Newcastle Utd 3 Reading 0OH TO be a fly on the wall when Kevin Keegan finally sits down with Mike Ashley to discuss Newcastle United's summer spending plans.
Keegan might not be renowned as a master tactician - although shifting Michael Owen to a deep lying "in the hole" linking role is looking pretty astute - but he is often pretty cute when it comes to playing the off-field political game and seems to have backed the club's owner into a bit of a corner.
"Mr Ashley has said he wanted to win something in the next 3½ years," said Keegan, now speaking from a position of strength after three straight wins and four goals in four games from Owen have banished the prospect of relegation. "When we sit down in the next few weeks we'll see how desperate he is."
Should the billionaire sports retailer fail to rise to that challenge, those fans who for the moment will hear no wrong said of a man who buys them drinks in Bigg Market bars may revise such opinions. After all only a Scrooge could deny a manager described as "much loved" by Obafemi Martins, Newcastle's Nigerian striker, the ammunition he needs to park Geordie tanks on the lawns of the Premier League's elite.
Yet even though rumour links the club with a litany of star names - Barcelona's Deco is the latest - there is also more than a hint of uncertainty about Ashley's budgetary intentions and Keegan recently let slip he had not had any discussions about summer planning with either the club's owner or chairman, Chris Mort, for five weeks. The excuse was that such talks were academic while the spectre of Championship football hovered but now there seems no reason for further postponement.
"I don't think it will be tonight," joked Keegan on Saturday after Reading had been one-touch passed into submission. "I think the owner will be going down the town to have a few. He's key. No disrespect to Chris (Mort) but the owner is the one who is going to have to find the finances for whatever is going to happen. I don't think I've got a very balanced squad, we've only got one left-back and one holding midfielder.
"We'll do our best to get the very best players. If we're beaten by other clubs, it will be ones who can offer them more and I don't mean financially. I think the summer could be very exciting; I've got an idea who I'd like here but I might be dreaming."
Although extremely careful not to criticise his predecessor directly, Newcastle's manager dropped a heavy hint Sam Allardyce's approach to management, studded with input from nutritionist, pyschologist and statistician, and his obsession with stopping the opposition had cramped his players' creativitity.
"I've always believed football is a simple game," said Keegan. "Sometimes you can complicate it unnecessarily . . . I've inherited some very good staff from the other regime but I've always thought the most important thing is the actual (football) training. What we've done since I've come in is trained more."
After a slightly sticky start on Saturday, during which Stephen Hunt delighted in nutmegging young David Edgar and a Kevin Doyle header brushed the bar, Newcastle benefited from Liam Rosenior's slip, thereby permitting Martins to seize the loose ball, dodge Andre Bikey and sidefoot beyond Marcus Hahnemann.
The second goal was claimed by Owen, who shrugged off tight marking to exert an increasing influence. Nipping in front of Ivar Ingimarsson he met a lofted pass from Habib Beye and hooked the ball over Hahnemann. Next, Mark Viduka confused Reading by checking and delaying his pass before playing a clever one-two with the again overlapping Beye before finishing from close range.
Martins attributes Newcastle's metamorphosis to Keegan.
"Kevin Keegan had to change a lot of things when he came in but now everyone loves him and wants him to stay," said the striker. Over to you, Mr Ashley.
