary pages of the Evening Standard – so many fish, so much ammunition, such a tiny barrel.

The first thing that was apparent during the recent games with Sunderland and Liverpool (0-3, 0-6) was that their attacking ethos was based entirely around getting the ball pumped directly, early into wide channel areas and they committed men forward in big numbers down both flanks to do this. Sylvain Marveaux and Yoan Gouffran played wide against Sunderland and clearly the plan was to get the ball to them as quickly as possible and try and utilise their pace. The second thing you couldn’t help but notice – and Paulo Di Canio and Brendan Rodgers had clearly picked up on this prior to the two games – was that this left them hopelessly exposed on the counter attack.

It really was like shelling peas. Sunderland and Liverpool both pressed much higher up the pitch when out of possession than you would normally see, and countless times they were able to seize possession on or around the halfway line and spring a counter on what was essentially a back four left all alone with no protection. Sunderland in particular forced Cabaye to pick the ball up much deeper and under much more pressure than he would have liked, meaning he was effectively knocking 60-70 yard hoofs down the field at two wingers which were easy to pick off for full backs Bardsley and Rose. Starving the two wingers of possession in turn isolated Cisse and so Sunderland were able to start their attacks from not much further back than halfway a lot of the time. Pardew sent on Shola Ameobi at half time, but it only served to make them more direct and Sunderland were happy to face that.

Much was made, particularly after the Liverpool game, of the defending of Yanga-Mbiwa and Haidarain and rightly so. The former was making unbelievable decisions for a centre half – rushing out of position while leaving free men behind him, playing offside alone rather than as part of a unit and so on. The latter exposed him still further by failing to work hard enough and cover round from left back to pick up those spare men Mbiwa was leaving alone. But for me Cheick Tiote got off lightly in the post mortem afterwards. A defensive central midfielder sitting in front of the back four and doing an adequate job would have helped the situation, but he was all at sea in that regard and caused a number of the problems himself with his poor passing – hard to believe this was the same player Man City were said to be ready to spend big on a year ago.

Still, no surprise that a return of Steven Taylor, Fabricio Coloccini and Danny Simpson to the back line last week brought a clean sheet at West Ham.

If QPR can be arsed then the cheat sheet has been written: press high, force Cabaye to go long, starve the wide men of possession, target Tiote when he has possession of the ball, run at the defence with pace and take advantage of their poor decision making.

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ozexile added 09:39 - May 10 Great piece. Loved the description of Tiote. We've got 15 of them and 3 on loan.
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TacticalR added 13:15 - May 10 Thanks for your write up and to James too. I agree with your conclusion: 'Perhaps the answer is much less dramatic. Perhaps Newcastle are simply a midtable club that had a very good season last term and a very poor one this year.' Something goes wrong and people look for a dramatic explanation. The problem for most clubs is that they are not insulated from bad seasons. A few bad decisions or a bit of bad luck that wouldn't derail one of the rich clubs can derail a smaller club. There are certain mistakes (e.g. selling your best player without a replacement) that smaller clubs can't afford to make and rich clubs generally don't have to make. Then, because people confuse failure and morality, relegation leads to an outpouring of moral damnation from all sides. However, from what James is saying, it does seem that mistakes are being made at Newcastle. With so many French players in the dressing room, you do wonder if there are profoundly different conceptions about how football should be played, and if the gap between what Pardew wants and those different conceptions aren't bridged then life is going to be difficult. It does sound like Newcastle can be got at, but it feels like we have given up the ghost.

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isawqpratwcity added 13:37 - May 10 Ah jeez, I was hoping for a win for this one...
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N12Hoop added 18:40 - May 11 Despite the above I expect Newcastle to win with a goal from a corner and one for Tiote. Loved James Harrison's comments, many of which sound like they could been written about some of our lot.
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