Former Arsenal star Paul Merson was very critical of Roy Hodgson’s decision to select Newcastle United star Andros Townsend for the England national team for the upcoming European Championship.
His main criticism regarding Townsend’s selection was the fact that the winger only ‘turned up’ during the final few games of the season and as a result, he never really deserved a place in the Three Lions’ squad.
Merson perhaps has a point and Roy Hodgson has most certainly gained a notorious reputation of employing favoritism whenever he makes a selection for the national team.
In truth, the call up earned by the likes of Jack Wilshere, Jordan Henderson and Fabian Delph are equally questionable but unlike the aforementioned trio, Townsend’s inclusion can be justified.
Leaving any Newcastle bias aside, Townsend certainly did not enjoy the best of campaigns after spending the first half of the season at Tottenham with the kids and he did take quite a while to get going at St. James’ Park as well following a £12million January move.
Nonetheless, Townsend’s form during the final six games of the season was simply superb as he scored crucial goals against Swansea City and Crystal Palace, and his contribution was perhaps the most important one in helping Newcastle give themselves hope of avoiding relegation.
Unfortunately, Townsend was unable to save the Magpies but on a personal level, the 24-year-old would surely have been very pleased with his performance and it would be hard to find a more in-form player in the Premier League over the last two months of the campaign.
Admittedly, selection for such a big tournament would be better off done on the basis of performances throughout the year rather than just a few games and many feel that West Ham’s Michail Antonio deserved a place ahead of Townsend.
However, Townsend was forced to miss the first half of the season at Tottenham due to his attitude problem and while one should not condone such behavior, the winger certainly buckled down to prove his worth at Newcastle.
Perhaps most importantly though, Townsend’s advantage over Antonio is the fact that he already has international experience under his belt and also has the trust of Hodgson. On the basis of statistics, Antonio should be on the plane but Hodgson clearly does not rate the West Ham man and he would perhaps be a waste of a space if he had indeed headed to France.
Townsend is unlikely to start for England, who are priced at 8/1(10Bet) to go all the way in France, but he does have the X-Factor to change the course of any game when thrown on as a sub and overall, Hodgson has perhaps made the correct decision in including the Newcastle star in his squad.
SHAM quite a few on here wished you taken over the blog from Toonsy,as I said they have no heart in this blog
Icedog(Quote)
Good Afternoon to you to, Sham. 😆
Stuart79(Quote)
Afternoon all 😐 😯
Good news coming our way today hopefully. Could be the beginning of a very happy relationship between Rafa and the Toon Army.
Shamrock(Quote)
The way this blog is going it will end up the way Workys site went,”down the pan”,and good bloggers will be lost
Icedog(Quote)
Why are we whinging about the blog? The 3 in a day articles? Commented on that and thought it was weird…there are times when they’re crying out for someone to write an article and yet couldn’t put a couple of them on the shelf? Odd…
Also, I don’t particularly like the ‘opinion pieces’ unless they’re really insightful and well written. I can see comments from fans with different opinions, I don’t need to read an entire article from one person’s opinion. Especially on a topic that’s already been discussed. I think most England fans do expect Townsend to go. He should be pretty fresh, he’s in very good form and he should be an excellent option without Welbeck. Nuff said.
I think the blog is generally very good. Bit shoddy with so many articles at once though…
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
Definitely looking forward to having Benitez confirmed!
Articles going around that we’re likely to sell Sissoko (makes sense), Janmaat (makes sense), Gini (kinda makes sense, but I think he could be a good player – loan perhaps?) and Townsend (doesn’t make much sense to me). Very disappointed if the latter goes. He’s at a club where he’ll get regular first team football under a top manager, we have great fans and there’s no international tournament next year. He could even still play for England next season if he has a good tournament.
Don’t see him going to Lisbon and getting matching wages. I don’t think it’s a particularly good league either. Could understand going to the likes of Everton or West Ham, but would be disappointing to lose him in particular. Don’t believe he’s making any moves to leave now though. He’ll be 100% focussed on going to Euro 2016. Anything else on his mind right now would be foolish.
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
The new blogmeisters blocked comments on their other threads with all good intentions, I think. They wanted to let the flow go on here but didn’t realise that people click on the newest article and want to post there.
THEY SHOULD GET TOGETHER WITH DR ED 🙂
Eric Sykes(Quote)
We are all off to “Lisbon in Sunderland”.
I talked to me Mam yesterday. She NEVER swears. and I was shocked when she said England are playing in the “Stadium of Shyte”.
Eric Sykes(Quote)
Yeah…coincidence?
Someone, “So where are you headed now Andros?”
Townsend, “Getting on a plane and heading to Stadium of Light tomorrow”
Cue, Townsend off to Lisbon…like that makes much sense…
What would the point possibly be of Townsend going off to Lisbon now to arrange a transfer? If he wants to move and if he goes to the Euros, and plays well, he’ll be able to demand a higher wage at a better club. Utter tosh.
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
Apparently Rafa will get to keep the money from player sales. That could be one hell of a war chest in the Championship…
Stuart79(Quote)
As Sham touched on, maybe if the new blog owners came on an odd time to comment and get to know what makes the blog tick and why so many people used to use it , it could have went from strength to strength . But tbh I don’t really get the feeling that they want to chat with the usual bloggers which for me says they have the blog for another reason and after getting a few pop ups recently when clicking the newer comment button I have made up my mind what they have the blog for.
Big Dave(Quote)
I cant even read any of you’re comments on the new thread or message any of you so I guess this is the end.
Terry(Quote)
Big Dave
Personally, I think the whole layout of all of the NUFC blogs I’ve seen, is a bit antiquated. I’d love to see things like the Fantasy Football incorporated as a permanent thread for banter and other threads spreading off for particular topics. It’s a pain having to scroll to see if someone has replied to your post. It would be a lot easier if it was in a thread. A bit like Facebook, but it shouldn’t be in Facebook because a) some people like the anonymity and don’t want to encourage more personal abuse and b) it would exclude people not on Facebook.
That’s a comment about all of the blogs really. I don’t think anyone (and I include myself in this) has really bothered setting up a modern NUFC blog where us fans can really chat about things in a properly interactive way.
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
There aren’t any comments on the new thread I don’t believe. Commenting has been locked out and this is the latest thread for comments, right?
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
I think so.
Stuart79(Quote)
These plebs gets slaughter most of the time & rightly so. But credit where it’s due. The fans could only do so much – congratulations to Mike Ashley & Lee Charnley for making it possible to keep Rafa.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Yeah they are a bit oldie worldie but it’s what has worked well on here from Toonsy started the blog I would also say that Toonsy joining in in the comments ,Craic, banter also helped the blog. As I’M he was one of us, but the blog has now got the feel of them and us. But it has been said many times and it hasn’t changed anything , so I guess that’s the way it’s going to stay.
Big Dave(Quote)
Andy/Nick – you’ll have to come clean here. Why did you take over the blog from Toonsy? Are you planning to get more involved. You mentioned new writers. There’s SRF who does well but the rest?
A lot of bloggers made comments/suggestions on the new layout. Nothing’s changed and now we have the fiasco of those new articles released together with none of them provoking much thought or comments. What’s going on?
Georgio(Quote)
Awesome. Now I just wrote a comment which didn’t appear…
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
Every cloud and all that…
Stuart79(Quote)
Eric, Enjoyed the link on Shearer mate, nice one.
Hopefully I’m posting on right thread now, been out all day so not quite sure if I’m on right thread?
Stu, that’s great news re-Rafa, I’m inclined to believe what Caulkin tweets as he’s pretty ITK on all things Toon and I enjoy his articles.
Kimtoon(Quote)
😆 now now Stu
Kimtoon(Quote)
Cheeky ******…
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
Quite like STUARTS comment 😆
Icedog(Quote)
Quite like Ice’s comment 😆
Big Dave(Quote)
I’ll leave you all to it then…
ToonDarnSarf(Quote)
Stu and TDS you two crack me up, you really do 😉
Terry(Quote)
No TDS don’t go someone’s got to educate Stuart on how to run a club mate 😀
Terry(Quote)
Is the champions league final tonight ?
Terry(Quote)
Hey guys,
Thanks for your comments above – as TDS said on an earlier comment maybe whacking four articles on in one day when we’ve had 0 for a week lacked a bit of thought. But I will be honest with you all now that we plan to put out more than one article a day in the future – I understand that will annoy some of you as I get the impression more than one every day or so interupts the flow of your chat and debate hence why I blocked comments.
I’m trying to find a happy medium whereby we can produce articles and chat can commence uninterupted which is why I suggested a forum a while back but no one seemed to like the idea of it.
Regarding the whole advertising thing. Nick and I spent in the five figure region to buy the blog off Toonsy (he can verify this) and with Google adsense paying peanuts we’d like to eventually see a return on our money. By no means is this a ‘business’ as such but I think with such an outlay it’s only fair we make a bit back like every other NUFC site undoubtedly does. Admittedly we have been quiet on the comments as of late, I myself currently work 50+ hours (I’m sure there’s plenty of people on here who work tough shifts so that wasn’t to sound condescending!) and have been really busy as of late with family stuff.
At the end of the day, it is our blog but you guys are also a huge part of it so we need to compromise. I think the main problem is Nick and I bought the site thinking it was a blog when really it is much more like a forum with regular members. It is called nufcblog but people refer to new articles as ‘threads’ and thus has a very forumy feel. I notice on most things we post, not too many pay any attention to the articles and just carry on what they were discussing in the previous article so when we say this happen, we sometimes think ‘what’s the point if people aren’t reading?’ (not using this as an excuse, just something I’ve observed)
If people aren’t happy with what I’ve said before and wish to leave then that’s fair enough, I respect that and would be no hard feelings. We will try and be more active on the comments in the future and I believe a compromise like I said needs to be reached. And I certainly don’t want it to feel like a ‘us v them’ mentality. We had very excellent news today regarding Rafa and am pretty confident we’ll bounce back at the first attempt with him at the helm.
If anyone has any suggestions of how we should go forward that’d be great 🙂
Andy Magpie(Quote)
Thanks Andy, I’m sure I speak for all posters when I say I have no problems with you clawing back your outlay, it is a large sum. The main issues are lack of interaction which we were used to with Toonsy previously and the type of articles put up and consistency . We do, I’ll admit continue to carry on a conversation/argument into following threads, but I’m pretty sure we all read the threads first. For my part I try to acknowledge the writer and comment on the article if I have anything to input on it. I would say one article a day is enough unless something happens to warrant a new one. Sometimes less is more as they say. Anyway thanks for getting back to us all Andy.
Kimtoon(Quote)
Andy I am not against you’s getting your money back and tbh I have never had a problem with 2 -3 articles a day.
But I do think it would be a hell of a lot easier if you’s would actually come on and converse with the bloggers sometimes and get to know us, but tbh to me I get the feeling that you’s don’t want to get to know us which then makes me question then what was the point of you’s taking over the blog if you’s don’t want to comment. I can’t speak for everyone on here but being with Toonsy and helping him get this place going from before it even went online I do think I know most bloggers quite well .
If you do reply I mightn’t get back to you until later.
Big Dave(Quote)
I meant to add that on most articles my 1st words are good read etc. But without the personal touch of knowing the writers it’s a wee bit like reading a story on news now, and I am not trying to sound nasty
Big Dave(Quote)
Press conference called for 7pm. Wonder what for… ❗ 😳 😀
First day of a club reborn and the start of a successful period in our history.
Stuart79(Quote)
That to me will herald a complete new dawn for our club , and I would then say it was worth going through the heartbreak of relegation etc, I might even give Jabba some credit ???
Big Dave(Quote)
Steady, Dave!
Stuart79(Quote)
Agree mate,you know the crack 😉
Icedog(Quote)
Official – Rafa the gaffer!!!!
Stuart79(Quote)
Presser at 7pm then, brace yourselves lads and lasses, if this goes the way we hope, it’s truly momentous for the club imo. I could never foresee a Championship club with a manager of Rafa’s credentials. Going to make next seasons championship a touch more exciting now .
Kimtoon(Quote)
So I’d like to see Rafa sign Zlatan and Gerrard for starters. They’ll do.
Stuart79(Quote)
Well looks like I missed the presser 😡 thought it was 7pm?
Kimtoon(Quote)
Rafa confirms “If I don’t want to sell any players then we won’t sell. If I want to I will keep all the players.”
Stuart79(Quote)
TDS: you are not leaving are you? Some of your comments made me reassess, to a small degree, what I think of the NUFC player development system. That’s a good thing.
Eric Sykes(Quote)
Thanks for the reply kim and tbh yes you’re usually first in the queue to comment on articles and have your view point on them. Regarding interaction there’s no real defence I have because it is something that has been neglected. SRF is a family friend of mine too so would be good to get him involved on the comments more.
I think someone mentioned the design and lay out of the site not being worked on? I thought we dealt with that pretty well (correct me if I’m wrong) adding a fresher theme and eventually getting over teething problems with comments.
Andy the Magpie(Quote)
Stuart: Rafa isn’t exactly svelte nowadays but at least he saved us from Steve Bruce. I was reading Stephen Hawking’s “A Brief History of Time” earlier and got a bit confused as to how the Universe could be continually expanding. Then I realised it was all down to Steve Bruce. He will gianticize into a small planet soon and block out the sun.
Eric Sykes(Quote)
Andy the Magpie: The design of the site is good but if you block comments on certain articles I think that confuses people.
Eric Sykes(Quote)
I thought Rafa had never manager a second tier club before (for some reason always assumed he started at Atlet)
Andy the Magpie(Quote)
I think it’s two Spanish lower clubs he brought up when he first got into coaching and moved on from there
Icedog(Quote)
Andy – for what it’s worth I think this site has some excellent writes – both original & newer ones.
I wouldn’t have an issue with multiple articles a day, providing it’s sort of 1 in the morning, and 1 in the afternoon/evening. I think that would allow us bloggers to comment on the articles & lets be right, that’s why the likes of Sham & SRB put these articles together and there time & efforts should be respected & appreciated.
I have to agree with Big Dave as well though. I thought with new owners would come new bloggers & fresh views & opinions. SRB has certainly made his mark on the blog in a hugely positive way – some cracking articles. There’s been the occasional post from Andy, but that’s been it unfortunately.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Well imo this appointment shows how much power and respect Rafa has,puts Pardew,SM JK.ect in their place no way would they have been given this sort of power
Icedog(Quote)
http://c.newsnow.co.uk/A/2/832161452?-11058:809:3
I see Rafa has started with the youth recruitment already.
Sharpy17(Quote)
So would now be a good time for a new article about Rafa with a comment box?
I will return to comment when my hard on has died down…
Stuart79(Quote)
I have to be honest, I still can’t quite believe we have managed to convince one of the Worlds best & most successful managers to stay on with us in the Champonship?!.
Ashley (and Charnley) has had a lot of bad press & hatred thrown their way (most of it justified I must add). But both deserve huge credit in getting this one done.
They have basically acknowledged that their whole blueprint has been wrong – pretty much everything they had in place, they have now agreed to change.
They have finally paid a manager a proper salary & agreed to give a manager money to spend on his own players.
I can honestly say I never thought I’d see this under Ashley.
Sharpy17(Quote)
I second that Sharpy. Fresh start deserved for Ashley and Charnley from the Toon Army. All in it together ?
Shamrock(Quote)
It’s a club reborn. Rafa is currently the most successful manager in England and he’s managing NUFC – regardless of what division were in.
I’m just as excited that the club have given him full control which includes a good budget with the option of keeping every single player if he wants to. That’s huge from Ashley imo.
A club with genuine ambition – incredible!
Stuart79(Quote)
Is it really conceivable that Ashley could win over the toon army after all that has happened? 😯
Sharpy17(Quote)
He will have to stick to his promises to Rafa, give him the funds to be successful and watch us win something on his watch for it to be clawed back to normal
Stuart79(Quote)
It is now Sharpy. Ashley admitting his mistakes and having the balls to hold his hands up AND make the changes immediately and totally along with securing a tip top manager in order to bring about a new dawn deserves huge credit. He will now be able to enjoy being a fan amongst the Toon Army at games again.
Shamrock(Quote)
Sham – not just Ashley coz to be fair to him, I think last seasons **** up with down to Charnley – he’s a man that has came back from the brink as well.
I watched Rafas press confrence on SSN and Rafa can’t speak highly enjoy of him.
Interestingly though, Rafas answer to was he in control of the transfer was not an outright yes – pretty bloody cryptic actually.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Welcome Rafa
Colin(Quote)
welcome back Rafa 😆
Munich Mag(Quote)
Well he said if he didn’t want anybody to leave they wouldn’t leave so I guess that’s pretty straightforward, Sharpy. The way he’s been talking is that he expects the squad to stay together for the main and he will add to it.
Be really interested in the players he targets. Will he target PL quality players who will take on board the ‘project’ or will he want Championship players who can do a job?
Stuart79(Quote)
a viila fan,
sorry,i posted this on the wrong header.
for the freinds i have on here like kimtoon.
congrats on keeping rafa.
at least,your owner has woken up.
as for us poor sods,it looks like we will have de,matio.
id rather have had pearson,because we are deep in the mire.a total rebuild is needed.
so,dont worry about us next season.we are gone.
a villa fan.(Quote)
The last Villa fan I spoke to said “don’t worry about us, you will beat us” and look what happened…
Stuart79(Quote)
Well for me today has been a new exciting dawn for our club, and yeah I will even give credit to Jabba for finally realising that the way he was trying to run the club wasn’t and never would work, so credit to him for giving Rafa the Tools he needs
Big Dave(Quote)
stuart79,
he was right,
christ,everybody else beat us.
a villa fan.(Quote)
Love it. Just love it.
Brisvegas(Quote)
😆 very good. Bring in The Messiah – part 2.
Shamrock(Quote)
Very pleased with the Rafa deal…. some good news after a poor season…
Regarding the blog…. People seem to have some romantic notion that the “old” blog was some how better that this “new’ version. I can’t see where this notion is being drawn from to be honest. The last 3 years of Toonsy’s blog reign was run by regular posters that would put up articles when they could. Weeks would go by with only 1 or 2 articles. I wrote for a fair while, Prem & Vegas did too. Then when I pulled the pin on writing, everyone else bandied together and promised to help out with content and….. then simply left it to Kimtoon to do all the articles.
Then to his credit, Shamrock has kept it together for the past 12 months prior to the buy out.. As Andy alluded to, not many bloggers actually read the articles, too many are simply happy to bang on about their current crusade and pretty much stay right off topic.
Toonsy put in a herculean effort early in the piece but the blog was sliding down hill well before it was bought out.
Andy & Co, keep up the good effort, you won’t get many plaudits for the good stuff you do, just criticism for the stuff you aren’t doing. Its a thankless job you have taken on….
Aussie Magpie Fan(Quote)
The next few weeks should be really interesting AMF. Who goes, who stays. Not even just the players, but Carr and Beardsley.
It could have been dead on here and at NUFC but we could now have a resurrection. And Uncle Ed might now even keep it together. I thought a couple of weeks ago he was going to go to Schteve’s house and give him a right good talking to.
Eric Sykes(Quote)
Aussie – I think your closing comment is a bit off mate. The lads asked for feedback from us and what I’ve seen by most has been constructive as opposed to slagging off. Infact most who have offer feedback are asking the new owners to get more involved in posting and try to drum up new posters – so that’s hardly harking back to the good old days.
You’re right though, this blog only just survived thanks to a handful of people writing articles. A lot of people commented on the piece written, and some continued their own agenda – but that will be the case on every blog I bet.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Sharpy, for the record I have always considered you to be a very good voice on this blog..however I disagree with the feedback comments. The lads have pretty much been responding to comments to the changes they have made right from the get go.. some have been right and some wrong but the notion that the old blog was better is off the mark.. The old only blog survived thanks to the efforts of a handful of writers. . Not because it was more user friendly or that the articles weren’t piled up on each other..
Aussie Magpie Fan(Quote)
Aussie – I totally agree with you on that part. I can’t speak for all posters but certainly my comments and those I’ve read from the likes of Sham, Dave & Kim have been constructive.
I think the newbies were welcomed with open arms.
I’d welcome more articles. It might just get us away from rehashing old and stale topics like Pardew & Carver. It might also inspire the likes of you & Bris and others to get on more – that’s not a pop by the way, I always enjoyed your contributions and they seemed to die off with your articles.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Sharpy, just got a little sick of the general vibe of this place.. found it was getting me down and wasn’t an enjoyable place to visit. Being constantly reminded how **** everything is/was doing my head in.. That is why I don’t bother much any more mate.
Aussie Magpie Fan(Quote)
Aussie, good to see you on again, don’t be a stranger. 🙂
Amazed Rafa has stayed with us and well done Mike and Lee for handing the reigns to him. I really hope this isn’t a false dawn and that they truly have seen the error of their ways. What I don’t want to see is a repeat of the KK situation where promises made were gone back on. Time will tell if this fairy tale is a good or not. I saw an article where it said that with Rafa’s original contract he’d employed the best employment lawyers in the business to make sure everything was watertight, so hopefully he’s done the same again as I’m sure he’s aware how slippery Mike can be. Don’t want to sound negative as I truly am over the moon like, but I have seen too many false promises and outright fibs from the club over the last 9 years to get totally sucked in.
If he can get us back up and it should be highly likely ,then we will see the level of ambition that exist. Looking forward to some deadwood being shifted and to what players Rafa attracts, should be able to get a better quality player in with him on board now. I can see Townsend staying now as I think they get on well.
Also
Don’t think you should worry just yet, the Toon were written off last time we dropped and we had a terrible pre season too. No one expected much but Hoots did a great job, so you never know your next manager may just surprise you.
Kimtoon(Quote)