? Spaniard worried about former club's player exits
? 'I think Joey Barton will leave soon'
Jos� Enrique, Liverpool's new �6m left-back, has said he fears for former club Newcastle United due to the lack of ambition that has precipitated a talent drain from St James' Park.
The Spanish defender became the third major departure from Newcastle in 2011 when he accepted the opportunity to fill Liverpool's problematic full-back position last Friday. The 25-year-old was another to fall foul of the Newcastle hierarchy on Twitter this summer and claims there is a lack of direction under owner Mike Ashley, with both Andy Carroll and Kevin Nolan sold since January and their full �38m transfer fees not yet reinvested in Alan Pardew's squad.
Jos� Enrique still expects Joey Barton to join the exodus from the club before the transfer window closes, despite the midfielder returning to the fold against Arsenal last weekend, and admits he left behind a nervous dressing room on Tyneside.
"The dressing room at Newcastle is fantastic, it is amazing, 10 out of 10, but of course it is hard for the players when the best players leave," the former Villarreal defender said. "It is not settled like it is here at Liverpool and I think that is why everyone is leaving Newcastle. I think Joey Barton will leave soon and Andy Carroll left in January and it is really, really hard for Alan Pardew. You want to be as high as you can in the table but maybe Newcastle don't think the same and that is why they sell their best players and that is why everyone moves."
Newcastle fined Jos� Enrique for accusing the club's hierarchy of lying over claims they had offered to extend a contract that had only 12 months left to run. His outburst came via Twitter, and Barton's subsequent support on the social networking site led to him being made available on a free transfer, and he insists there will be no repeat at Liverpool. Jos� Enrique said: "The Twitter ban was hard and I got fined two weeks' wages but I didn't have any problems because I only had one year left on my contract and I wouldn't have cared if I had stayed for that one year. But I'm really happy here. But Twitter just gives me problems and I won't tweet again."
His concerns for the future at Newcastle extend, pointedly, only to his former team-mates and supporters. "I do worry," he said. "Not because we leave, because at some clubs good players leave. But because they have not signed another left-back, nothing. I'm worried not for the club, but more for the fans because they are amazing. They are like here, it's really similar. I have a lot of friends in the dressing room and they are a little bit nervous because they don't know what the club is going to do."
Kenny Dalglish, meanwhile, has said the government must abide by an agreement to grant full disclosure of documents relating to the Hillsborough disaster to the independent inquiry. The Cabinet Office is appealing against the independent commissioner's ruling that details of then prime minster Margaret Thatcher's discussions on the tragedy should be released to the public. Though he has supported an online petition calling for full disclosure, Dalglish, the Liverpool manager at the time 96 supporters lost their lives, said there will be no controversy providing the inquiry is given the papers.
He said: "The panel have total access, as far as I've read, to all the papers, as Andy Burnham [the former sports minister] said they would two years ago. All the government has appealed against is making that public knowledge and I don't think the most important people in the process have a problem with that. Margaret Aspinall [chair of the Hillsborough Family Support Group] seems relaxed about it. If the government give full co-operation then there's no problem. The campaign has made great progress since Andy Burnham came up here two years ago. He was as good as his word and gave the panel full access. The government has allowed them full access and there is no need for anyone to make mischief."
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2011/aug/18/newcastle-liverpool-jose-enrique
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