Sir Bobby Robson was on the verge of being Newcastle United manager in 1997 as he was struggling to keep the Barcelona fans happy. While he had the backing of the owner at Barcelona at the time he decided to stay, while not long after he was shifted upstairs as director of football and Van Gaal was announced as manager. I can imagine had Robson taken over from Keegan in 97, he wouldn't of destroyed Keegan’s Entertainers squad like Kenny Dalglish did, he would of built on the Entertainers team and who knows we might have been a dominant force?
Fast forward to 1999, Robson landed his dream job at his beloved club. Still to this day it baffles me that Sir Bobby Robson got the sack after finishing 5th after achieving Champions League finishes the previous two seasons and built a very good team throughout his years as our manager. I know he might have retired the end of that season, if he didn't get the sack but I'm sure we wouldn't have finished as low as 14th and brought players in such as Boumsong, fallen out with big players such as Bellamy and Robert, which Graeme Souness did and completely destroyed Sir Bobby's team.
Newcastle United surprised the odds when they finished 5th in 2012, four points off a Champions League place, the next season Alan Pardew didn't get the backing off Mike Ashley. Although Pardew guided Newcastle United to a Europa League quarter-final that season, Newcastle massively dipped in the league from 5th to 14th. With a couple of quality reinforcements, I really think that was the time for Newcastle to compete again but Mike Ashley and his clowns, never had the ambition. Imagine if they had capitalised on that, who knows what might have happen? Not too long later that team was slowly falling apart with the sales of Demba Ba and Yohan Cabaye and not replacing them.
It might have been very different if Newcastle United had stayed up in 2009, following Kevin Keegan's resignation in 2008 after being treat appalling by Mike Ashley and hiring Joe Kinnear. After Kinnear was feeling unwell, Alan Shearer was given a chance to save us for the last 8 games and was unsuccessful following in 5 points from the last 8. Imagine if we had stayed up that season? Shearer could still be manager today and brought us success or could have had a decent managerial career somewhere else who knows?
I always wonder what might have been if Kevin Keegan didn't resign in 1997? We might have been on the list of Premier League title winners. Instead, Dalglish was appointed and it went all downhill from there after the next season, he sold the likes of Les Ferdinand, Peter Beardsley and David Ginola and replaced them with Ian Rush, John Barnes and Des Hamilton. That still baffles to this day how much that Kevin Keegan team was dismantled?
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