Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 24, 2017 21:13:51 GMT 1
Yay! It's currently 4-1 to Newcastle and Preston are down to 10 men. 20 minutes still remaining.
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 24, 2017 21:39:54 GMT 1
Newcastle are promoted!!!
Final score: Newcastle 4 Preston 1. I was so close to winning £110...
Now the rebuilding needs to start but will Ashley spend big? The team we have is simply not good enough for the Premier League and if we don't strengthen then we'll be straight back down plus it would probably lead to Rafa walking.
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Post by suedehead on Apr 24, 2017 22:21:16 GMT 1
Congratulations to Newcastle. Still heading for second place though (I hope)
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Post by Shireblogger on Apr 24, 2017 22:23:38 GMT 1
Delighted Newcastle are back. They definitely add an extra dimension to the Premier League. Partly because of the fans, partly because of what the club means to the community, and partly because I have a natural favouritism for football clubs based in regional capitals.
It's also good that big clubs can get relegated. I'd hate to be stuck with sports leagues like the American ones, when you can never dream of your small town club rising through the ranks to occasionally challenge the megabucks superstars. Or the big clubs getting a bloody nose (or worse) every now and again.
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 24, 2017 22:37:16 GMT 1
Congratulations to Newcastle. Still heading for second place though (I hope) Brighton are definitely firm favourites to win the Championship and should clinch it on Saturday at the latest as you're at home to a very inconsistent Bristol City. And we play on Friday, away to Cardiff in a game we can't afford to lose as that would hand the title to Brighton without a ball being kicked in the Brighton match.
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 24, 2017 22:42:06 GMT 1
Delighted Newcastle are back. They definitely add an extra dimension to the Premier League. Partly because of the fans, partly because of what the club means to the community, and partly because I have a natural favouritism for football clubs based in regional capitals. It's also good that big clubs can get relegated. I'd hate to be stuck with sports leagues like the American ones, when you can never dream of your small town club rising through the ranks to occasionally challenge the megabucks superstars. Or the big clubs getting a bloody nose (or worse) every now and again. I just hope that Mike Ashley doesn't put a spoke in the wheel. He's got form for that and I know that Rafa wasn't very happy that Ashley didn't allow him to strengthen the team in the January transfer window. That led to talk that Rafa might walk at the end of the season. Hopefully Ashley will behave himself and will put up money for team building.
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 26, 2017 13:28:52 GMT 1
Worryingly, Newcastle United's offices have been raided this morning by a number of HMRC investigators on suspicion of income tax and national insurance fraud. They arrived at 6.30am at St James Park, they have also searched our training ground and a house in Gosforth (3 miles north of Newcastle city centre) has also been searched. The HMRC have also raided the offices of West Ham. In addition a number of locations in France have been searched. HMRC have so far only issued a brief statement that says they have arrested “several men working within professional football industry for suspected income tax and national insurance fraud”. They have refused to (so far) give further details other than to say the arrests and searches were in connection with an international investigation into football clubs’ transfer dealings.
Quite what this means for us and West Ham, well who knows.
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 26, 2017 13:31:30 GMT 1
In other news, Joey Barton has been suspended by the FA for 18 months with immediate effect for betting offences. Unless he can overturn the ban that's the end of his career www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/39720232
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Post by Earl Purple on Apr 26, 2017 14:57:31 GMT 1
Because it's Newcastle and West Ham it will probably be a paltry fine. When a small club like Swindon Town does it though they are not allowed to take their place in the top flight.
It could be a points deduction for Newcastle which might see them either drop into the playoffs or out of the promotion places altogether dependent on how many they have dropped. Dropping a couple of points leaving them 2nd anyway wouldn't be a punishment.
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Post by Razzle Dazzle on Apr 26, 2017 15:46:11 GMT 1
Bit of a weird thing to say before you know the facts, first of all it cant be a points deduction for someone dodging a bit of tax, the individual would be prosecuted and a fine issued if the clubs were implicated, they are the rules for everyone in that case but...
Actually the allegations appear centre around Marseille. We all know Newcastle have a history of signing players from France so I'm sure they have signed a few, they have asked questions of Chelsea about the Batsuayi transfer. Puts an interesting spin on Payets demand that he 'will only return to Marseille' I wonder now if there was more to his demand than what we have been led to believe, Both Thauvin (Newcastle) and Payet (West Ham) signed from Marseille and then returned less than a year later as they couldn't "settle"
Its a French led investigation and all they took was documents from West Ham obviously vital evidence in their case against Marseille, lets wait until detail come out before everyones guilty
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Tom
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Post by Tom on Apr 26, 2017 19:59:19 GMT 1
Going back to Newport, I hope they stay up as got family connections to the place. Reading Graham Westley's piece in the Football League paper after he was sacked (that article itself is a discussion point - so much came out of it) I would say they're probably not going to come back up for a while if they do go down as i'm assuming their better players will go and infrastructure doesn't really seem to be there.
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Post by o on Apr 27, 2017 10:29:26 GMT 1
I'm not sure they have any better players...
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Post by Shireblogger on Apr 27, 2017 11:24:35 GMT 1
Newport's priority is surely to sign a groundsman. They have easily the worst pitch in the Football League. If they were a cricket club, they'd be deducted points for not being able to prepare a pitch that is fit for sport.
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Tom
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Post by Tom on Apr 27, 2017 20:06:24 GMT 1
I'm not sure they have any better players... It was an interesting column. I did start by feeling sorry for him as he listed all the problems at the club and basically said it was a tougher job than he envisaged when he took it, so much so that he was relieved that he was put out of his misery. But then in an arrogant kind of way he produced stats showing what a good manager he was, and also said that with the business done in January Newport were now a decent competitive L2 team (something like that anyway) which raised an eyebrow. He certainly gave the impression that they still had a chance of staying up, and however ridiculous that sounded at the time he's actually been proved right (which also makes you wonder if he could have done a better job after signing those players).
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Post by o on Apr 27, 2017 20:13:48 GMT 1
Thye pitch has various rugby games played on it, when they're not playing football, but yes, awful, awful surface! The last place was underwater, and this one is under sand! And Graham Westley is arrogant!
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Tom
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Post by Tom on Apr 27, 2017 20:14:11 GMT 1
Newport's priority is surely to sign a groundsman. They have easily the worst pitch in the Football League. If they were a cricket club, they'd be deducted points for not being able to prepare a pitch that is fit for sport. They play rugby on it don't they? So it must be because of that (as many Reading fans would say given that the rugby has damaged the Mad Stad pitch)
I've never bought into the whole rugby damages football pitches argument - I didn't realise until relatively recently that rugby is played on Swansea's pitch, which says it all. And anyway, our pitch hasn't always been bad.
Edit - Looked like Andy mentioned rugby while I was replying to this post!
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 29, 2017 10:54:24 GMT 1
After my winning bet last night - I took Newcastle to win 2-0 away to Cardiff, £5 at 11/1 so am £55 up on that one - I've gone for a more sensible bet on Celtic to beat Rangers 5-0 at Ibrox (75/1) at midday! and Brighton to draw 1-1 with Bristol City early this evening (8/1). Hopefully the second comes good as it gives us a good chance of winning the Championship. I still think Brighton will win the league though...
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Robbie
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Post by Robbie on Apr 29, 2017 13:52:50 GMT 1
Well, I was close with the Rangers v Celtic match. It ended up 5-1 to Celtic...
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Tom
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Post by Tom on Apr 29, 2017 17:04:50 GMT 1
Promotion for Maidenhead at the 2nd attempt. I'm gutted though, was very tempted to go (Margate is Maidenhead's closest away game for me) and they won emphatically (3-0). Nice weather for it as well.
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Post by o on Apr 29, 2017 20:15:19 GMT 1
Bloody refs! Striker clean through and hauled to the ground by the last man and the ref gives a yellow card, how, why, can he justify that? Then we have a goal disallowed for offside, not seen a replay so can't comment, and then Portsmouth score the winner. Amazing atmosphere and there's the core of a good squad there, couple of good signings and we should be up there next season.
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