The aircraft touches down at lunchtime every day. Dwarfing the charter planes and inter-city shuttles dotted across the Tarmac, the 777 looks somehow out of proportion, its giant wingspan making everything around it resemble scaled-down toys.
In the eight years since Emirates began a direct Newcastle-Dubai service offering numerous onward connections to Asia, Africa and Australasia hundreds of millions of pounds worth of cargo have been exported from north-east England and passenger demand has grown to the point where there is talk about a second daily flight.
As hundreds of passengers arriving from the Middle East, India, China and beyond troop towards baggage reclaim they pass a collage of photographs of jubilant Newcastle United footballers celebrating goals at St James’ Park.
For the majority of the eight years since Mike Ashley bought out Sir John Hall and Freddy Shepherd and took complete control of the club, many Newcastle fans have dreamed of a benevolent billionaire from the Gulf – or perhaps somewhere further east – striding past those pictures with a knowing smile before stepping into a waiting car.
In this fantasy he steps out six miles down the road, blank cheque in hand, leaving the driver to hoist a flag high above the Gallowgate End. With Ashley ousted all that will remain is for the new owner’s public relations team to reveal spending plans intended to facilitate a Champions League challenge along with the latest details of the hunt for a new manager. What’s that Klopp chap’s first name again?
Quite apart from the minor details that any deal would almost certainly be sealed in London and the new owner could equally well arrive from Russia, Israel, Azerbaijan or the United States (expect a few rumours to surface when a daily Newcastle-New York flight starts next month) the biggest problem with this daydream is that there is no indication that anyone, anywhere actually wants to buy Newcastle. Or that Ashley is inclined to sell up right now.
The swaths of empty seats at St James’ Park on Sunday as John Carver’s team sunk to their sixth straight defeat and Tottenham cantered to a 3-1 win certainly made a point but Newcastle’s owner is unlikely to be swayed by this show of disgruntlement with his stewardship of the club.
Ashley’s failure to invest earlier in what is now an alarmingly slender and injury-ravaged squad has been exacerbated by Newcastle’s recent announcement of £18.7m profits in addition to the presence of £34m cashflow reserves but the owner has reason to remain confident he will get away with it.
While relegation remains a potentially calamitous risk, the team’s total of 35 points and theoretically “winnable” impending fixtures dictate it is still a relatively remote threat.
Then there are the restless natives. Although Sunday’s official attendance of just over 47,000 was inflated from somewhere nearer 40,000 by the inclusion of all season ticket holders regardless of whether they turned up, it was still the Premier League’s biggest crowd of the weekend.
Much as Ashley likes to see St James’ filled to its customary 52,000 capacity the reality was that the boycott had a limited impact and emphasised a division among Newcastle fans, the vast majority of whom opted against voting with their feet. A near empty ground – or one with a sub-25,000 attendance – would represent an incredibly powerful statement but few would bet on it happening in the coming weeks.
The same goes for club merchandise. When supporters stop wearing Wonga-branded replica shirts even a hierarchy as brass-necked as Newcastle’s may finally sit up and take notice. Starting a protest movement is one thing, sustaining and extending it quite another.
It might be different if there were a credible alternative, if a wealthy charismatic figure anxious to seize control from Ashley had emerged. Instead this is a mooted fans’ revolution without a figurehead.
Aware that leaderless revolutions are invariably doomed the sports retail tycoon has, albeit unintentionally, succeeded in dividing and ruling. Expect the arguments between those Newcastle fans who believe in boycotting games and those loyalists anxious to support the team not the regime to intensify in the runup to Saturday’s vital home match against Swansea.
Without a focal point – or figure – for their protests the boycotts seem set to go nowhere in particular. Ashley probably expects to fade away if and when Steve McClaren is unveiled as the new manager and he announces the signing of up to six new players this summer.
The riches offered by the latest television deal mean the owner can afford to loosen the purse strings without really denting his fortune and a good start to next season could conceivably see the current angst all but forgotten.
Yet until someone credible emerges on the horizon to buy Newcastle, – and as Randy Lerner has discovered at Aston Villa the enduring repercussions of the credit crunch are such that such figures remain elusive – the signs are that Ashley will continue to do the bare minimum to sustain Newcastle as a mid-table Premier League club. What really matters to him is its function as a marketing vehicle for Sports Direct’s growing international merchandising operations.
When the time comes to sell – at some, unspecified, point after the summer of 2016 he has stated – the purchasers are likely to be asked to fund the £129m interest-free loan Ashley has handed Newcastle and to pay at least £250m for the club.
If identifying someone suitably credit-worthy – and remember the rule of thumb in these situations is that purchasers rarely invest more than 10% of their total capital in such ventures – is one problem, their motives represent another entirely.
One day in the next few years a regime changer will surely step off one plane or another at Newcastle airport. That person will almost certainly be welcomed with open arms – but then so was Ashley when he swept the Hall/Shepherd axis aside.
Tynesiders are fully justified in feeling betrayed by the coldly cynical management of their club but sometimes one has to be careful what one wishes for. Goodness knows to whom Ashley may eventually sell Newcastle … but no one should bet on the new owners necessarily having Pep Guardiola – or even Jürgen Klopp – on speed dial.
