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TO the surprise of nobody, the deadline was again extended for the sale of the club. This ensures that it neatly equates with the closing of the transfer window, and therefore not allowing any substantial strengthening of the paper-thin squad.

The fact that Mr Moat requires all this extra time to accumulate funding doesn't inspire confidence. What is it about this club at the moment that puts off potential buyers? In recent weeks we've seen the sale of Notts County, Southampton and could add Portsmouth to that list any time soon. What is their selling point compared to ours?

Yes, they're cheaper, but can any of them match the potential earnings for investors better than us? Maybe their grounds are built on former conquering Roman Emperor's gold-encrusted holiday homes?

UPON this very Wednesday, Newcastle United will report back for a season in the Championship, God help us all.

Players are set to return to the scene of their crimes with no new owner, no manager, no skipper, no signings to inspire hope, and no sense of purpose or plan.

Desperately requiring promotion in a solitary season, the only way the Magpies will get out of the Championship right now is by dropping into League One like Leeds, unless bold and decisive action is taken damned quickly. Like this week.

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SO after nine and a half months, 37 matches, four managers, an aborted attempt to ditch the club, and a hated director of football, it all comes down to an hour and a half in England's second city.

Oh, and a similar amount of time on Humber and Wear.

The immediate future of Newcastle United, humiliated and ridiculed in equal measure, will be decided over the nation's Sunday tea.

AND so we totter bruised, battered and buffeted but ever hopeful into the last home match of a heart- pounding season.

Shock absorbers at the ready, black-and-white flags unfurled, voices soothed with cough medicine and perhaps lubricated with a pint, it is the final hurrah.

Having destroyed Middlesbrough after literally handing them a goal start, Fulham arrive to bar our way to safety.

We can see the signposts - but can we make the journey?

IT WAS just like 206 other wondrous moments painted in black-and-white across football's landscape.

Alan Shearer wheeling away, fists clenched with a grin as wide as the Tyne, celebrating a Newcastle goal.

Delighted players jumped into his arms. The Toon Army chanted "Shearer, Shearer" in deafening unison and all was right with the world.

Except Shearer hadn't scored. He hadn't a No 9 on his back, and he wasn't even on the field of play.

IT'S akin to pulling out your teeth with a pair of pliers. And just as enjoyable.

Looking for other results through the cracks in your fingers and then watching United's death throes for an hour and a half is hardly fun.

Football is supposed to be entertainment, but not in the North East it isn't.

THE fact that Alan Shearer and United should come under withering attack over a new-look disciplinary code in the wake of the Joey Barton bust-up is nothing short of absurd.

Surely discipline is the thing that has been missing more than anything during the long dark days we've all endured. Bypass that and you end up with lunatics running the asylum!

Barton and discipline have never been bedmates. He has ignored rules all his professional life and we've seen the outcome.

OH, we can start contemplating it all right. Ordering the hearse and booking the wake.

We're about to enter a period of mourning.

What else are we supposed to think?

The body of a once fine football club lies still, the life pummeled out of it by those from the south who took over and maltreated a once-healthy specimen.

Last night we almost certainly witnessed its death. Alan Shearer called it a must-win situation, but United didn't win.

JUDGEMENT Day is at hand. Within a few hours we'll know if Newcastle United have any chance of avoiding the catastrophe of relegation.

Portsmouth must be defeated at St James's Park tonight, as they were at Fratton Park, or hope will disappear across the Tyne Bridge with them.

It has been a wretched year, 2009. Not a solitary home win to pleasure faithfully loyal fans, and only one away at doomed West Brom. How the once mighty have fallen.

WHEN languishing on death row praying for a reprieve, it's natural to look anywhere in desperation to somehow find salvation. So it is this weekend as the Toon Army waits for a wrist-slashing home match with Portsmouth on Monday night.

Like it or not, United require outside help and therefore all eyes will be cast in every direction searching for a lifeline.

When humiliatingly second-bottom of the Premier League, all assistance is gratefully received.