Another farce@St James' Park
There are some things that money just can't buy - and one of them is the name of St James' Park.
As previously stated, it's accepted that it is a common practice to name a brand new stadium with the backing of a sponsor just like Tottenham Hotspur are currently in the process of doing and like Arsenal and a host of others have in the past at home and abroad.
Yet to call it anything but St James' Park including Sports Direct.com@St James' Park heaps more pain and more misery on Newcastle United fans.
And when those concerns are getting as far as The House of Commons who made fresh "calls" for the current ownership to leave history alone, it has to be considered as serious as it can get in football terms.
Once again this does nothing but attack the identity of Geordies everywhere and surely does not do the current team any favours whatsoever in attracting adverse publicity.
So far the squad of players have worked miracles to be top of the table in November and getting back to the Premier League is still the main aim to get back to the top flight.
Long may that continue.
But for now ill advised statements over ways of raising money for the club and talk of jumbotron screens rather than putting together a capable team of the field, does nothing but turn fans completely cold.
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Lee Ryder - Proudly born and bred on Tyneside, the Chronicle's chief sports writer has followed the fortunes of the club over the last three decades as a Toon fan and football writer.
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Whats the betting more cash goes out of the club in January than comes in.
The asset stripping will continue.
This man Ashley is unbelievable.
Why does a billionaire buy a football club and not put his cash into it?
Shame Ashley didn't invest £20 million in players last year and he might still be getting Premier league TV cash.
Not sure how Llambias dares show his face after Keegangate discredited him completely.
Bunch of liars.
Notice Ashley doesn't wear the shirt anymore. Must feel ashamed pulling it over his head?
fattw@nufc.go.away/soonaspossible
Our fans need to get a life!
Is it any wonder nobody wanted to touch us with a bargepole? Owners cannot do anything to raise turnover without it upsetting our fans! It's a joke!
I haven't heard any fan, not one single fan make a issue out of the fact that there is a sportsdirect.com sign on the Gallowgate stand.
That's all their proposing to do, they already do it, their just letting everyone know that their going to do it on all four sides.
It will always be St James' park to us and to everyone else.
Our supporters make too much noise, create endless headaches for every regime- ' Sack the manager' 'Bring in this manager' 'You cannot do this', 'You cannot do that'!
I don't like Ashley or his regime but were are making it almost impossible for anyone to buy he club and plought their own money into to make it successful.
Why don't we concentrate on supporting the club and focus all our energy on that rather than demo's and letting people like NUSC, Steve Wraith and Mark Jensen whip us all into a frenzy over pointless issues!
Stuart..what a load of rubbish!!!
If you really cared about the club you would do ANYTHING to get Ashley out and that includes demo's, and it you think the issues are pointless you are a fool.
Ashley is not going to sell at a huge loss, he will sell the better players off in January to reduce the debt collect from naming rights and sell at a small loss or break even then put up the fingers to Tyneside and laugh all the way back to the smoke. Why because he can its his not yours or anybody elses its his to do with as he pleases, he wants out at the best price for him and he doesn't care if he leave behind a shell.
Here here Ray...Stuart, you're so far out of tune with reality its untrue. What we are talking about is this discredited regime (did you see the Keegan tribunal outcome?) renaming our stadium with what sounds like a web address. How can you possibly defend this?
What exactly are they renaming?
Their charging a company to whack their logo on the stadium. Don't we do that with the shirts?
As for Ashley - The best way to get him out is to get promoted. I don't think we'll get promoted with all this negativity in the city or the club.
We need to support the club and the team if we want to go up.
Ashley isn't going anywhere this season - We have to face that. Demo's won't change that fact. They will have a adverse effect on the players though.
But surely you can see that all this negativity, moaning and trying to control the club decisons is giving the club such a negative look.
We all want a rich Arab to buy us but why would they do that if they cannot even spend their own money how they like and employ who they like?
They'd be to scared of making any decisionsfor fear of upsetting the supporters.
I want Ashley OUT, but it won't happen until we are a PL club.
Lets pull together, support the team and get promoted!
Ashley is irrelvant this season.
Although I am thankfull for him putting£20m into the club, as if he didn't we would most likely be in administration this Xmas.
Am i right in thinking it's mike ashleys own company thats got the renaming rights?
If it is then how much has he paid for them? are we getting any money from this at all?
Stuart, you're not a fan. End of.
If by 'not a fan' means I bought a season ticket for three years with up front payment then you're right, I'm not a fan.
Sorry having an opinion, I'll remember to ask next time.
Keep enjoying the FCB's pies Stuart. Try not to drip them on to your nice new stripey yellow top or your Lonsdale trainers.
Ker-ching.
It would be best to ask Stuart because it is total b******s to try and explain away anything this cancerous regime say or do. You and other Ashley appeasists (because that's what you are by turning up at the ground every other week) should not be allowed to utter this 'support the team' and 'I'm a real fan' nonsense while our club is dying. The only real fans are those who are boycotting until he is gone. An empty ground for the Peterborough match and he'd sell to the highest bidder. Will the afflicted do it ? 'No because poor little Kevin and poor little Alan can't function without me'. Do me a favour. Most of the crowd just sit and moan at the team anyway so it's a pointless argument. Act or he will continue to plunder our once great club until he kills it.
Native, I hate what this regime have done to the club. I want him out as much as the next man but were stuck with him.
I'm not going to stop supporting the team because some idiotic owner cannot run the club.
My point is that this whole sponsorship of the ground is a revenue maker. Nothin more, nothing less. We need that revenue!
It hasn't change the name it's St James' Park, always will be.
I still believe that it's only because Ashley has come up with the idea that it's got o much opposition. Their using it as an excuse to beat him with.
I'm all for having a go at him for his mistakes, but not for this. We need ideas like this to prospor in the future.
If that means I'm a bad supporter, so be it. But I know I support the team every week, not Ashley.
Oh and Ron - What a sad supporter you must be. Boycotting watching the team because you don't like the owner? Get a life!
Ashley has tried to sell he couldn't. If nobody turned up every week we would be in administration faster than you could say SportsDirect.com@St James' Park.
Glad the majority still go and support. You'll probably be back when we go up. Not that we need fans (I use that word rather than supporter, as it's obvious you don't) like you.
Whatever the pros and cons about the name of the ground, the main issue is that there has been yet another blatant lie by Llambias. When the club was taken off the market, it was clearly announced that they were prepared to change the name of the ground for a price. Then after the protests made in the meantime, it was suddenly "no no, we were never going to remove the St. James' Park name, just @dd to it"
Never ever trust anything these people say again
Stuart, where do you draw the line for acceptabilty?
Would it be acceptable for Ashley to sell the name of the club itself ... "sportsdirect@newcastle.united. football.club" for example. It may seem unimaginable, but then again so would the new name of our ground.
Some differences of opinion on this one, which is fair enough. 50,000 people can't be expected to agree on everything. However, lets not lose sight of the reasons for this discussion. Ever since Ashley arrived he has been sucking money out of the club and this announcement to sell the naming rights to the stadium is extremely cynical and misguided. Those fans who think it is an OK way to raise money for player investment are being conned on a massive scale - solely because it is the only hint of cash flowing into the club, rather than out of it since Ashley arrived.
Don't lose focus and start arguing amongst yourselves, this is one mans fault and one only.
People who say its good to have more revenue are missing a Biiiig fact right in front of there eyes. The money which will come in from the naming rights, even a penny from that wont go into the team, it will all go into FatMan's pocket to cover his losses which..... were his own doing only by not doing due diligence before buying the Club.
Why do people turn blind eyed to the truth?
Ashley will only try to get most out of our club and strip it naked. In every transfer window he sells our best players which leaves us with a set of more and more mediocre players... wake up people see the truth... if he stays on for long then , that Day is not far away when only kids and loanees will play in the team and NUFC will tumble down and down into the lower levels of English leagues.
I have read with interest everyones opinions on the naming rights and have to admit when I first heard about it I was horrified, let face it football has always divided supporters as much as it brings them togeather, The way I see it is this -
Ashley bought the Toon as a toy because his best mate had bought Spurs and his biggest buisness rival owned Wigan, It was nothing more than a toy so he could try and gain bragging rights over the pair of them and they could enjoy having wagers over games to get a rush from the gambleing,we have all seen the obscene amounts of money he plays at the roulette tables.
When he first arrived everyone was ecstatic it was like the new kid moving into the big house down the road and having loads of money so everyone wanted to play with him, he seemed nice at first but the more you got to know him the more you realised he he was just a spoilt brat who was used to getting his own way and if you did'nt play his way you were not welcome anymore, but some of your friend would side with him because they still wanted what He had and you found yourself out of the gang because you spoke out, the problem now is we are involved in Ashleys big game of Monopoly and at first when he was the banker and he was winning he liked the game and everyone liked him and now he isn't winning anymore he does'nt want to play, BUT his friend is beating him and his arch rival is laughing at him and HE can't have that so even though He is losing He is still trying to play along to save face.
But here is the problem if he loses too badly he will just pack up his board and go home and then everybody loses, all the friends are left divided and no one has anywhere to play anymore but the new kid will just move on and do it all over again to somebody else!
So He dos'nt realy care,
Even school kids understand that they have to let someone else have there way sometimes or they won't play with them for long and while that might not be a bad thing, the divide they have caused between others may be irepairable.
If Ashley loses to heavily he might just pick up his toys and go and play somewhere else but if he does what is he going to leave behind?
Maybe we should just let him have a little bit of his way until someone else comes along with some new toys and then we can drop him and the gang will still be togeather and maybe the new boy will not be so spoilt!! But then again maybe he could be even worse who knows??
Lee - can you please state clearly what your censorship policy is on this blog?
I would like to know on what basis you remove comments, so that I can decide whether I want to continue to contribute to what I had previously always thought was an open, healthy debate.
If your policy is to delete any comments that are critical of you, The Chronicle or Thomson House, then this blog is a sham and I will gladly opt out of participating, to save you having to use your delete key.
where to start? - well
1. sportstsdirect.com @ was an example not a confirmation of the renaming, 2. St James Park surely is the area that the gorund stands on and the ground takes its name from that? not the other way around so it will always be st.james park unless the council rename it? 3. i don't mind if the 2 argies go in jan jonas isn't all that and curlyargy is on way too much money. 4. I agree any money from the naming rights will go straight into MA pockets. 5. DL is full of total rubbish he really is missing every single point, he thinks we can't see whats going on? (i think some chemicals maybe involved with is outlook on life?)his statement in the EC leaves me gob smaked it really does i feel like i'm being spoken to, the way a strange old person talks to a 3yr old! it really bothers me... its like willy wonkas chocolate factory up there! cookooo!
MA and DL have created all the conflict here and they are the reason we are in the CCC, if they cant see that or they can't see why we dropped down god help us we'll be going in circles but you know what they do know because the dropped us on purpose and if the gamble isn't paying off well there you go, a hard lesson learnt, gamblers always lose in the end!! And of MA bank rolling the club? Eh! what!? -ITS HIS OWN FAULT!!!! HE DID THIS, ALL OF IT NOT THE FANS!!!! AND IF YOU'RE NOT MAKING MONEY ON PIES BEERS AND SHIRT YOU NEED TO TAKE A HUGE LOOK IN THE MIRROR!!!!!!!!!
Lee
How about you do all of the fans a favour and contact the companies/individuals that were supposed to be buying the club from the Shopkeeper, and find out why the "deals" fell through?
Surely any non-disclosure agreements are now null and void if the process has been stopped.
We all had to bear the heartbreak of relegation, only to be messed around all summer by what ifs, and ever increasing deadlines.
Do it for yourself, be a journalist, find a decent story. We all know MA and DL have been lying through their teeth, prove it for us.
The mess we currently find ourselves in is a result of false hopes given by the club, as protests and stay-aways would have been arranged sooner had it not been for dreams (lies) of some Saudi Oil Baron sweeping us back to the Premiership under Shearer's rightful command.
This latest farce of renaming the stadium, surely can’t be allowed mid season by the League Association? it's a bad joke, and it's us(the fans) being laughed at!!
Be a Fan of this club we all love and have had to watch being destroyed in front of our very eyes, just to appease some Fat Kid that was bored of his other toys and wanted to have what all the cool kids have.
I think looking at what Llambias actually said, there is NO money coming in from changing the name. They are allowng SportsDirect to use it this season as a 'showcase' to other businesses. Basically Ashley has decided he wants more advertising in return for his so-called £20 million (£20 million paid into the club, yeah right). The club won't get a penny from until somebody else comes along and buys the naming rights. In the meantime we're all going to have to look at lots of new signs for chavshop.com. I hope they put them high up because if I can reach them I'll tear them down.
Who is this bloke trying to bu*****t?
Ashely put in £20 million of Sports Direct money into Newcastle to BUY sponsership, not his own! That way Sports Direct Shareholders are happy, Ashley is happy and the fans are p**ed off.
Hands up, in 2007 I thought that a new owner might be good for the club (hall and shephard are not innocent in all of this) but oh how wrong I was...
Reading the papers today, there's more talk of trying to get enough supporters together (ie.40,000) to fork out £2,500 each to buy Ashley out. It will never happen.
I know this has been mooted before, but it's worth repeating. The easiest way to force his hand is to stop attending the home games, season-ticket holders excepted.
A 40,000-full SJP makes him a million quid. With 31 more home games to go that's £31 million he stands to lose. I don't suppose that many would ever stay away, but even if a quarter stayed at home, he's looking at a £7-8 million pound loss for the rest of the season.
He's doing all these things to the club because he knows he can and there's nothing we can do about it. Well, this is one thing we can do to him and there's nothing he can do about it.
It may smack of desperation, but I think we need to bite the bullet before it's too late.
Although the appalling stewardship of the club leaves me seething, I am not getting into a lather about the stadium naming rights. Once a place has been given a name, it will remain forever, despite commercial interests:
http://opinion.latimes.com/opinionla/2008/08/invesco-field-h.html
Mile High Stadium in Denver is seldom referred to as "Invesco Field at Mile High". The link shows that sponsors are wasting their money, if a stadium already has a proper name, since no-one will bother with the extra verbiage.
Ashley needs treatment. Doesn't he? Yep!...........absolutely a suitable case for treatment.