I had a rather predictable conversation with another Newcastle United fan very recently, this was on the comments section of The Mag with one of the best known (notorious!) posters recently.
He was lamenting the fact that the Newcastle United owners have been presiding over ticket price rises and actively promoting the corporate side of ticket sales at the expense of the “working class” fan.
Whilst I couldn’t dispute that both of those things are happening, I would put a far different interpretation as to the owners’ motives.
As I said in my reply to his claim that the owners’ are robbing fans blind and destroying the traditional fan profile, t’s a real dilemma. As the club ramps up its ambition beyond that of just staying in the Premier League and lining the owner’s pockets, it needs money to finance that. One line of revenue is match day income so, inevitably, the cost to the punter will rise and the traditional, young working class fan becomes increasingly alienated.
It’s really sad but the choice is to follow the Mike Ashley model and remain a mid to lower table feeder club or try to lift ourselves up, out of that quagmire, into the elite class.
His reply to that was that we had “loads of better seasons under Kind Mike” and he would love to turn the clock back to those days.
Well, once I’d picked myself up off the floor and calmed my sniggers, I decided to fact check that claim.
The aforementioned corpulent cockney bought the club at the end of the 2006/7 season and sold up a couple of months into the 2021/22 season and the club’s record during his stewardship is detailed below:
Newcastle United: Season-by-Season Record (2007-2021)
(Best viewed in Landscape mode)
To be sure, there was a little bit of excitement in the 2011/12 season when we reached the heady heights of 5th place in the league. That was Alan Pardew’s managerial apex. Reviled by the fan base as a member of the “cockney mafia” and for his public subservience to the owner and his frugal policies, he was never really credited for that achievement – despite being recognised by his peers as manager of the season – and it was written off by many as some sort of fluke based on the form of Demba Ba and the spectacular goals of Papiss Cissë.
I was never a fan of the “Silver Snide” but I did think at the time, and had many arguments with other fans about it, that he deserved credit for the good performances alongside the brickbats for the bad. Not a big man but a giant ego, if he had been made of chocolate he would have eaten himself! Personally, I would have sacked him for his disgraceful verbal assault on Pellegrini which, I thought, reflected very badly on the image of the club – but then what standards of behaviour was our owner of that time setting?
Interestingly, Pardew was reviled even more for the phantom “head butt” on David Meyler of Hull City. In that incident, I saw Meyler as the aggressor and Pardew simply standing up for himself. All a bit childish, to be honest, but if that was anyone’s idea of a head butt then I doubt they’ve ever had a Saturday night out down the Bigg Market.
Anyway, back to the stats. I can only assume that my correspondent’s claim about better seasons under Mike Ashley centred on the two first place finishes in 2010 and 2017. Unfortunately, those first places were in the Championship. Yes, Kind Mike brought us silverware but, sadly, he had to ensure that we were relegated first.
Scanning the rest of the stats, there is the odd cup quarter final here and there, the most notable being in the Europa Cup in the 2012/13 season. Another decent showing by Mr Pardew which was regarded with the same lack of appreciation by the fan base as his 5th place finish.
What stands out – other than the 5th place finish and two relegations – is that our league position for the other nine seasons was between 10th and 16th.
The Mike Ashley policy of trying (and sometimes failing) to do just enough to stay in the Premier League is often mentioned in articles and comments on The Mag but looking at that table brings home the significance of his lack of ambition and explains the unrelenting frustration and despair of the fan base during those times. Year after year of no hope. Little wonder that Pardew’s “hiccup” was barely recognised.
It’s a human reaction, I think, to manage good and bad experiences differently. My feeling is that the average person will try to minimise the effects of bad experiences over time and dwell instead on the good ones. We know that those things happened but we try to move on and not dwell on them in too much detail.
Yes, we all know that the Kind Mike Days were bad but do we really remember just how consistently bleak and joyless that were? Year after year of performances ranging between mediocrity and abject failure with one rogue season standing out as bizarrely as an honest man in the House of Commons.
Judging by the reaction recently of a growing number of people to our performances and results this season, I would say that many people’s memories are sadly lacking. Having survived the trauma of those years, their subconscious has maybe dulled the memories of those times, merging them into a period labelled “unpleasant but increasingly forgettable”.
Let’s contrast the record under the current ownership against that of their predecessor.
Newcastle United: Season-by-Season Record (2021–2026)
(Best viewed in Landscape mode)
*Position as of current 2025/26 mid-season standings.
Just imagine some sort of strange version of Bullseye in which Kind Mike was taken by the hand at the end of his tenure, shown Eddie Howe’s record and told, “Let’s look at what you could have won.”
“Matches sold out without having to give 10,000+ free season tickets away”
“Consistent single figure finishes in the league”
“A cup semi-final and two finals”
“Champions League qualification twice and progress to the last 16”
“Real silverware – a League Cup – for the first time since man first landed on the moon”
Loads of better seasons under Kind Mike? I rest my case.