Alan Shearer will not give up bid to be NUFC manager

Jun 9 2009 by Luke Edwards, The Journal

ALAN Shearer will not give up on his bid to become Newcastle United’s manager despite the increasingly shoddy treatment he has received from the club.

Shearer returned to Tyneside yesterday afternoon after a short break determined to get some straight answers from Mike Ashley and managing director Derek Llambias.

The Journal understands that United’s manager-in-waiting has only had one brief conversation with Llambias in the last 11 days and has no idea why there has been a delay in confirming his appointment. He has been kept in the dark and is getting exasperated by the lack of progress.

However, the 38-year-old will not issue Ashley with an ultimatum as he tries to organise a meeting for later this week in an effort to clarify his position.

Although the indication from some quarters has been that Shearer’s appointment has been put on hold until after a takeover is complete, Shearer has denied this was ever mentioned as a problem to him during his meetings with Ashley.

A source close to the former Magpies skipper told The Journal: “Alan is back and he wants answers. He hasn’t been told anything and something is obviously going on that he doesn’t know about. He had a short conversation with Derek Llambias on Friday to tell him there hadn’t been any progress and that is it. It looks like Mike has run for the hills.

“Alan is angry and frustrated, this has gone on too long. This is a disastrous situation to be in and it simply doesn’t make any sense.

“Mike never mentioned that putting the club up for sale would be a problem in appointing a manager, far from it in fact, it was all going to happen regardless.

“Not that Alan will walk away, not yet. He hasn’t even thought about issuing them with an ultimatum. He will wait and see what happens, but the sooner the better.

“Newcastle United are a managerless club and could be for the next six to eight weeks the way things are going. That isn’t any way to sort out a football club which has just been relegated.”

How long Shearer will be prepared to wait is unknown and, if it was not the Newcastle job he was waiting for, it is likely he would have already severed ties and looked at other options.

Shearer still has a TV pundit’s contract with the BBC to fall back on if his patience with Newcastle snaps. He has also been linked with the manager’s jobs at Southampton and West Bromwich Albion as the pressure grows on Ashley’s

regime to make the appointment. And Shearer’s former team-mate and friend Rob Lee insisted that the former striker was the only man capable of saving Newcastle from further decline.

He said: “This is the first time I’ve been back up to Newcastle since they were relegated and it’s depressing. I’m devastated for the fans, but the club has been in decline for some time.

“This has been coming. It didn’t just happen overnight. The table doesn’t lie and the warning signs have been there for a few years now. They just weren’t heeded by those who could have done something about it earlier.

“Now we have to pick ourselves up and try to get back into the Premier League as quickly as possible. As far as I’m concerned there is only one man for the job. Alan Shearer is the only man for the job.

“Hopefully the owners will see sense and put him in charge to run the club how he wants. He needs to be able to buy some players the club can be proud of again.

“I can understand why the fans are getting frustrated by the delay in appointing him. The more the weeks go by the more problems it will cause. We are playing catch up as it is. It could get a lot worse.

“Alan needs time to get players in who can get us out of the division and we need an awful lot of them because a lot of players are going to be sold. There is so much work to do; Alan hasn’t been able to get started.

“Whether Alan is appointed Newcastle manager, as he should be, he will be a very good manager somewhere else. He has all the attributes needed to be a top manager. He’s a strong personality, he can mix it with people, but can also be supportive of people when they need it.”

Meanwhile, Obafemi Martins’ agent has released a statement saying his client wants to stay at Newcastle. However, as one of the top wage earners at St James’s Park, the Nigerian is highly unlikely to get his wish.