Alan Shearer and the Newcastle United years - 1999/2000 nufc
Alan Shearer and the Newcastle United years – 1999/2000On 19 September 1999 the fans inside St James’ Park were in jubilant mood. A packed house was eagerly awaiting the home debut of new manager Bobby Robson.
Lee had joined the club in 1992 from Charlton Athletic, famously persuaded by Kevin Keegan to choose Newcastle over Middlesbrough as it was ‘closer’ to London and Lee had been a fantastic servant. However, that seemingly counted for nothing with Gullit, who stripped Lee of the captaincy and his number seven shirt, giving it to new signing Dyer.
Things wouldn’t get much better in the following two games with Gullit’s side losing back-to-back games away at Tottenham Hotspur and Southampton, with Shearer scoring his first goal of the season with a penalty in the 4-2 defeat at The Dell. “We were at the old training ground at Durham Cricket Club, and I was in the room with Steve Clarke and Ruud. All of a sudden, he started talking about what the team was going to be against Sunderland. “I said ‘sorry Ruud, what did you say there?’. He said he was going to leave out Alan and Duncan, and this was going to be the team. I said ‘do you know how important this game is?’.
“I talked about it being a motivation for the opposition. Reidy was the manager at the time, so I said ‘this will be a motivation for Peter when he sees that Alan Shearer and Duncan Ferguson are not on the teamsheet’. “But he had no concerns whatsoever. Shearer’s thoughts at this stage of the game would have been fascinating. Just over three years after his triumphant return to his hometown club, in a blaze of glory and with a world record transfer to boot, his career at the club now looked to be on the brink.
“Run the other way, run towards goal – that’s what defenders don’t like. It was just that tiny bit of advice and he said if you do that, you’ll create more space for our midfielders and you’ll get more balls into the box by doing so.
From there Robson achieved significant success abroad, winning two league titles in the Netherlands with PSV Eindhoven, before winning two more with FC Porto. This impressive record led him to the Nou Camp and Barcelona where he would win a treble, picking up winner’s medals in the Copa Del Rey, Spanish Super Cup and European Cup Winners Cup.
Starting with a 1-1 draw away at Tottenham, Robson’s Newcastle produced a performance reminiscent of the best day’s of Kevin Keegan’s time at the club in the replay with goals from Speed, Dabizas, Ferguson andputting the team 4-1 up before Shearer added two late goals to put the gloss on a thumping victory.
Newcastle would face Chelsea in the semi-final, and they were hoping to give a much greater account of themselves than they had in limp defeats against Arsenal and Manchester United.
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