Gerry Francis Rejects Newcastle

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[And just to note (as I did in an earlier blog post), it's a decade to the day - October 16, 1998 - since Gerry Francis returned to QPR for his second stint as QPR manager]


Evening Chronicle/Lee Ryder - Gerry Francis says no to NUFC coaching role
GERRY FRANCIS will not be coming to St James’s Park as coach.
Newcastle United interim manager Joe Kinnear had wanted the experienced former Premier League manager to help bolster his paper-thin coaching roster.
But the Chronicle can confirm that Kinnear held unsuccessful talks with the former Tottenham Hotspur and QPR boss, who was put off by the uncertainty hovering above St James’s Park.
And the ex-England international did not want to jeopardise his current coaching role at Stoke City.
Kinnear told the Chronicle: “A lot of it has been blown out of proportion.
“I was surprised to see it all over the TV. We had a casual chat about things.
“He is already doing two days a week at Stoke.
“Gerry doesn’t want to be involved with football on match days.”
Kinnear also admitted the current restraints at the club mean he can offer no guarantees when it comes to attracting any other potential coaches.
He added: “It was a difficult one for Gerry because I can’t give him a contract in any form or way. I think he has one at Stoke.
“So he doesn’t want to burn his bridges.
“If something happens here in the next month and the club is sold, he knows that if the new people come in and don’t want you that is the end of it.
“I told him that and he had to know that before he came in.
“In theory, it wasn’t worth his while to leave his job at Stoke.
“The job there is more permanent.
“He was very interested, but there was no contract and certainly nobody is getting any contracts at the moment.
“Nobody knows how long anybody is going to be here at the moment – and that includes me.” News