No manager, no new signings, financial problems looming thanks to a massive and unsustainable wage budget - the never ending farce of Newcastle United adds extra intrigue to this season's Championship.

Last Season: 18th in Premier League and relegated on final day Doesn’t it frustrate you when an accident on the other side of the motorway causes a five mile queue in your lane because people like to slow down and have a look? Don’t you find when you get to the scene you can’t help having a bit of a gawp yourself? If so you probably found yourself following Newcastle United quite closely last season. Hey, even if mangled wreckage isn’t you’re thing, I bet you struggled to stifle a laugh at the Magpies’ expense on at least a couple of occasions last season. Their 16 year stay in the top flight of English football, during which time they came agonisingly close to winning the title and regularly played Champions League and UEFA Cup football, came to a shuddering halt in May with a 1-0 defeat at Aston Villa when even a point would have seen them survive at Hull’s expense - the lack of passion, commitment and effort from their vastly over paid playing staff with that in mind was lamentable. Newcastle always was a bit of a circus with televised Keegan rants, management turnover to rival even our own, players thumping each other on the pitch, chairmen slagging off the locals in saunas and so it goes on. But the chairmanship of Mike Ashley has taken the farce to new unplumbed depths.

They started the season with Kevin Keegan as manager, and Dennis Wise buying the players - something that was doomed to failure and fell apart by mid-August when Keegan walked out. As talks to persuade him to return lingered on Chris Hughton proved he is a coach and not a manager with a series of poor results. When it became apparent Keegan was not coming back the search began for somebody who would not only put up with the obscene expectations and wild mood swings of the “best fans in the world” (c - Richard Keys) but work for a fat chairman more bothered about being seen downing pints in replica shirts than doing his job properly and take orders from Dennis Wise. Joe Kinnear was duly scraped off the barrel floor and did look like he was steadying the ship suitably for it to survive, and throwing the odd rant at incompetent referees and egotistical journalists in for good measure and entertainment value. The inevitable heart attack followed and while Kinnear had bypass surgery Hughton did his ‘worst caretaker manager in the world’ act again. Newcastle drifted slowly towards the bottom three without anybody really noticing until, far too late, Ashley suddenly panicked and appointed Alan Shearer as manager - something he probably should have done in the first place, and by the first place I mean before he even brought Keegan back.

By that time Newcastle’s over paid, under worked, lazy, work shy, detestable squad of players had clearly given up and while their performances at home to Fulham and Portsmouth in must win games were bad enough it was the display in the crucial final game at Villa that really summed up the modern day footballer to me. Those that didn’t immediately walk off to bigger and better things having contributed fuck all to Newcastle, I’m looking at you blue eyed boy, will now stick around and slowly cripple the Championship club with wages of 50, 60 and 70k a week, and probably higher. Ashley’s running of the club and management turnover is the prime reason for their decline, and nobody forced Newcastle to hand out the contracts they did, but for the money they are paid Newcastle were entitled to ask more of every single member of their playing staff last season. For a team with Owen, Viduka, Smith, Martins, Nolan, Taylor, Given and others at its disposal for various parts of last season to be relegated is an utter disgrace and a shame to everybody involved. A thoroughly rotten club from top to bottom.

Head to Head: QPR last met Newcastle in the Premiership relegation season of 1995/96. At Loftus Road, on Les Ferdinand’s first return to W12, the Geordies won an absolute thriller 3-2. The sides traded goals in a minute either side of half time with Dichio giving QPR the lead and Gillespie equalising for the visitors. The inevitable spectacular goal from Ferdinand gave Keegan’s side the lead just after the hour but within two minutes another Dichio goal brought the R’s level and at that point the momentum seemed to be with us. However a disaster the likes of which only QPR, and Karl Ready in particular, could come up with presented Newcastle with an easy third –Ready and goalkeeper Jurgeon Sommer came together on the edge of the box with the former calmly rolling the ball past the latter to Gillespie who calmly rolled it into the open goal. If rangers were kicking themselves that day, they were positively suicidal at St James’ park at the end of the season when Ian Holloway gave them the lead with just over ten minutes to play in a do or die match only for Peter Beardsley to score twice in the final five minutes and turn three precious points into one and then none.

Odds: Despite everything Newcastle are second favourites for the title with odds as slim as 9/2 with Ladbrokes and best price only 6/1 with Bet365, Sky Bet and several others and frankly you’d get better value leaving your money in your current account than that.

Manager: Newcastle don’t have one. Having worked through three permanent ones and a caretaker last season Mike Ashley hasn’t seen fit to appoint one this summer. Alan Shearer remains ready and willing to take over, Chris Hughton is currently the caretaker and presumably Joe Kinnear would like to come back and have another crack at killing himself off but at the moment this is a sinking ship with no skipper.
Survival Chances: N/A

Players: Newcastle have discovered this summer that shifting under performing players on long and expensive contracts is easier said than done. A clear out is desperately needed for football and financial reasons and although the departures of Michael Owen (Man Utd) and Obafemi Martins (Wolfsburg) will save them a tidy sum there’s still a massively inflated squad here. On paper Newcastle should walk this league, but then on paper they should never have come down and a 6-1 pre-season defeat at Leyton Orient tells you all you need to know. Players like Damien Duff, Kevin Nolan, Joey Barton, Shola Ameobi, Jonas Gutierrez, Steven Taylor etc should be far, far too good for this league and if they all stay, and all play to the best of their ability, then Newcastle will indeed win this league comfortably, probably by March. However with a month of transfer window left it’s likely that there are plenty of departures still to come – although as Hull manager Phil Brown pointed out this week, probably the only thing of any sense he has said all summer, who do you talk to at Newcastle about buying their players? People like Taylor and Habib Beye will probably get new clubs leaving Newcastle with the problem children that played such a big part in getting them into this mess.
Likely Star Player – Steve Harper

Transfers
No incoming transfers
Out:
Obafemi Martins – Undisclosed
David Edgar to Burnley – Tribunal
Michael Owen to Manchester United - Free:

Prediction: Who knows? The team on paper is easily the best one in the Championship but without a manager, with financial disaster looming, with a chairman so obviously incompetent and out of his depth he really should be put down I can see another Leeds United situation here rather than an immediate return to the Premiership. The fact that every other Championship club is going to want their scalp more than any other and you have the lethal combination of poorly managed, under committed players facing teams making extra effort and raising their games.
Verdict: Midtable, another season of farce, further decline.

Photo: Action Images

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