Newcastle United - Road To Europe

A project where I am attempting to ressurect Newcastle's European nights

I want to give every player a chance shine whether young or old and my preference is look towards the future and sign young talented footballers that will light up Europe's top division. Football is about entertainment and that is what i will be encouraging as well as modern day counter attacking football. There's a lot more to concentrate on than just the Premier League as i believe that as a top English club you should not prioritise one competition over another at this stage.

I Have only been given a budget of 3.1 million to spend but with many possible departures approaching we can make up the funds to buy players that would be critical for us to relenquish success.

I will be trying out different tactial approaches over the pre season campaign so i will not announce any main tactics as of yet.

Our Pre-Season fixtures include a friendly cup clash against Guangzhou Hengda with a possible outcome of facing Lille or Kaiserslautern depending on if we see off our Chinese opponents.

Other Fixtures include: Home ties vs Benfica and PAOK respectively, before we clash with partner club Gateshead at their ground followed by away games at Carlisle and Rotherham. It then concludes back at St. James' with stiff opposition in the form of 'Money Bags' Malaga.

PRE-SEASON (JULY/AUGUST):

July 6th: 18 year old Jak Alnwick sings a new 5 year pro contract

July 7th: Yohan Cabaye is appointed as Vice-Captain due to its current vacancy

July 11th: Sammy Ameobi and Nile Ranger are both called up to England's U20 World Cup squad. On the same day Ameobi joins Cardiff City and Ranger joins Birmingham City. Both will stay on loan for the forthcoming season. Danny Simpson is also injured and will sit out the next 4 weeks.

Cabaye is a very good vice-captain and is well worth keeping until he retires! Stick at it, i'm following!

Yet Another newcastle story!No Offense but they don't last that long

July 13th:
Guangzhou 3-3 Newcastle 4-2 Penalties

Shola Ameobi
Sylvain Marveaux (2)

Demba Ba
Yohan Cabaye
Papiss Cisse
Davide Santon

July 14th:
Newcastle 1-3 Kaiserslautern

Haris Vuckic

I cannot be too angry with the players as we played 2 games in 2 days. The positives were there in the structural shape and the passing game seems to be effective. The players that participated in this friendly competition - was a mixture of youth and inexperience and first team squad members. It may take a little longer for the team to become adapted to the tactics but i am sure of an influential pre-season ahead.

Jonas Gutierrez 3 weeks out with a pulled hamstring

July 16th:
Peter Lovenkrands joins Wolves for £1 Million


Newcastle 2-2 Benfica
Papiss Cisse
Shola Ameobi

July 17th:
16 year old Adam Campbell signs a pre contract deal with the club.

Leon Best joins Sunderland for £2.1 Million

Tamas Kadar joins Reading for £500k

July 19th:
James Pearch joins Southampton for £1 Million

July 20th:
Newcastle 3-0 PAOK
Fabricio Coloccini
Papiss Cisse
Yohan Cabaye
Yohan Cabaye

18 year old goalkeeper Jak Alnwick joins Barnsley on a season long loan deal

July 22nd:
17 year old Gael Bigirimana joins from Coventry City for just £170k

"I am pleased to get the deal done at such a cheap price i am delighted and want to welcome Gael to the Toon. He is a fine young player and he will have a solid development here at St. James'. We had been thoroughly scouting Gael and we knew he was a good aquisition for the club's future. I have high hopes for Gael and i just want to say what a wonderful encouraging young prospect he is. He's got bags of potential but as with every newcomer he will need time to settle. The fans will also appreciate the signing and i think they're going to love him"

July 23rd
Gateshead 0-1 Newcastle
Mike Williamson

July 27th:
Carlisle 1-2 Newcastle
Cheick Tiote
Mike Williamson

July 28th:
Youngster Michael Richardson joins Fleetwood Town on loan for 6 months

July 29th:Steve Harper signals intention to end his career at Newcastle by signing a new 2 year deal until the end of 2012-13 season.

Conor Newton joins Gateshead on loan
Jeff Henderson joins Grimsby on loan

July 30th:
Rotherham 1-1 Newcastle
Shola Ameobi

July 31st:
24 year old left back Manuel Pamic joins from Sparta Prague for £1.9 million

"I have great respect for Manuel and i am glad he chose to come to Newcastle and i look forward to working with him. I am confident it'll be a massive boost to the team. I have the utmost confidence that he will perform at this level of football in the right manor"

Paul Dummett joins Burton Albion on loan for the season

August 3rd:
Newcastle 5-1 Malaga
Papiss Cisse (2)
Fabricio Coloccini (2)
Gabriel Obertan

Well that's it, Pre-Season is over 3 wins, 2 draws and 2 defeats - not bad and the upsets against Benfica and Malaga also pleased me. We are still in the transfer market for a central midfielder. Danny Simpson is also back to full fitness and you should expect to see him feature over the next few weeks. We have also turned down 2 bids for youngster Adam Campbell from Manchester United as the offers were simply not good enough and he only recently signed a pre-contract deal commiting his long term future with Newcastle.

With Sunderland away on the first day of the season i have settled for a 4-2-4 formation that is backed up by a strong 4-2-3-1 if necessary.

August 10th:
Carling Cup 2nd Round Draw: Newcastle Utd vs Crewe Alexandra 24th August, 2011

August 13th:

Taylor Tynes Up Weary Sunderland

Sunderland 0-1 Newcastle
Steven Taylor
Demba Ba - 6 days out

Perhaps not the most convincing of wins but i am happy that we got on over on our rivals. Steven had a fantastic game and i expect him to build on that. The only goal of the game came when Taylor headed in Marveaux's corner brilliantly. We defend expertly and look confident going into the next fixture at home to QPR. Pamic and Birigmana also made their first team cameos late on.

August 17th:
Danny Simpson joins Cardiff for £1.9 Million

August 18th:
Ryan Taylor has also resumed full training

August 20th:
Youngster Shane Ferguson joins Carlisle on loan

Slow Shola Shows The Way

Newcastle 1-0 QPR
Shola Ameobi
Sylvain Marveaux - 11 days out

Another match that we just about edged. Again I am slightly dissapointed but the team is beginning to shape and formate in a good way and everyone is doing well to link up and work together as a team unit. Our defence looks as solid as ever and the attackers are showing encouraging signs of improvement in every game.

August 24th:

A Tale Of Toon Halves

Newcastle 6-2 Crewe aet
Shola Ameobi (pen)
Haris Vuckic (2)
Papiss Cisse
Yven Moyo
Steve Phillips

A good run out especially from the youngsters as it also saw Ameobi sensationaly slot home a penalty kick. They did take us to extra time but goals from Vuckic, Cisse, Moyo and an own goal decimated the league 2 opposition. It did not even matter when we coneded a penalty late on as we completely tore them apart (in extra time).

French defender Mapou Yanga Mbiwa signs from Montpellier in an attempt to boost the defences' strength and depth. the overall cost of the deal was £2.5 million with further incentives.

August 27th:

UN-MBIWA-BLE

Swansea 3-2 Newcastle
Jonas Gutierrez
Papiss Cisse

A game that we should of perhaps won. Mbiwa set up Gutierrez for the first goal (a volley). This was followed by an early second half tap in from Cisse before Mbiwa's game started to go downhill. He got on the end of an Ashley Williams effort thus resulting in an own goal before misqueueing a back pass allwoing Danny Graham to pounce before a late header from Graham again completed the comeback and turned the game around dramtically.

We were also fined £25k for failing to control our players. They showed commitment and i won't apologise for that.

September 1st:
Youngster James Tavernier is named League 1 young player of the month for August whle on loan at MK Dons

September 3rd:
Danny Guthrie resumes full training.

September 4th:
Yven Moyo received a call up to the Republic of Congo sqaud in which he scored an international debut goal.