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Season 2008-09
mackems (a) Premier League
 
  Date: Saturday 25th October 2008, 12.45pm
Live on Sky

Venue:
 Stadium of Plight

Conditions: 
Gloomy

Admission: £33

Programme:
£3
 

mackems

Newcastle United

2 - 1

Teams

Goals

20 mins A virtual re-run of the third goal we conceded at West Ham saw Malbranque play the Di Michele role of advancing towards the right side of our box and then scuffing a shot that flew across the area into the path of Etherington (played today by Cisse) who planted it in the net 0-1.

30 mins Fulop's erratic handling was exposed as Shola Ameobi headed in Geremi's free-kick from the left at the back post,  the striker winning the award after his jinking run was halted illegally 1-1.

Half time: mackems 1 Newcastle 1

75 mins A clearly ailing Butt tripped Diouf on the edge of the penalty area as he waltzed forward, easily evading a half-hearted challenge from Danny Guthrie - who had been booked earlier. Given was helpless as Kieron Richardson smashed an unstoppable 18-yard free-kick into the roof of the net. 1-2.

Full time: mackems 2 Newcastle 1

We Said

JFK commented:

"There wasn't much between the two teams, but I'm very disappointed, I know what it means to the city and supporters. Immense disappointment.

"But looking at the bigger picture, we were beaten, and we have to play West Brom on Tuesday night and get maximum points.

"That's what I said to the players in the dressing room because it's hurting them.

“I will be known as the manager who lost a derby game, but this squad is too good to go down."

Further extracts from the press conference were also published by the mackem paper as follows:

"Q: "Did you consider bringing Joey on any earlier because there was an incident when he was warming up during the game?"
Joe Kinnear: "I didn't see any incident. I didn't see any incident. I thought he did very well when he came on. So whatever happened prior to that doesn't really bother me."

Q: "You were not aware that he was warming up and the police went over to him and had a word with him and he went straight back to the dug-out?"
Joe Kinnear: "No. I wasn't aware of anything like that. I just shook hands with Roy Keane and that was that."

Reporter: "This was during the second half."
Joe Kinnear: "Oh, I didn't see that."

Reporter: "The police told him that, the police told him to go back to the dug-out, I mean what do you think of that when the police are telling all your players to go back to the dug-out when they're warming up?"
Joe Kinnear: "I didn't see it. I don't really know, I didn't see any police there. What were the police doing there?"

Reporter: "Police obviously felt it was right to send him back, but it effectively meant he couldn't warm up properly."
Kinnear: "Well, it's a bit unfair then really, isn't it? It's not Joey Barton's fault, is it? He's been in the thick of everything this week. Any mass murder that's been going on in this country, his name has been associated with it. But I honestly can't answer that because I didn't see it. I was more focused on what was going on on the pitch."

Reporter: "And the trouble afterwards, you didn't see any of that?"
Kinnear: "No, as soon as the final whistle went, I was off down the tunnel."

Reporter: "Sunderland fans taunted the Newcastle fans. There was a bit of a pitch invasion and rival fans were on the pitch and there were stewards and riot police on the pitch."
Kinnear: "Well it's up to the FA to sort those things out, isn't it?"

Reporter: "I know you didn't see the coin throwing and the bottle throwing, but a player deserves to have the chance to have a warm up without being subjected to that."
Kinnear: "Well, as I say, it's not very nice, is it? But it's the first I've heard of it, if you're telling me the truth."

Reporter: "Is it acceptable?"
Kinnear: "No, it's not. Doesn't matter what club or team you're playing for. I'm only repeating what you're telling me mind. I don't know if they were throwing bottles."

Reporter: "Yes, they were. Definitely. Did you see the police tell Joey Barton, well, effectively they gave him his marching orders to get back to the dug-out? Is that, again, something which is unacceptable?"
Kinnear: "Well, I think the police are under a lot of pressure themselves. Are they underpoliced there? But I don't think it is any different from any other club, is it?"

Reporter: "What do you think the FA have to do to cut it out?"
Kinnear: "Difficult question, but one which needs addressing, but I'm only assuming that the case today needs investigating."

They said


Roy Keane said: 

"We've finally defeated Newcastle on home turf for the first time in 28 years and I thought it was an excellent game. It's always nice to beat your local rivals and everybody has been reminding us how long it has been. But we deserved it, we played some good stuff.

"It was good performance - I think we deserved to win the game. I thought it was a great atmosphere and I enjoyed it. Conditions weren't great but I thought we handled them well. We passed it and moved it well.

"We edged the game in terms of chances. We were under the cosh at the end but we got through it. The players have got their just rewards after the last few weeks, when we didn't get our rewards.

"It was a brilliant strike by Kieran Richardson - a bit like his 'goal' last week. We thought it might have been a penalty but Kieran stuck it well in, the keeper had no chance.

"It was tight in the second half and it probably needed something special to win the game, thankfully for us one of our players did it. I thought we were very positive and it was good to see Kenwyne on. The win meant a lot to the players - you saw that at the end of the game.

"We can't get on our high horse and think we've achieved something, far from it. Newcastle have been ahead of us for many years, it's a small step for us.

Talking about the prospect of an investigation of fan behaviour:

"We'll have to wait and see but hopefully it won't take away from what the players have achieved. Nobody likes to see fans on the pitch, trust me, but hopefully the FA will go easy on us because the fans have to enjoy it.

"If one or two ran on the pitch, well they've had plenty of time to wait for the chance."

 

Stats


The 140th competitive game between the two rivals ended with the mackems celebrating their 44th victory and Newcastle unable to record either their 52nd win or scrape a 46th draw.

Shola Ameobi's goal was the 211th we've netted in those games, while the opposition have now managed 207.  

United's proud unbeaten record on wearside ended after 12 games, or 28 years & 6 months and they were beaten there in a top-flight game for the first time since March 1967.

2008/09 lost 1-2 Ameobi
2007/08
drew 1-1 Milner
2005/06
won 4-1 Chopra, Shearer(pen), N'Zogbia, Luque
2002/03 won 1-0 Solano
2001/02
won 1-0 Dabizas
2000/01
drew 1-1 A.O'Brien
1999/00
drew 2-2 Domi, Helder
1996/97 won 2-1 Beardsley, Ferdinand
1992/93 won 2-1 og(Owers), L.O'Brien
1991/92 drew 1-1 L.O'Brien
1989/90 drew 0-0 (playoffs)
1989/90 drew 0-0
1984/85 drew 0-0
1979/80 lost 0-1

1979/80 drew 2-2 Davies, Cartwright (LC)
1978/79 drew 1-1 Withe
1976/77 drew 2-2 Cannell, T.Craig
1969/70 drew 1-1 Smith
1968/69 drew 1-1 B.Robson
1967/68 drew 3-3 Burton 2, McNamee
1966/67 lost 0-3 

We've scored eleven goals in our seven visits here and never failed to hit the target. Seven were scored in front of the travelling fans but Shola's was the first at the other end since Solano's in 2003.

Only Steven Taylor remained in our starting XI from the last fixture we played here, 12 months ago:
Harper, Taylor, Faye, Rozehnal, N'Zogbia, Milner, Smith, Barton, Emre, Owen, Viduka. 

Waffle

The clocks went back an hour on Saturday night across the British Isles - except for one godless enclave, where they were apparently reset by 35 years.

Mike Riley's whistle just before 3pm sent the citizens of wearside into a state of delirium unsurpassed since the exploits of Porterfield & Montgomery in 1973 (levels of excitement recorded at the discovery of cheesy chips remain sadly unrecorded). 

The home stands were a scene of unconfined joy, with even Royston Keane looking vaguely pleased. And in keeping with the revivalist tone of the occasion, several home fans emulated Bob Stokoe's 1973 excursion across the Wembley turf - albeit not wearing trilby hats or being pursued by Arthur Cox.

Once the dust(ups) settled though, there were few arguments with the result, as the luck we've enjoyed in this fixture finally ran out. And JFK's side can perhaps reflect that any remaining reservoirs of good fortune were used up last time, when Milner's shot crept in to give us a barely-deserved point.

That made it a dozen undefeated, but unlucky thirteen proved to be a game too far - and a display as forgettable as that overseen by Allardyce a year ago. The names change, but little else it seems.

Unfortunately while we've stagnated and spent much of the intervening period shooting ourselves in the foot, the clowns down the road have progressed. Today they had enough in their starting XI and bench today to get past us and stay there. Hardly pretty, but fairly disciplined and fairly effective.  

The spirit apparently inspired by JFK and exhibited in recent fightbacks against Everton and Man City gave some cause for optimism, but this ultimately proved to be one attempted comeback too many.

Our interim manager can take some of the responsibility for this, allowing the clearly ailing Butt to continue when he was running on empty and needing pain-killing injections mid-game to move at all. That sort of spirit is admirable, but not always the best policy. Besides which, Barton would probably have been safer on the field, rather than warming up on the sidelines and inflaming slack-jawed locals. 

Alongside Butt, Guthrie struggled - an early booking adding to the pressure he was under. And with Geremi's occasional sightings down the right still more than Duff managed to do, we were too often reduced to bypassing the midfield entirely and howking the ball up from defence to attack.

To be honest, there may have been an element of common sense and level-headedness from JFK in holding Spiderman and the madman back, rather than becoming wrapped up in the occasion and throwing them both on earlier - with a less fevered home game to follow just four days later.

Up front there was less to shout about as Martins had another forgettable derby display and stand-in keeper Marton Fulop was rarely tested in what was only the second Premier League game of his life.

The Hungarian made an unexpected appearance after Craig Gordon withdrew through injury, having been beaten twice in his only other senior runout this season against Northampton in the League Cup. It's fair to say that he'll have more testing days than this though, as we largely left him alone.

Shola had missed our best chance at 1-1, blazing high when well-placed after being put in by Martins but other than that we only sporadically threatened before Barton showed some guile in his late cameo but didn't quite produce a chance. Xisco of course wasn't trusted to take off his tracksuit top.

The killer blow came with a deadly free kick from Richardson which surely couldn't have come as a shock to anyone - Match of the Day having highlighted him hitting the woodwork once and seeing another one wrongly ruled out at Fulham last week (the cover of the match programme for today's game also featured a photo of the latter effort).

Enough. A crushing blow but only 1/38th of our season and with the same number of prized points at stake for beating West Brom on home soil this Tuesday night.

Forget dented local pride and bruised egos, failing to improve on a record of one win from nine games will entrench us firmly at the wrong end of the table. A victory now is vital, not least because of Sunday's maiden success for Dirty Harry's new team....

Biffa
 

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Page last updated 07 February, 2017