Newcastle disunited again

I once heard it said that the lot of most football fans is 90% miser and 10% joy.  Well that 10% seems to have all been used up for Newcastle United in a five-game winning streak as autumn settled on the nation.  Relegation is now not just theoretically possible, nor a very real danger but likely.  The last time it occurred in 2009, it was very traumatic for one-two days, akin to the stumbling reality dissonance when the club failed to qualify for the Champions League in a play-off in 2003, beginning United's long and slow decline (bar the 2011-12 season which blazed as brightly and as briefly as a shooting star).  This time though it is not unthinkable and the club is in a more serious plight than in 2012-13.
Burnley and QPR, after today, can count themselves down.  Now the battle is to avoid 18th place.  The magpies already have one more point than they did in 2009 and 35 points would have been enough to stay up in that year.  It may still prove to be in this year but with the black-and-whites on a club record-breaking eight consecutive defeats (in all competitions) and with the squad seemingly resigned to losing the last three games of the season, reliance is on the failures of others.  It would be easier to bear if the most likely candidates to leapfrog Newcastle is the bitter derby rivals.  On each of the past three seasons (including this one), United has generously given them the points needed to stay up by losing the last five games - except this time, it might cost the club beyond bragging rights (counterbalanced by consistently finishing higher in the table).
Aside from that, relegation is more irritating and disappointing than shattering.  An overwhelming consolation is that it will hurt owner Mike Ashley where it really hurts - in the pocket and being a laughing stock among his Spurs-supporting friends.  If there's one thing that aggravates Ashley, it is losing money - his employment of zero-hours contracts on virtually all of his SportsDirect workforce attests to that as he glories in being worth more than £3bn.  It is the principle as much as anything.  The policy at Newcastle United was the same - mid-table every season, free from the distractions of cup competitions, all designed to avoid relegation but this season the string has been stretched so far as to snap.
There has been incompetence at every level in the club this season.  The only halfway competent actor was former manager (or rather 'head coach') Alan Pardew and since he jumped ship to Crystal Palace, he and his new team have been like men reborn.  Starting with Ashley, he is a billionaire who won't spend a penny (more) on the club, insisting all revenues are raised internally.  While it is nice to run a profit, what good are they if the owner refuses to sanction their use.  Essentially, it is his money but in reality it is the club's and he has no good reason to withhold it.  £18.8m was more than double the profits Arsenal, the next most profitable club, made (and Arsenal are in the Champions League), but unofficially it is £34m but redesignated otherwise 'for cashflow purposes' (whatever that means).  Those were the figures for the 2013-14 season.  They may be higher this season but are only a third of the cost of relegation (and its lingering after-effects).  In starving the club of ambition and the squad of numbers (partly to spite the fans who he fell out with after he forced out Kevin Keegan as manager, an action that culminated in relegation), Ashley has gambled again, as he did selling the best player mid-season in each season since the club returned to the Premier League.  No player was sold this time, but neither were any reinforcements brought in mid-season.  Add to that him taking £18m out of the club every season for his own bank balance.  In being parsimonious and reckless, it will eventually cost him more as he will never recoup his money while Newcastle are in League Two, so will have to spend his own money to ensure they return.  Moreover, a second relegation in his time in charge may finally make him sell up, realising his business model is broken and considering the hassle and expense not worth it anymore.  That would be the ultimate silver lining.
Lee Charnley was previous club secretary but when Derek Llambias resigned as managing director in protest at another hare-brained Ashley scheme, Ashley, as is typical to save money, promoted from within.  He has been useless in his higher role and would deservedly receive a P45 at the end of the season if it came.  He told Ashley that the club was safe from relegation and didn't need to spend any more money on the squad.  At the same time, he sold off two of its better defenders as their loan periods lasted long enough to trigger moves away, preferring to bank solid money rather than possible money by finishing higher up the table.  As I said, string stretched too far.  If Ashley is cacking his pants as relegation looms, Charnley's squirming in his seat on matchdays suggests similar.
John Carver must take a significant proportion of blame too.  Despite losing all but one of the matches last season while Pardew served a stadium ban and a touchline ban (after the former expired), Carver's blandishments to Charnley and Ashley that one season as head coach of the Vancouver Whitecaps equipped him to become 'head coach' at Newcastle were disingenuous - understandably though they jumped at the thought of saving more money, while pocketing £3m for Pardew from Crystal Palace.  But Pardew helped the squad punch above its weight and when he moved to Selhurst Park, he took his valued assistants with him (part of the £3m compensation).  Maybe a good no. 2, he is totally out of his depth and blaming players for performances rather than protecting a shell-shocked squad, shows he is losing control.  Craig Bellamy once threw an airport chair at him - I am starting to understand why Bellamy did that.
The medical team has been abysmal as too many Newcastle players have been injured for far longer than they should have been.  The latest is that a supposed routine operation on a knee for Papiss Cisse that would need a couple of weeks recuperation looks like ruling him out for the rest of the season.  That the world-class University of Newcastle with its medical division is so close by is one more scandal among many.  The club has always been in the top three of clubs with most days lost to injury and while that membership composition changes, Newcastle remains there.  It needs a complete overhaul as such consistency cannot be down to bad luck.
Graham Carr has had a good track record with cheap, high-quality signings but there have been diminishing returns and one bad season would prove very dangerous.  The signings at the start of the season were inserted into a threadbare squad and while Jack Colback and Daryl Janmaat have impressed, the rest have been duds and the first XI is not good enough to carry so many passengers.
The players deserve criticism - rank indiscipline, resulting in numerous and long-lasting suspensions (two more players banned today), is partly the fault of Carver's weakness but also indicative of the malaise at the club.  When they have managed to stay on the pitch, most have been disinterested and/or not good enough, a consequence of Ashley sucking ambition out of the club.  Local lad Colback fights for the cause but it is a case of rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.
The fans, it must be said, also bear some of the blame.  It was their vitriol towards Pardew that helped make up his mind to leave and now the consequences are being felt.  I was ambivalent about Pardew given his awful derby record but the club's avaricious refusal to appoint a replacement has been stunning yet what the fans in a way deserve.  The inability to pose a united front to Ashley is another concern - he doesn't listen at the best of times but it is easier for him to ignore fan protests if half support and the other half tolerate the thin gruel served up.
Maybe it is too late but a new, experienced manager must be appointed for the last three games of the season if one can be found.  No good will come of persisting with Carver but are Ashley and Charnley still gambling that Newcastle will escape or are they rabbits in the headlights?  The uninspiring selection of Steve McClaren seemed a done deal for the start of next season but will it be if Newcastle are in the second tier.  In a way, Derby County 's collapse to finish outside of the play-offs (when they were top of their respective table ten weeks ago) means their season is over and McClaren can join immediately, rather than continue at Pride Park to try and win the play-offs.  He also knows come what may, Derby will be a second-tier side next season.
So relegation seems inevitable.  No demotion is ever good but it may allow the club to start again.  Ashley will have to invest deeply to get Newcastle back up at the first attempt and if he sells up the moment promotion is clinched, some good will come of it.  Yes, a new owner could possibly be worse than Ashley but very few people on this planet would fall into that category.  An era of blight needs to end.