KK on hearing he's got Joey Barton again!
Kevin Keegan, the manager responsible for some of the Premiership's greatest attacking football and some of its worst defending, has returned to club management just weeks after he'd said never again. The man who until this morning was running Kevin Keegan's Soccer Circus in Glasgow has decided to take over control at the St.James Park Managerial Circus.
I'm as stunned as the next man, providing the next man isn't some 16 stone salivating Geordie who is wearing a Newcastle number seven shirt with the word God on its back, by his return. Yesterday we had the revelation that Alan Shearer had been phoned by the club and told he didn't have the experience, then the news that Gerard Houlier wouldn't be allowed to leave his job in France and then we thought that Didier Deschamps was going to be offered the job, today it's King Kev who steps into his hot seat.
I can't help thinking this is a mistake. Keegan returning on some sort of emotion fuelled return will be seen as the cure to all ills. His team will play the 'right way' - is that the right way that saw them throw away a twelve point lead the last time he was in charge? Has he actually looked at the Newcastle squad? The last time he was the manager he was blessed with the likes of David Ginola, Les Ferdinand, Peter Beardsley, Faustino Asprilla, Florian Albert oh and Warren Barton and David Batty. This time he's got Alan Smith, Geremi and Michael Owen - three players not good enough to play for any of the top four clubs but apparently considered good enough by one of the previous regimes at St.James to get Newcastle into the top four - how does that work?
Tonight there will be a full house expecting Stoke City to be put to the sword. KK is on a no-win situation right away, if they win the fans will love him, say his influence is being felt already, if they lose (which seems unlikely) then the fans can blame Nigel Pearson. Whatever happens in the transfer market between now and the end of the window in a fortnight's time and the end of the season in four months time Kevin Keegan has heaped more pressure on himself than any of us could imagine.
btw - Keggie Keegle is in memory of Brian Moore who famously called KK this during an England commentary.
3 comments:
Well, the football we are served up today is very different to what it was like when Kevin was last in charge of Newcastle...other teams have more money sloshing around etc...
As you say if he keeps giving hope the fans will stay quiet but for how long?
I wonder if Kevin is a stop gap or a genuine choice that will deliver and stay committed and if it goes wrong will the fans give him time?
It all starts again from now.
Someone on the radio, a few minutes ago, said that Newcastle United were "terminally mental".
Despite my reservations about the terminology used I am inclined to agree.
That remark about southerners and the theatre.... Oh, please!
How sad is it to have the supporters and the media calling KK the Messiah and the supporters his disciples...makes me want to see the club fail...all the hype.
They wouldn't dare say something similar if it was a reference to other faiths.
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