Please, someone give me a bridge to nowhere...at least then we'll have a direction.

With Newcastle quickly becoming one of my least favorite professional sports teams, due to the purely insepid behavior of each of its various divisions (owner, board, players, even supporters at times)(example, example, shocking example), it was really refreshing to turn on the last twenty minutes of the Chelsea-Man Utd match this evening. This is football the way it should be played and every once in a while I am reminded of the fact that the club I support is really only there to either A) act as a pawn in the much larger drama played out by the top clubs or B) make me and every Geordie miserable as retribution for our various sins or character flaws. It's a punishment sent to me by a higher being.

Watching Solomon Kalou come on as a substitute in the 75th minute then put away the tying goal in the 80th made me remember the good ol' days, just less than a month ago, when we were scoffing at even the THOUGHT of buying a player like Kalou - he's on Chelsea's BENCH for Christ sake - why would he be good enough for KING KEV'S ARMY??? Now there's no King Kev, no army to speak of, and Kalou would easily be the best player on our half of the ball.

It's distressing for me, watching a club full of very highly paid grown adults, play a game that we all love, but playing it with such disdain for the current situation and such lack of spirit. I most certainly feel for the players and I fully understand that crap that happens off the field can quickly manifest into on-field crap. But times like these are when heroes are born. If King Kev was the leader, and he left, and the interim manager doesn't want to grow a pair and fill in for the emotional beacon of the team, then one of these players (ehem - Captain Michael Owen?) HAS to step up to lead.

It's just sad seeing such a great club become such a public announcement for how NOT act as a football club - at EVERY level.