10 Players Newcastle Still Need To Get Rid Of

By Michael Ramsay /

7. Rob Elliot

If one game sums up Rob Elliot€™s career, it€™s the MOTM performance he gave at St. Mary€™s last season, when he repelled effort after effort. The likes of Adam Lallana and Jay Rodriguez were thwarted on multiple occasions, and the showing was reminiscent of a young Shay Given in his pomp. However, a goalkeeper€™s job is to stop the ball flying past him, and the difference between the two Irishmen is that Southampton still plundered four past Elliot. The statistics do not stand Elliot in good stead: he has played 12 times for the club, and one of them was the demoralising 6-0 home defeat to a Suarez-less Liverpool side in 2013. And with the Republic of Ireland hardly spoilt for choice in the goalkeeping department following Given's retirement, it speaks volumes that the former Bishop's Stortford goalie has just the one cap to his name. Elliot is not, nor has he ever been, a Premier League standard goalkeeper. Indeed, when he was poached from Charlton Athletic for £100,000 in 2011, the London outfit were languishing in the third tier of English football. A cheap option at the time from Ashley, but if Tim Krul is to exit this summer, then a season with Elliot between the sticks isn€™t even worth contemplating.