Newcastle United Blog

Dr. Ed Harrison is a recently retired IBM Consulting Group Executive who now has time, lots of time, to write about his lifelong passion - Newcastle United Football Club.

Ed was born and bred in Newcastle and attended London and Newcastle Universities, before joining IBM and being moved to the USA. He remains an exiled Geordie.



GET NEWCASTLE GAMES LIVE

If the Newcastle game is not on Sky Sports, Setanta Sports or the Fox Soccer Channel (USA), then you can usually get the game by using LiveFooty with Sopcast. The quality is surprisingly good.

Today's game is being broadcast on the PC so here's how you can get this and most future games on your PC.

Download and install Sopcast from Here

Then go to the LiveFooty site and scroll down and click on the Newcastle Blackburn game and then just follow directions - it takes a couple of minutes to buffer before the game comes on.

It seems to work best using Internet Explorer – I cannot seem to get it to work on Firefox – so in case you have problems with Firefox try it on Internet Explorer. Best of Luck.

COMMENTS POLICY

We publish all comments on this blog, but some have to be moderated first for bad language or other reasons.

Please remember your comments are only opinions and not necessarily fact, so let's try to respect everybody's opinion, even if we don't agree with them.

Personal attacks on other readers are not encouraged.

It really works if we follow these simple rules, and we can then have some great discussions about our club Newcastle United, which is really what this blog is all about.

Also try to keep the language decent for the youngsters who we know are regulars on this site.

Thanks!

GIVEN MAY NEED OPERATION



Shay Given may have to undergo surgery again on his groin, which has kept braking down since he suffered that horrific injury in September, 2006 at West Ham United with Marlon Harewood..

If he does indeed need surgery the season could be over for Shay.

HUGHTON - ASSISTANT MANAGER



Chris Hughton became Kevin Keegan's Assistant Manager at Newcastle United yesterday, February 25th.

We warmly welcome Chris to Newcastle, and hope he can help fix that defense quickly.

100th APPEARANCE

When Steve Harper came on in the second half on Saturday it was his 100th appearance for the club.



Congratulations to Steve for his dedication and excellent play for our club over the last 12 years.

SIR BOBBY ROBSON



The great man cast in bronze

JOEY BARTON BANNED



It has been reported that Joey Barton will not be allowed to play in the game at Liverpool on March 8th, because it violates his bail conditions.

DUFF WANTS CARR STAY

Damien Duff is apparently urging Newcastle United boss Kevin Keegan to extend Stephen Carr's contract at the club.

Duff said today:

"He only has until the summer until his contract expires, but as a friend and a player, I'd love him to stay,"



We must say that Stephen has played quite well since returning from injury but we think there's no chance that Newcastle will retain the right back.

We have Beye and Geremi who could challenge for right back, and both are better than Carr. Also David Edgar can play anywhere across the back-line and he will be pushing hard next season, if not this.

FORSTER DEFIES LIVERPOOL

Newcastle United Reserves maintained their unbeaten run when they held the powerful Liverpool Reserves side to a 0-0 draw at St. James' Park tonight.



They have now gone 4 games unbeaten but Newcastle were indebted to a fantastic display of goalkeeping from 19 year old Fraser Forster who was in inspired form tonight in the home goal, and pulled off a string of superb saves.

Shay and Steve should be looking over their shoulder at this boy, who is 6'4" and still growing, and the most improved player at the club over the last 2 years.

We have out own report listed as an article but to get another (the other) viewpoint here is the Liverpool official site's report on the game.

NIGEL PEARSON NEW MANAGER AT SOUTHAMPTON

Just 10 days after leaving Newcastle United for pastures anew, Nigel Pearson was appointed manager of Southampton Football Club on Monday, 18th February.



This is a great opportunity for Nigel and you can read our report on this here

FABIO ZAMBLERA

TAMAS KADAR

BEN TOZER

WESLEY BAHENG

OLLE SODERBERG

CONTACT US

Goals

Player  PL   FAC CC Total

Martins  6    0   1   7
Owen 	 4    1   1   6
Viduka 	 5    0   0   5
N'Zogbia 3    1   0   4
Milner 	 3    1   0   4
Butt 	 2    0   0   2
Cacapa 	 1    1   0   2
Emre 	 1    0   0   1
Taylor   1    0   0   1
Beye     1    0   0   1
Barton   1    0   0   1
Duff     1    0   0   1

PL – Premier league
FAC – FA Cup
CC – Carling Cup

Assists

Player 	    Assists

N'Zogbia       3
Martins        2
Taylor 	       1
Milner 	       1
Ramage 	       1

Injuries

Player  Injury   Return Date

Emre    Calf       7Mar08
Carr    Hamstring  14Mar08
Martins Ankle      no date
Krul    Shoulder   no date
Ramage 	Knee 	   Apr08
 

Cautions

Player    YC   RC  Games 

Butt 	  10 	0    3
Smith 	   8 	1    3
N'Zogbia   5 	0    1
Milner 	   3 	0  
Barton     3    0
Faye 	   3 	0
Taylor 	   3 	0
Beye       2    0
Geremi 	   2 	0
Emre       2    0
Given      2    0
Duff       2    0
Cacapa 	   2 	0
Owen       1    0

YC - yellow card
RC - red card
Games - games suspended


Actim Index

Player     Points Rank

N'Zogbia    174    38
Milner 	    154    55
Owen 	    123    96

Points – Actim points
Rank – Place in PL top 100

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Board of Directors

Owner          Mike Ashley
Life President Sir John Hall
Chairman       Chris Mort
Exec Director  Dennis Wise
Football
Vice President Tony Jimenez
Player
Recruitment 	

Management and Coaching

Technical      Jeff Vetere
Coordinator
Manager        Kevin Keegan
Assistant Mgr  Chris Hughton
Adviser        Arthur Cox
Coaches        Steve Round
               Terry McDermott
Reserve Team   Adam Sadler
Goalkeepers    Paul Barron
Fitness        Adrian Lamb
               Caig Russell
Youth Academy  Joe Joyce
Manager
Youth Academy
Coaches        Kenny Wharton
               Simon Tweddle
Physios        Derek Wright
               Kev Bell
Head Scout     Paul Montgomery
Scouts 	       Chris McMenemy
               Vic Halom
               Bobby Saxton
               Jack Chapman

NEW NEWCASTLE BLOG BANNER

We have a new banner as you can see, and we'd like to thank Phoon CK for designing and creating it for us - all free of charge. Phoon CK also did our first banner for us last August.

Phoon CK, who is located in Singapore, is just one of our readers who has given us enormous help since we started.

We are very appreciative of Phoon CK's efforts - many thanks!

By the way it also makes a super background for your PC. If you have windows right click on the banner and choose "set as desktop background"

Well, we are all set - now all we need is for Newcastle United to be really successful again - next season!

NEWCASTLE PENALTY TAKER

In case you hadn't seen it on the Official Web Site KK says Michael Owen will take the penalty kicks. Michael has missed quite a few in his career, but scoring will give him that extra confidence that seems to be doing him the world of good. Another good decision by Kevin.

HOWARD LEAVES NEWCASTLE

The Evening Chronicle is reporting that Newcastle have parted company with senior fitness coach Mark Howard, who Sam Allardyce brought in from Bolton Wanderers.

Newcastle recently allowed head of sports science and medicine Mark Taylor leave the club also.

So it looks like some of the back room staff Sam brought in during the summer are no longer required at the club.

KEEGAN HOPING THAT SHEARER WILL JOIN HIM

"I’ve definitely not given up on it, what we have agreed is that he is going to come in training with us to start off with and then we are going to revisit it later when the commitments that he’s made to other people are no longer in place."

"The door is left absolutely wide open. It’s up to Alan and me to come up with the right solution for him coming in here. I’ve left the door wide open because I respect him and know that he would bring something to the party."

"He’s now got a bit of time to think about it and he will think about it deeply. As he always has done in his life, he will come up with the right decision. I’ve definitely not given up on it and Alan’s not said anything to my knowledge that suggests he doesn’t want to do it. I think deep down he does."

KEVIN KEEGAN PHONE IN

We'd like to help with charity on this site - and we've chosen the Salvation Army as that charity we'll support. Please give if you can, donations go directly to them, and many thanks.