Newcastle United journalist Liam Kennedy has provided his views on the club’s managing director Lee Charnley for his lack of interaction with the fans.
It’s fair to say that some of the relations that the fans have with certain people at the club at are not as great as they could be, with the likes of Steve Bruce and Mike Ashley coming in for some serious abuse over the years about the way the fans think the club is being run.
One of the main gripes that the fans have is their perceived lack of communication between the club and the fans when it comes to ongoing matters at the club, and speaking about the issue on NUFC Matters, Kennedy felt that people like Bruce came in for too much of the stick as a result of being the only person who actually speaks publicly by virtue of his press conferences.
He hinted that one way to ease some of the pressure on Bruce’s shoulders would be for people like Charnley to be more open with the supporters on occasion:
“The guy’s the only bloke who talks at Newcastle United. He’s the only person who fronts up.
“So all the issues that build up with regards takeover, with regards no transfers, with regards whatever it may be – lack of movement, ‘we’ve got no money’, season tickets – all that anger that builds up amongst the fanbase, effectively gets channelled into Steve Bruce.”
“Some of that heat should be taken off by the people above him. I think it’s a dereliction of duty that the likes of Lee Charnley don’t regularly – or at least once or twice a season – speak to fans, put out statements explaining things.
“Would it be so hard for Newcastle United to put a statement out at the start of this summer and say ‘Look, it’s going to be difficult… we’re struggling, we haven’t got a load of money, so this is whatever’?
“Or even if they said, ‘We’re now going back to a policy where we target young players, because we want to bring the average of the squad down’. Or if they just talk about things like ‘Joe Willock’s the person we’re going for’ – there’s nothing wrong with that kind of thing. Transparency, being clear, would take a little bit of the heat off Steve Bruce.”
TIF Thoughts on Liam Kennedy’s comments about Lee Charnley…
Do you think that Charnley does a good job?
No, he is awful
Yes, he deserves some respect
Kennedy does have a point about the club being open and what it can do to the fans – take Christian Purslow at Aston Villa and the praise he got for how he handled Jack Grealish’s exit, for instance. Whilst the club perhaps don’t have to go that far on a weekly basis, a happy medium somewhere could go a long way to helping smooth things over.
Given the toxic atmosphere that has been generated over the years under Ashley and Bruce – some of it out of their hands with regards to the takeover – anything that can be done to help create a better atmosphere around St. James’ Park would surely be beneficial.
The club doesn’t need to reveal every little detail of what goes on behind the scenes, but just enough to make sure that the fans aren’t totally left in the dark when it comes to the present and future at the club.
In other news: ‘I thought it was a big call from Steve Bruce’ – Lee Ryder questions NUFC tactical decision