Clowns are really scaring the fans

Jan 25 2009 by Neil Farrington, Sunday Sun

FOR a few blessed hours last Tuesday, Newcastle United were knocked off the top of the FA Comedy Club League.

Manchester City’s Kak-handedness, and Robinho flying away home, brought brief respite from the Toon’s tabloid torment.

All too brief.

No, to a medley chorus of the Rocky theme, “Handbags and Gladrags” and “We Shall Not Be Moved”, Charles N’Zogbia and Andy Carroll quickly bitch-slapped the City stargazers down to earth and into their place . . .

As a mere sideshow to the circus at St James’s Park.

“Send In The Clowns”, so the old song says, when all hope is lost.

Well, clowns — both the painted-faces kind and the men running Newcastle United — frighten me.

And Tyneside’s fear is that, with Sunderland ready to roll up to the Big Top, all hope WILL appear lost within the space of 36 hours next week.

Make no mistake, while a neighbourly defeat for the Magpies on February 1 would be an apocalyptic catastrophe, February 2 would be judgement day.

Yes, the timing of derby and transfer deadline has a biblically fateful look to it . . . and Newcastle’s reckoning has been a long time coming.

In terms of consequence for United, it is certainly Sunderland’s most important visit since 1999.

But in what it could mean to both clubs, it’s the biggest since 1990 — when top-flight football, albeit in very different circumstances, was the victors’ potential prize.

Considering that Premier League survival is worth far more than promotion to the old First Division ever was, it may just be the biggest derby ever.

And yet the custard pie moments just keep coming at Sid James’s.

Before this week’s training-ground brawl came the news of two signings — one actual, one potential — which weren’t needed in January . . . Shola Ameobi and Joe Kinnear.

That Kinnear so readily revealed he had been offered a new two-year contract, in a month which has been all about the non-arrival and feared departure of players, said everything about the state of collective denial in which Newcastle United exists.

But why should Kinnear make any apologies for himself?

After all, a large part of his job seems to be about excusing his bosses’ failings.

To be honest, a part of me feels for him. Or pities him. Unlike some Newcastle managers of the past, he was genuinely hurt to face flak from fans last Saturday.

And, left all alone to talk up a football club in meltdown, is it any wonder he indulges in the odd flight of fancy, even if he looks ever more like a stool pigeon?

Trouble is, if he tries a Corporal Jones-esque “Don’t Panic” routine in the wake of a derby defeat, still no new signings and the possible departure of Shay Given, he’ll end up looking like another joker in uniform . . .

Comical Ali.

So pray God — or Allah — that talk of Mike Ashley and/or Derek Llambias finally being ready to break their bond of silence proves accurate.

Newcastle’s latest club accounts have prompted some supporters to throw themselves in the path of the anti-Ashley bandwagon.

But I won’t be joining them; not when United’s latest annual accounts lend the lie to the myth that the owner has “wiped out” £100 million of club debt in some romantic act of philanthropy.

And not when the Magpies’ total liabilities appear to add up to more than they did under the previous boardroom regime.

Debt is debt, whether United owe it to a bank or to Mike Ashley.

Yes, the benefit of being indebted to him is that he is charging no interest on his £100 million loan.

But any new owner would still need to pay it off, and — thanks to a wage bill which proves Ashley can also pay players silly money — conduct a major re-financing of the club to keep it viable. And if his commitment is solely to the club, why does Ashley persist with its most divisive figure (Dennis Wise) and a policy of false economy?

Of course no one wants to repeat the days when United simply threw money (money they didn’t often have) at problems.

But what point saving for tomorrow when the bailiff — aka relegation — is almost at the door today?

Having decided Joe Kinnear is the man for that tomorrow, Ashley and co must back him in the next eight days.

For this joke isn’t funny any more.