Joey Barton To Be Released On Free Transfer Over Twitter Farrago – Mike Ashley Drops A Bollock Once Again

Chris Wright

2nd, August 2011

18 Comments

By Chris Wright

Coming about a week after Jose Enrique accused owner Mike Ashley and managing director Derek Llambias of a lack of balls and lying about a new contract offer, Joey Barton was tweeted his way into a transfer-listing at Newcastle.

More accurately, Barton has been made available on a free transfer, with the Toon board simply running out of patience with his incessant need to tweet every single gripe he has with the club’s hierarchy over a summer of botched transfers and contract re-negotiations.

Apparently, this ‘ere is the batch of Barton tweets responsible for Ashley pushing the big red ‘JETTISON’ button on the St James Park control panel…

Yep, that’s it. Nothing more ‘incendiary’ than a little mild narkiness and what sounds like the threat of a tell-all chapter in Barton’s autobiography as and when the time comes.

Just bung him a few extra quid and get your most influential player – who, we might add, genuinely seems to enjoy playing for Newcastle – back on board for next season, right? Wrong…

Toon released a brief statement last night:

“Newcastle United can confirm that Joey Barton has been placed on the transfer list today. The player has been advised that he can leave the club on a free transfer.”

Barton then responded thusly, tweeting:

“Somewhere in those high echelons of NUFC, they have decided, I am persona non grata.

“I am on a free but the honour of wearing those B+W stripes, surpasses that.

“One day the board might realise, what the shirt signifies. HONOUR and PRIDE. Thanks for your continued support……….. #toonarmy.”

Newcastle had been hoping to offload Barton this summer with his contract dwindling to nothing next summer, but apparently no-one was prepared to do business at the ramped-up prices that Ashley and Llambias were touting their wares.

However, since the kerfuffle broke out yesterday afternoon and the asking price was publicly reduced to big fat nada, Barton’s agent Willie McKay has claimed to have been ‘inundated’ with offers for his client’s services – thoroughly unsurprising given his consistently impressive performances last year.

Indeed, the more we hear, the more we reckon Mike Ashley hasn’t really got this ‘business’ thing completely sussed out yet.

Posted in Newcastle Utd, Transfers & Rumours

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18 Comments

  1. Davy says:

    It’s a fookin joke!!!

  2. Stepehn Fry says:

    The guy is a prick and I’m very impressed with the action Newcastle have taken. Seriously, why do people feel the need to tell the world about their problems on Twitter, he might have a point but keep it between you and the club for fucks sake.

  3. Dont worry says:

    this guy is funny as hell, keep it up joe

  4. Anonymous says:

    Wow another terrible view point from you Chris. Barton has regularly been a bad professional. His rap sheet speaks for itself and after been given another chance at being a professional football player he comes out on twitter and basically calls the clubs owner a dick. This isn’t the first time he has done this on twitter also. Releasing him was stupid, should of at least sold him and got some. Regardless of his view, and it having some validation, you don’t go onto a social networking site where thousands of people can see him bash the club. Anyone else would be fired in the same position if they said how shit their boss is at a job on twitter so he deserves no different.

  5. Steve says:

    I have some sympathy for views no. 2 & 4. Except that this is Newcastle United, a club run by complete cretins. Every decision they have taken over the past 4 years has proved to be 100% wrong and if they don’t know they’re heading for relegation, perhaps they need Barton to tell them.

  6. Chris says:

    @Anonymous: ‘Terrible’ = ‘different to yours’, right?

    We all know that Premier League footballers exist on a different plane to us mere mortals – need I remind you that, not so very long ago, Ashley Cole not only bought a gun to work but actually SHOT one of his colleagues only to go almost completely unpunished.

    Admittedly, Barton is or at least ‘was’ an odious little shite but it matters not in his line of work. A rap sheet as long as your arm and an actual bona fide prison sentence won’t prevent him from finding work as long as his footballing merits continue to outshine his checkered private life.

    As for Twitter: whereas I’m not condoning his conduct, playing to the gallery with continued gobshite-ery seems to be part of the deal with Barton MKII – the voice of the downtrodden masses of NUFC fans.

    Ashley could’ve either ignored him or taken his criticisms (heaven forbid, maybe even LISTEN to them) on the chin and continue to employ an influential Premier League standard midfielder at his football club – but instead he chose to sulk, effectively throw Joey out of the club for calling him names and, what’s more, gift-wrap him for one of Toon’s top-flight rivals.

    Hardly the actions of a savvy businessman.

  7. I would love to see him as a replacement for Modric at Spurs. The prospect of him and Sandro terrorizing the middle of the pitch is quite enticing and his dead-ball skills would prove handy as well.

  8. Mitch K says:

    Persona non grata? This is Joey Barton typing this? I don’t know what to think of him being shown the door; I could imagine all of these little sympathy tweets and whatnot being a pain in the arse for the people at the top, and you don’t know what’s going on behind closed doors. He definitely seems to believe he’s gods gift to football/the world.

    To be honest though I am biased against him – he might be an OK footballer, but I’ve got no respect for him after all he’s been involved with off the pitch.

  9. Mitch K says:

    Just noticed this too, he tweets this:

    I wont be commenting on situation at Newcastle again, as I feel it helps nobody and serves no purpose. Hope u all understand

    Then goes on to tweet 6 times about Newcastle. He just can’t keep his mouth shut!

  10. Stepehn Fry says:

    Ashley didn’t sulk, he just didn’t want to bow down to a scumbag’s opinion which none of us know whether is correct or not. Ashley might be a complete dick as well but he happens to own Newcastle United and in any profession if an employee publicly insults you and the way you run your business then you should expect the worse.

    The guy’s a scumbag, always has been and always will be and the way he writes on his Twitter sucking up to the fans and at the same time making out he’s an innocent victim just makes me hate him even more.

    The thing that annoys me is that Barton happens to be a good player and clubs these days have absolutely no morals what so ever so he will have a host of teams willing to take him.

  11. Red Devilish says:

    Couldn’t agree more. It’s well known that NUFC did not win a single game that Barton was not a part of last season so it’s unbelieveable they would let him go when they need him so much, and for free?! They already lost their captain to a championship team, even if it is West Ham. Ashley is a bad a running a team as he is good at being a useless pig.

  12. Michael D says:

    Its saying something when Joey Barton actually looks like the sympathetic victim here…and while his past has shown him to be a temperamental twit, he does seem to have matured over the past couple of years and quite honestly, it seems he’s been playing his best football and as Chris noted seems to enjoy playing for Newcastle. But Mike Ashley has proven again this is merely a device for him to make money, though in this case its hard to figure out exactly how he’s going to do that with these latest episodes. My oh my, how the mighty have truly fallen, Newcastle used to actually be a club of note

  13. newcassel says:

    Hadaway and shite
    Fat Ashley has nowhere to go with Joey. Can’t keep him, he’s a cancer.
    Could have tried to get a couple of million for him but that’s peanuts to Ashley. Get rid as fast as he can and show him who’s the boss man
    Footballers pull all the strings these days, bosses can’t do nowt when they decide they want to go

  14. Chris says:

    Who knows how long Barton has been working on everybody’s last nerve? And how devisive he may be in the dressing room, in the board room, everywhere he goes? May just be a last straw situation – as good a reason as any to get rid which they’ve probably been wanting to do for years…Stupid on both sides.

  15. says:

    Lets hope the hammers pick him up so he can play with his favorite player, Scott Parker

  16. wolfinho says:

    nice!!! goodbye NUFC, hello MUFC!

  17. :) says:

    come and join nolan! ;)

  18. Kevin says:

    nice on Joey

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