Jürgen Klopp hopes his decision to
remain at Liverpool until 2026 helps to
convince Mohamed Salah and Sadio
Mané to extend their contracts but has
said it will not be the decisive factor in
determining their futures.
Salah, 29, and Mané, 30, are nearing
the final year of their existing contracts.
The signature of Klopp, who agreed on
Thursday to extend by two years hisKlopp: I hope my deal makes Salah and Mané want to stay on
Paul Joyce
Northern Football Correspondentstay at Anfield, offers the club and their
players continuity and stability.
Klopp, whose side face Newcastle
United at 12.30pm today, wants Salah
and Mané to sign up for that journey
and hopes knowing the direction in
which the club are travelling helps.
“That is a question for the boys, what
it means for them. My relationship with
them is great,” Klopp said. “There are
more important things to think about,
not only who is the manager. But know-
ing who the manager is is important
because you know what you have.“I think everything is clear in this
moment. If it is a positive sign for the
boys, great, but I don’t think this will be
the one decisive thing for whatever
decision they want to make. It is their
own life but we just wanted to guaran-
tee that everyone who wants to be here
knows what he can expect.”
Discussions with Salah, who was
named footballer of the year by the
Football Writers’ Association, have
become drawn out. Liverpool’s strong
relationship with Mané’s representa-
tives means the club are in dialogue.Roberto Firmino, who is out injured
today, Naby Keita and Alex Oxlade-
Chamberlain are also out of contract in- Divock Origi and James Milner’s
deals expire this summer.
The travails of Philippe Coutinho,
who pushed to join Barcelona in Janu-
ary 2019 and is now on loan at Aston
Villa, highlights the risk of stepping
away from Liverpool.
“Philippe was the last one [we sold
but did not want to],” Klopp said. “That
is another message. We don’t want to
rest here [with squad growth].”
Mohamed Salah has been named
the Football Writers’ Association
footballer of the year for the second
time. Salah, who also won in 2018,
got 48 per cent of the vote, ahead of
Manchester City’s Kevin De Bruyne
and Declan Rice, of West Ham
United. The Chelsea forward Sam
Kerr took the women’s award.Egyptian wins award
Newcastle]. He didn’t. He came in
with novices, his gambling friends and
others, and then when he brought
[Dennis] Wise up [as executive
director of football], who had a
history with our fans, it went wrong
from that day, then it got worse and
worse and he sold in his time.”
On Ashley’s long-claimed lack of
due diligence when buying the club,
and being unaware of a £50 million
loan to rebuild the stadium that had
to be repaid, he says: “No, no, no, he
was told there was a mortgage.
“That’s what he says [that he was
unaware]. His team were told and
they went through the accounts. We
had a mortgage like any other
business. He could afford to pay it off
but we basically couldn’t afford the
money. We had to take a mortgage on
it. I saw that, I thought, ‘You stupid
bugger.’ You had the accounts and
everything. He knew. It was up to
him. I saw that comment.”St James’ Park sold out for almost
every match, fellow dog-walkers often
ask him if he can get them a ticket.
He has a box at the stadium but it was
only Hall and his grandson who went
regularly by the time the Ashley era
was coming to an end. Now he has to
book a place.
“In the past few years my grandson
kept going and the rest couldn’t be
bothered,” he says. “I’ve been trying
to fill it. Suddenly it’s the place to be. I
got a call, ‘Grandad, I hope you don’t
mind but the box is full.’ I said, ‘What
do you mean?’ They said, ‘We’re
bringing our friends.’ I said, ‘You can
get stuffed.’ ”
There is no sympathy for Ashley
either. “He came with the best intent
but, like me, he didn’t know how to
run a football club at the beginning,”
Hall says. “I was lucky to find Freddie
Fletcher [who moved from Rangers to
become chief executive] and I had
people from the brewery [Scottish &have the richest backer [Crown
Prince Mohammed bin Salman,
chairman of the PIF], but that’s
not to say he is going to pour the
money into the club.”
The former property
developer is more
aware than most of a
mood change in the
city we are driving
through, similar to
the one that he
and Keegan
effected in 1992,
when he
became the
club’s owner.
He walks his
two labradors
twice a day
through Swalwell
Park in
Gateshead, which
their family home
backs on to. WithS
ir John Hall leans forward in
the passenger seat of my car
and points animatedly. “Left
here, left here, this way’s
quicker.” I do as he says and
turn left. To our right is the Tyne
Bridge — “What a state that’s in,” he
says — and then we drop down to
cross the river on Newcastle’s Swing
Bridge as he is on his way to lunch.
The instructions do not end.
Hall is 89, although you would
never guess it. Still energetic and
sharp, the stories he retells over the
course of three hours give an insight
into the long road he took from
Ashington — as an eight-year-old he
rode the No 3 bus with George, his
miner father, and the entire family to
matches at St James’ Park — to
becoming the Newcastle United
owner during their most celebrated
period since the 1950s, when Kevin
Keegan’s side almost became
champions of England in 1996.
Hall confidently predicts that
Newcastle will go one better and win
the Premier League given that the
club now have the financial power of
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment
Fund (PIF) coursing through their
veins since the takeover in November
last year.
He issues a warning, though, that it
will take time for Newcastle to get in
the top four and that they must not
make the same mistakes as Mike
Ashley, whom he called a “stupid
bugger” for not getting the right
team behind him after the retail
entrepreneur bought
Newcastle for £133 million from
himself and Freddy Shepherd
in 2007.
“In five years,
Newcastle can
challenge
Manchester City
and Liverpool,” he
says. “They have to
get the team to
challenge and
after that you can
go past them. In
my mind there is
no argument about
that. The new
owners haven’t
come in to fail.
Amanda [Staveley]
and her team have
got that will. We‘Ashley was stupid but Saudis won’t fail’
Ashley, who had made £929 million
from the flotation of Sports Direct,
wanted to buy the club so desperately
that he completed the takeover, with
a team of lawyers, in three days, while
Hall was in London on other
business. Hall, despite being a life-
long Newcastle fan, was far more
reluctant.
He went to work in the colliery as a
surveyor after he left school. He went
on to develop property in Sunderland
and was the driving force behind the
Metro Centre in Gateshead, one of
the first out-of-town shopping centres
in Europe, which was eventually sold
for £272 million.
“One day, I was sitting in a second-
hand Portakabin on a rainy Friday
afternoon and we couldn’t get on with
the construction of the Metro
Centre,” he says. “I’m all morose and
who walks in but Bob Cass [a North
East football journalist].
“He said, ‘You’ve got to do
something for Newcastle.’ I said, ‘Bob,
bugger off. I’m not interested.’ He
pulled out a bottle of whisky,
and I’m not a whisky
drinker, but he kept
pouring it and I became
maudlin. I said, ‘I’ll tell
you what, Bob, I don’t
want to own the club
but I’ll be the catalyst.
Here’s half a million
quid on the table,
guaranteed.”
It ended up costing him
£10 million to gain control
after a bitter boardroom battle,
but after surviving relegation on the
final day of the 1991-92 season, and
with Keegan as manager, Newcastle
took off, gained promotion to the
Premier League and three years later
almost won it, finishing runners-up.
“Keegan understood the fans more
than anybody,” Hall says. “He had this
rapport. Beating Barcelona and
beating Man United 5-0 were the
highlight games.
“What anyone running Newcastle
will find out is that people live their
lives through the club. You have a
responsibility. Football is so much
part of the culture. When Newcastle
played at home when I was young,
everything stopped. The No 3 service
went from Newbiggin to Ashington to
North Seaton to Bedlington and on
the old road to Newcastle. One sister
got on at Newbiggin, the next at
Ashington, and so on.”
Although he changed the direction
of the city’s football club, he would
not get involved if he had his time
again. “I still stand by that, yes, yes,”
he says. “I did what I could to help. I
had to make it successful but if I had
my time again I wouldn’t get in, no. It
takes over your life.”
We have reached his favourite
restaurant. “Just pull over here,” he
instructs. It is time for lunch.Ex-Newcastle chairman
Sir John Hall, 89, tells
Martin Hardy
why it will take
five years for club
to vie for title
Hall with Keegan, left, and Terry McDermott during a trip to Lapland in 1996 and, below, reminiscing at his Gateshead homeIAN HORROCKS FOR THE TIMES; OWEN HUMPHREYS/PA8 1GS Saturday April 30 2022 | the timesSport Football
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