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BREAKING NEWS:
Kevin Keegan is rumoured to have resigned from his Newcastle job after showdown talks with the club's directors on Monday.
Markets on the first Premier League boss to leave his post this season have been withdrawn by many bookies after Keegan's odds tumbled.
Keegan is reported - by the Daily Mail - to have been 'called into a 2pm meeting yesterday which club insiders described as 'very important but not related to transfer business' and it is believed a heated discussion took place, with managing director Derek Llambias making it clear they were not happy'.
Newcastle signed two players on transfer deadline day but Keegan was not thought to have been involved in signing either Xisco or Nacho Gonzalez, while the club were trying to offload Joey Barton without his consent.
They had already sold James Milner to Aston Villa despite Keegan claiming that he was not for sale. Keegan has a history of walking away from jobs - famously deciding in the bath that he would quit England - and there are strong rumours that Keegan has walked away from Newcastle again.
Skybet are already running a book on who will be Newcastle's next manager - with Dennis Wise the clear favourite.
Edited by zocoss 02 Sep `08, 6:59PM
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Keegan reports leave fans fuming
Angry Newcastle supporters have gathered at St James' Park to protest amid growing speculation manager Kevin Keegan is set to leave the club.
Chants of 'sack the board' were repeated as fans voiced their dissatisfaction at reports Keegan was set to leave or be sacked only eight months after his high-profile return to Tyneside.
Fans arrived at the ground to show their support for the man they hail as their 'Messiah' but media were forced by security guards to leave the stadium grounds as the club declined to comment on reports of Keegan's exit.
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Keegan sacked as Newcastle manager
· Spell in charge ends after less than eight months
· Role of Dennis Wise at centre of Keegan's frustrations
Newcastle United's owner may have worn a replica shirt emblazoned with 'King Kev' at Arsenal last Saturday but that failed to prevent Kevin Keegan being sacked by Mike Ashley today.
Rumours that Keegan - who refused to resign - and Newcastle had parted company began circulating in mid-morning after it became apparent that the manager had not turned up to take morning training.
It is understood that Keegan was summoned to a meeting with club officials including Derek Llambias, the managing director, early on Monday afternoon and effectively told he needed to pull his socks up in the wake of the team's 3-0 defeat at Arsenal. This in turn prompted a furious row in which Keegan, once again, expressed his frustration at Dennis Wise's control of the recruitment policy.
Newcastle's executive director, Wise is in charge of transfers but failed to deliver Keegan the specialist left-back he had been demanding all summer, let alone the "four top quality" signings he had hoped would arrive by midnight on Monday. Newcastle's only transfer activity on deadline day was the signing of Spanish striker Xisco and the loan signing of midfielder Ignacio Gonzalez.
Moreover Keegan, who returned to manage the club for a second time in January, was uneasy at both the decision to sell James Milner to Aston Villa, just days after he had claimed the England Under-21 winger would be going nowhere, and the club's delay over negotiating a new contract with Michael Owen.
Sam Allardyce's successor, who was appointed in the job on January 16, was due to watch Newcastle reserves play Sunderland on Monday night but, when he did not turn up, it was assumed he was either licking his wounds in the wake of the afternoon's row or had become involved in a last-minute piece of transfer business. By then though it seems Keegan sensed the axe was about to fall.
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Toon Army turns its anger on Ashley and the board after Newcastle boss Keegan is sacked
Newcastle supporters revealed their anger and disappointment as news of manager Kevin Keegan's sacking from St James' Park by owner Mike Ashley emerged.
They rallied to St James' Park to direct their anger at the club's board, with Keegan still appearing to have their unwavering support. Keegan returned for a second spell as Newcastle manager in January but was today reported to have parted company with the club after suggestions of a rift between him and the owner Mike Ashley.
Mike Ashley: target of the fans' fury
Frank Gilmour, of the Independent Newcastle United Supporters Association, said: 'It's an absolute farce, you cannot run a football club like this.' Keegan walked out on the club in January 1997 when he was manager, citing off-pitch interference when his first spell in charge ended in disappointment.
Gilmour said: 'This is on a par with what happened 12 years ago. I wouldn't blame Keegan for going whatsoever.' The horse-racing pundit and Newcastle supporter John McCririck called on owner Ashley to bring Alan Shearer back to the club as manager - and joked that he would fancy a role himself.
'The only way the Toon Army can unite is with Alan Shearer in charge and myself, along with the ubiquitous racing nut Terry McDermott, as his assistants,' said McCririck. 'I've always fancied being in the dugout shouting instructions and rallying the players and supporters.
'The fans on Tyneside need me. When the calls comes I am ready to serve.'
The Rev Glyn Evans, whose St Andrew's Church is just 200 yards from St James' Park, said: 'I love Keegan and if "The Messiah" has walked then, as a Christian, I am really upset.
'Someone is calling him elsewhere. There has been so much going on at the club, and he has been trying to keep it together, it has been hell for us. 'There are some people in the north-east who always felt he was a bottler when things get tough. 'I don't think so, he just goes when he thinks it is the right thing to do. 'We put up a sign outside the church saying, 'Season's Greetings - We Hope It Will Be a Good One'. Well, it hasn't been so far.'
Former England midfielder Ray Wilkins, who worked with Keegan at Fulham in the late 1990s before being succeeded as manager by his former England team-mate, believes Newcastle had little chance of attracting the highest class of players during the summer.
Keegan's anticipated exit is thought to relate to the club's transfer policy and the level of influence he has been afforded as manager. Wilkins said: 'It is very difficult for clubs outside the big four to attract players because everybody wants to go to a Champions League team.
'These guys should not move for money, it will be because they want to play against the best. 'Unfortunately with Newcastle being out of that situation now, they find themselves buying players who are just underneath the top quality. 'The finance is not really there to keep splashing and splashing.'
Edited by zocoss 03 Sep `08, 2:32AM
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