Put yourself in Newcastle Manager Sam Allardyce’s rather large shoes; his star striker Michael Owen has sustained more injuries than most of us have had hot dinners, and to make matters worse little Mickey always manages to get crippled whilst playing for England. Rumblings of discontent amongst the St James faithful were already focussing on the fact that Owen seemed to prefer playing for England, and the fact that he got injured for the umpteenth time whilst on international duty will have Allardyce tearing his hair out.
Big Sam voiced his annoyance with this injury japery saying:
“I don’t like having a go at Steve because he’s a mate of mine but I just didn’t see the need to pick Michael against Austria. It wasn’t a question of assessing the lad’s fitness because he had proved himself playing for Newcastle. Michael had fully recovered from his hernia after missing only one match and had really worked hard building up his fitness. But now this is something entirely new — an injury that couldn’t have come at a worse time for Newcastle or England.”
Yep, that’s right folks, another perfect example of why Steve McClaren is such a glorious manager – picking his main goalscoring threat in a pointless game and watching him succumb to injury and miss a do-or-die game the week after. Genius, sheer genius. Steve McClaren – we salute you!