Meeting Steve McClaren's Newcastle Backroom Staff - Everything You Need To Know

Newcastle United do not do things the conventional way, that's for certain. Not only was Steve McClaren's appointment as the club's new head coach one of the worst-kept secrets in Premier League history, but then his unveiling was restricted to just the "preferred media partners". For the first time ever, the Newcastle-based Chronicle were not at the unveiling of a Magpies boss. Undeterred by the resultant criticism, and determined to continue their own stubbornness to only release information when it suits them, Newcastle then took a full week to confirm the makeup of McClaren's backroom staff. One of McClaren's assistants, Ian Cathro, agreed to join the backroom staff last week - and even did a few interviews in which he confirmed that he had accepted the position just after the weekend - yet Newcastle did not confirm him then. In fact, the majority of the Newcastle playing squad reconvened at the club's Benton base for pre-season training and, on the Magpies' official site, pictures of them were released - carefully positioned not to show any of the coaching team except McClaren though. It actually took until Thursday evening for McClaren "himself", in a bizarre email, to "introduce" his coaching team to Newcastle supporters. Despite briefly introducing Cathro, Paul Simpson, Alessandro Schoenmaker, Steve Black and Andy Woodman via this email, McClaren did little to explain exactly who they are. What are their backgrounds? What are their strengths? And what will they offer the Magpies? Well, here is an introduction to each and every member of Steve McClaren's Newcastle United backroom team...