All or nothing

The Magpies duly lost to Liverpool last Sunday, but typical of the farce that Newcastle United has become, it wasn't done quietly. Heading for a comfortable 2-0 defeat at Anfield, (albeit with a third goal looming) United were set to leave Merseyside without any real damage until Joey Barton, on his return, stirred up inevitable controversy.

Alan Shearer had dropped Michael Owen and brought Barton into a starting eleven that saw Obafemi Martins and Peter Lovenkrands play on either wing behind the lone striker, Mark Viduka. Barton was the most advanced of three central midfielders, with Nicky Butt and Alan Smith sitting deep. And the formation itself didn't do too badly, but regardless of tactics and instructions from the touchline, when players insist on making individual errors, the management becomes somewhat powerless.

Barton put in a decent first half, including some nice passes, but faded in the second half after being moved to the right. In the 77th minute, the frustrated midfielder needlessly lunged into Xabi Alonso in front of the Kop End. What was technically a bad tackle, turned into a moral panic as Phil Dowd immediately flashed the red card (the same referee who sent off Wayne Rooney at Fulham earlier in the season for 'aggressively throwing the ball' towards him from roughly 20 yards away; without taking into consideration that Manchester United were losing and he was stood with the free kick takers).

This was Barton's first offence and it was certainly ill-advised with his reputation but what has followed is ridiculous. Apparent fights and bust ups have resulted in Barton being allegedly ban from the club until further notice.

Surely all that had to be done was for Shearer to give a clichéd post match reaction about how 'Barton should know better by now that his reputation makes him a marked man' and to acknowledge that 'it was a bad tackle,' but with regard to the remaining fixtures, 'it's a big blow.' Give the outside world as little to go on as possible, deal with matters in house and then hope the story doesn't linger.

Now speculation mounts that Barton has played his last game for United. Which means his valuation has substantially dropped too, now everyone knows he's not even welcome at the training ground. Regardless of his previous misdemeanours, it was not the worst tackle in Premier League history; it was nothing that (say, for example,) Steven Gerrard (or, for that matter, Alan Shearer) hasn't done in the past, and it barely qualified as worthy of a straight red. The incident is just another entry into the journal of Newcastle United's farcical season. Monday can't come soon enough.