I'd like some honest answers here.

What have we lost by not having Shearer in the team for the last few games, and similarly what have we gained ?

I feel we have lost nothing. He hasn't scored in open play since Boro back in October. His ability to hold up the ball is superb, but that is the limit of it. He doesn't scare defenders that he can turn them and score. He gets huge applause for clearing corners, taking the ball into the corner falg at the end of games, and harrying defenders.

We have gained a new, more confident, Keiron Dyer. Prepared (or forced) to attack, to take on attacking responsibility. We have gained a kid who doesn't look out of place in the team, and seems to have the same level of commitment that Shearer sometimes shows. The lad doesn't score, but neither does Shearer, so no real difference there. The lad will learn and improve, Shearer is on the slide.

Discuss

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

Answers

We've lost very little by not having a 50% fit Alan Shearer in the side. However, let's judge the man when he's fit and able to do himself justice rather than sniping at him when he's out injured.

"The lad (Ameobi) doesn't score, but neither does Shearer, so no real difference there". Check your facts pal.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

ping.

yes someone else has noticed that shearer has become a negative force.

why?

because his style dictates the way we play. long early balls to shearer. problem is he's lost the pace and power to beat his man and get a strike at goal. his lack of pace means that the defender can sit in his shorts and break up 80% of attacks. also, the midfield is bypassed and the likes of dyer, solano even bassedas don't get the chance to play. i saw the manu game, most of the play went thru' dyer and he shone.

if shearer has a future its as a role player. i.e he drifts on the periphery and looks to make late runs into the danger area when the skill players have done the spade work. he can still finish.

over to you clarky

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

U cud also add the fact hes world class at putting the ball in the net, given half an opportunity. When the team plays well theres noone ud want in the team more than Al- look at Sheff Wed, Man U and a few other games last season. Amoebi wud not have scored half the goals Al got, given the goal scoring opportunities last year. A well rested and injury free Al in a decent team(hopefully in a few mths time) will do the trick. A regular partner up front also helps a bit :-) His ability to flick the ball on with headers also led to at least 3 wonderful goals - Duncs last year vs ManU and Dyers 2 recently.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

Oh yes hes almost as good a crosser of the ball as Solano and is BETTER at beating his man on the flank- stick him on the right wing?? :-) Strikers tend to appear poor when the team behind them arnt performing.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

George,

* Alan Shearer doesn't dictate the way we play - Bobby Robson does, or should.

* Alan Shearer is certainly not the player he was 3-4 years ago, but he is still the only player at NUFC capable of scoring 20 goals a season. Unless you have at least one striker bagging 20 goals you will achieve nothing. If you believe Kieron Dyer is going to do this then I'm afraid your dreaming.
If we are able to replace AS with Gabriel Batistuta I'll be delighted, until then I'll continue to support the best striker we've got by the length of Scotswood Rd.

* what we need is a system capable of blending the creativity of Kieron Dyer with the goalscoring ability of Shearer and Carl Cort. Unlike some others, IMO these are not mutually exclusive.

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

Oh dear - following Softie's (apparently successful) dyertribe (geddit? - please yourselves) against Kieron a few weeks back it is now open season for the controversial post. :-)

Personally I think (and hope) we can be very good without Shearer as well as with him. I wrote recently that I felt his enforced absence would do him and the team good and he might be coming back into a better team than the one he left.

I hate to attack any member of the club, unless there is a lot of justification, so I have held back from my idle speculations about Shearer, but there is one thing about the man that concerns me. In Ginola's recent autobiog, he spoke of how close TSM and Shearer were and how Gin and others felt left out (of the team sometimes). It occured to me that maybe the factionalism that seemed rife under Ruud was perhaps born during the TSM era. I don't know - idle speculation as I say. It's just that we have been playing with a lot of spirit recently, which doesn't prove the point but lends evidence to support it.

Over the last year or 2 I've felt that perhaps the club and we the fans are a little to hung up on Al. His is the one name almost guaranteed to be chanted at a game despite the fact that other players may be having a blinder. One feels that any manager is issued with several blank team sheets at the season start with Shearer's name pre-printed on them. The furore when Ruud left him out last season was amazing and yet we were 1-0 up when he came on and lost after he came on. And he did have a damned good chance to square the same fixture this season which went begging ....

As I say, I don't like knocking our own players without damned good reason so I'm not wanting to attack Al here. I will say that I'm very pleased that we've played so well without him and let's hope that a fully recovered Al fits back into the team (rather than having it rejigged around him) and starts to show some of his best form again.

But I do hope that we start singing for some other players besides. Nobby, for example, has been playing superbly, recently, and deserves more credit than he and many others get from the terraces.

Get well soon Al

-- Anonymous, January 09, 2001

There are bits of the truth in many of the replies posted. Yes-AS is slower than he was. Yes-Playing a long ball game from defence to AS is becoming less and less successful. Yes-the team has in some ways been better without AS-because in the abscence of a recognised goalscorer they hav had to play the passing game. Yes SBR is responsible for tactics-BUT apart from the two young lads(Shola and Lua)he has had no choice but to play AS as frontman. If however SBR goes back to the old tactic of playing AS upfront on his own-I would be very disappointed! What I hope to see when AS is fit is A)The passing game being continued B)a choice of Carl Cort,Shola and Lua up front doing the bulk of the donkey work C)Kieron Dyer to continue in his more forward role-making rather than scoring goals and D)AS to come back in a much deeper roltiming runs into the box,shooting from edge of box etc OR playing on the wing where his crossing ability and his shooting talents would allow him more freedom. Yes.AS is still a great player but due to the long run of injuries he has suffered,he is not the SAME player as he was.Not only SBR needs to accept this but even more importantly so does AS. Up the Toon!!! Fifties Fan

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

What have we lost?

We've lost a proven goal scorer. Not so much an individual goalmaker/scorer, but one who can put 'en away as well as most in the EPL. We've lost a player who still makes opponents plan their game around his. We've lost a player who has been carrying an injury for longer than he should.

What have we gained?

We've gained more mobility up front, with more linking runs from midfield. We've gained a young striker who now has over 300 mins of top level English football. We've gained another aspect to our game. But no matter what you might say, we've still seen the long ball humped down the middle. The difference being that Shola tends to win more flick-ons than AS. We've gained a huge opportunity to blood new players, try a different style and realise that their are other options. Ideally, AS should take from this that there will be times when he is not in the starting line-up.

Get well soon, Alan.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

I'll judge Shearer when he is 100% fit. It is plainly obvious he has not been. If he had the attitude of some players he would only have played a handful of games this season before having surgery and he'd probably be making his comeback this Saturday! Maybe that would have been better.

Lately we have been making runs from deeper in midfield not passing the leather off the ball until we get to the edge of the box. By that time all thier defenders have got back and all our midfielders are marked as well. Look at Acuna's goal at Leeds, perfect example.

If Shearer comes back and we revert to the same gameplan then I think we will be taking a step backwards. Hopefully we'll get a decent run going and it will be imperative that we carry on playing that way. Shearer will have to fit in and I'm sure he's more than capable of adapting.

I've lost count of the number of times I've said recently, "Shearer would have scored that" whether watching Newcastle or not.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

The more I think about our striker options, I hope that Ameobi gets the opportunity to play more and hopefully after a decent start he can nick a flukey goal and start off his career at the toon earlier than expected.

Hopefully Gallagher can come back in the side as a partner for Ameobi or leave Dyer up front.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

I don't disagree with much of what has been said here, principally because it is not good for a club to be as dependent on one man as we became. However, what I will never agree with is in criticising Alan, even blaming him, for that situation.

Alan Shearer does not pick the team, does not decide the team formation, and does not dictate the tactics - he simply plays centre forward to the best of his ability, even when he's not fully fit, for Newcastle United, the team he loves. And his track record in scoring goals for our team is pretty damned impressive, despite not having had a regular strike partner now for three years since we sold Sir Les.

IMO, we bought a world-class star for £15mm, have largely wasted a fantastic talent, albeit one whose goals have kept us in the PL for three consecutive seasons. What is STILL required is a team and a formation that can effectively utilise the talent that he undoubtedly still has - quite simply because we haven't got anybody anywhere near as good at sticking the ball in the net, and the stark reality is that we can't afford anyone anywhere near as good.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

Right: one of my issues with the Shearer-thing is that we have one player song: "Shearer! Shearer!". Almost every other side in the PL has sings for all their players (bleeding Arsenal even have a song for Nelson Vivas). This season, we have seen tremendous performances from both goalies, Solano (who deserves about 4 songs), Dyer, Speed, the new Argentinians and Super Aaron. Admittedly there was the Alan Gowling song being wheeled out for Goma at one point in aways but where is the inventiveness that gave us songs like "Ketsbaia my Lord" amd "Philippe, Philippe Albert". For all the world, the other players must think that we don't even notice them. The other thing is how annoying Shearer was neing about Sunday's game. "It was crap to watch" - has Alan ever seen those games when he stands offside for about 70 minutes of the game? Dull as. He wasn't that optimistic about how we'd score goals - Nobby has scored three while Shearer has been out - all of them great goals while I can't remember the last great goal Shearer scored: they've all been from about 3 yards out. I am a real fan of Shearer but I also think that he is bigger than the club and I think he knows it and that can't be good.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

Dougal see the Geordievision Song Contest thread. We've witnessed enough craft and intelligence on here to suggest we can come up with something. The trouble is getting it onto the terraces and it being accpeted.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

The lack of new songs is connected to the poor atmosphere in the ground I believe....people who make these things up would feel more confident singing them if surround by a group of mates rather than total strangers.....they'd probably have a couple of mates help them out straight away as well.....

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

Nice discussion everyone. I didn't start this as a Shearer-knocking exerceis, btu more with a view to what would happen if his career was over tomorrow, would the club come to an end. I was also interested in the tactical side of things.

When Big Dunc was at Everton their fans loved him but they also questioned how his presence made the team play. The defenders instinct was not to play out of trouble but to lump the ball up to Dunc who could hold it up and relieve the pressure. They weren't instructed to do it, they just knew it was the easy option. He was viewed as the saviour several seasons in a row as it was his goals that kept them from relegation. The counter argument was that his presence was what was causing poor TEAM performances throughout the season. Everton's best season for years was last year when he wasn't there. Not proof of the theory but a nice discussion point.

Now I find it very easy to substitute 'Newcastle' for 'Everton' and 'Shearer' for 'Ferguson' in the above paragraph. The most uplifting team performances this season have been the ones since Shearer has been out, maybe it's coincidence. Maybe it's like the new manager syndrome .... the star is gone prove you can live without him.

I know as well as anybody he has been carrying an injury, and performing heroically because of that, but it was all for short termism. We have to accept that he won't be playing in 5 years time, will the club stop existing at that point ? We have shown we can compete without him, and doesn't seem to be any the worse for it.

I too have defended Shearer, in some cases a couple of seasons ago it felt on my own, we just have to be able to have other options, maybe it isn't Shola, he's only played a couple of games so its impossible to tell, but we mustn't be dependent on a body which has taken the punishment his has had for the last dozen years.

(Clarky, Shearer has scored three goals in open play this season against Man City, Boro and Ipswich, this is not 20 a season form)

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

Has Shearer been anywhere near 75% fir all season we have to ask. Judging by his preformances I don't think he has been half fit for most of the season and if it wasn't for the injury to Cort we would have seen a lot less of Shearer.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

That should read 'fit'! I wasn't questioning if Shearer had been 75% Nordic tree for most of the season, no matter how static he has looked on occasions.

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

Pining for a fit Shearer ?

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001

De-fir-niteley! No wonder he always has needles in him!

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2001