Newcastle United's owner may have worn a replica shirt
emblazoned with 'King Kev' at Arsenal last Saturday but that failed
to prevent Kevin Keegan being sacked by Mike Ashley
today.
Rumours that Keegan - who refused to resign - and Newcastle had
parted company began circulating in mid-morning after it became
apparent that the manager had not turned up to take morning
training.
It is understood that Keegan was summoned to a meeting with club
officials including Derek Llambias, the managing director, early on
Monday afternoon and effectively told he needed to pull his socks
up in the wake of the team's 3-0 defeat at Arsenal. This in turn
prompted a furious row in which Keegan, once again, expressed his
frustration at Dennis Wise's control of the recruitment policy.
Newcastle's executive director, Wise is in charge of transfers
but failed to deliver Keegan the specialist left-back he had been
demanding all summer, let alone the "four top quality" signings he
had hoped would arrive by midnight on Monday. Newcastle's only
transfer activity on deadline day was the signing of Spanish
striker Xisco and the loan signing of midfielder Ignacio
Gonzalez.
Moreover Keegan, who returned to manage the club for a second
time in January, was uneasy at both the decision to sell James
Milner to Aston Villa, just days after he had claimed the England
Under-21 winger would be going nowhere, and the club's delay over
negotiating a new contract with Michael Owen.
Sam Allardyce's successor, who was appointed in the job on
January 16, was due to watch Newcastle reserves play Sunderland on
Monday night but, when he did not turn up, it was assumed he was
either licking his wounds in the wake of the afternoon's row or had
become involved in a last-minute piece of transfer business. By
then though it seems Keegan sensed the axe was about to fall.
