10 Most Laughable Excuses Alan Pardew Has Made At Newcastle
2. The One Where We Had 10 Senior Players Missing..."
In the same breath as blaming the local press in the wake of Newcastle's demoralising defeat to Stoke at the Britannia Stadium, Alan Pardew did what most managers do when they've got a few players out with injury: he blamed the injuries for the result, saying that the team had no fewer than 10 senior players missing. How could anyone ever have coped with that sort of grand scale injury crisis? Of course his side would lose - even Barcelona would struggle... Except, Pardew was somewhat liberal with the word Senior, because some of the players would never have got near the first team even if they were fit. French trio Sissoko, Remy and Debuchy were basically hiding waiting for the World Cup to start, Sylvain Marveaux hadn't even been considered all season, Santon was AWOL, Obertan and Sammy Ameobi were both pretty poor and Ryan Taylor had been out for almost two years. Quite who the other players were is unclear. Perhaps he meant players he wanted to sign? Or ones out on loan - again, not exactly first teamers. Whatever the case, it was something of an exaggeration.
