Bristol City 4-1 Newcastle

&c

Newcastle lost 4-1 at Ashton Gate on Wednesday night in a game reminiscent of the famous 6-1 Leyton Orient reverse.

However, the story of this game isn't about the result, or the performance, or even the confirmation that our captain is intending to jump ship when the going gets tough.

No, the story of this game is the story of Eddie Howe's last game as manager of Newcastle United.

Had he gone at the end of last season there would have been little surprise, and apparently he considered this but was persuaded to remain in charge by the hierarchy.

Assuming this to be true, if he really has got no more to give, then this is the next best scenario - rather than running out of steam weeks or months into the new season.

It seems likely that the straw that broken the camel's back was the impending sale of Guimaraes to Arsenal, Eddie potentially feeling he's on a hiding to nothing trying to replicate his previous success after his team has been gutted and fleshed out with high potential kids.

I heard the news 24 hours after visiting the Kevin Keegan shrine at St James' Park.

I'm not sure that's relevant, but it somehow felt fitting that the first manager to win a domestic trophy in 70 years has left the building in tandem with the man who laid the foundations for the club as it stands today.

Less the end of an era, more the end of an epoch, and a chance (or rather a pressing need) for the club to decide what it wants to be, and indeed what it can be in the world of SCR.

Not holding an advanced accounting degree, I don't fully understand the implications of SCR, though my limited understanding is that it's even more restrictive for us as a club than PSR was.

Something to do with wages and not being able to bank a load of big sales in one window - something we're in line to do this summer, naturally.

It does tally with our new strategy of bringing in younger players on lower wages though - no longer trying to find the Guimaraes, Tonalis and Isaks of the world, those almost top class players with something putting other top clubs off, but those one or two levels below.

The Steurs, the Bambas, the Toures.

It's risky, of course, but we've shown we simply cannot compete with the stockpiling of the Sky 6, or increasingly Villa (see Manzambi, quoted in some corners as another reason for Howe's ultimate decision to leave).

And this new strategy has expanded to the touchline, with German manager Matthias Jaissle coming in from PIF owned Al-Ahli (following a torturous wait to conclude a deal with ourselves that doesn't do anything to allay fears about the glacial pace of Saudi decision making).

Initial reservations about plucking a manager from the PIF stable have been somewhat replaced by excitement at the new man's achievements so far - a serial trophy winner in his young career, one which started at Red Bull Salzburg, a club who are obviously no stranger to the concept of buying, developing and selling young players.

To that end, it's starting to feel like there actually is a coherent plan in place, backed up by CEO David Hopkinson coming out with bullish quotes about "Newcastle 2.

0".

We have much work to be done in the transfer market - my kingdom for a right back - but before whatever this brave new club brings us, it's time to pay tribute to two of the most important figures in the club's modern history.

Two men that perhaps bookended "Newcastle 1.

0".

Most of the eulogies around King Kev - who died tragically before he could return to St James' Park - have glossed over his return as manager in 2008.

They prefer to point out, rightfully, how he ignited the city as well as the club as a player in the 80s and as manager in the 90s.

I want to examine an alternative timeline, in which the same could have happened in the late noughties.

When KK was confirmed as returning, I was getting ready to head into town for the FA Cup replay against Stoke City, then of the Championship.

We'd battled to a grim 1-1 draw there the week previously under Sam Allardyce.

Mike Ashley, our minted new owner, was a wildcard, buying the club for a laugh and to give the big boys a bloody nose.

And then he brought Keegan back.

The one man who knew more than anything about giving the big boys a bloody nose.

I fair flew to St James' Park that night.

The feeling on the Metro and in the City that night was that anything was possible again.

That we were back.

We battered Stoke 4-1 with KK in the crowd (despite an early Emre red card) and I honestly believed that the old magic had been recaptured.

The dearth of quality in the squad at that time told, and KK went winless for a while after being officially confirmed as manager, but he proved the doubters wrong with a tactical switch to a 4-3-3 towards the end of the season that had us playing good football.

Mike Ashley then committed an utterly unforgivable crime of undermining King Kev, bringing in the poison dwarf as Director of Football and foisting players on him (Xisco and Nacho Gonzalez going down in SJP infamy).

The rest is history - the history that Mike Ashley deserved for not understanding KK - and heartbreak, years in the doldrums, and bitter recriminations followed.

And I still think about what could have been.

Which brings us on to Eddie Howe's Trophy Winning Mags.

KK, Bobby Robson, and let's be honest, a bunch of absolute dross before, after and in between them, did everything but win a trophy.

It was the one thing that eluded us, that came to define us, that was our very identity as a club and as supporters.

The side that Eddie Howe built wasn't always as balletic as the sides KK and Sir Bobby built (though those sides had their fair share of battering rams), but it had something else, a steel running through the heart of the team, a feeling that this team would do anything to win.

And then Eddie saved us from relegation and got us to a Cup Final.

Could this time be different? Obviously not, the occasion got to us and we folded, our classic bad luck striking with Nick Pope getting a mad red card in the game before the final and Dubravka out on loan at opponents Man United - you couldn't make it up.

That left Loris Karius in goal and a familiar sinking feeling at another Wembley defeat.

Oh well, we got to a final and we're never going to win anything anyway, we'll focus on the league.

This got us into the Champions League and one of the greatest nights in the club's history, as we sent Kylian Mbappe's PSG packing 4-1 at the most raucous St James' Park in living memory.

This was all done with a highly skilled team, but one whose beating heart was pre-takeover players and local lads like Dan Burn (scorer on the night) and fans like Jacob Murphy.

And then something else happened.

Two years after the Man United defeat, we got to the final again - beating the top four league sides along the way, including an unbelievable 4-0 aggregate dismantling of Arsenal.

Of course we got the unbeatable Liverpool in the final, and of course we lost our left flank just before the game, Gordon to suspension and Hall to a broken foot.

And of course we don't win things.

Except we had Eddie Howe, and the team he had built for this exact moment.

For the first time in my lifetime, we went to Wembley and actually showed up.

That was all I had wanted, but as we got into Liverpool and absolutely dominated, it became clear that we weren't just there to take part.

Goals from local hero Big Dan Burn - called up to the England squad for the first time in the hours before the game - and somebody else saw us do the unthinkable, and actually win a trophy.

In one fell swoop, everything it meant to be a Newcastle fan was upended.

It's something I honestly, legitimately never thought I'd see, and thanks to Eddie Howe, I know what it's like to support a team that's won something (with all due respect to the Glen Roeder, Scott Parker and the InterToto Cup).

Online sentiment towards Eddie has been appallingly ungrateful in my opinion, and for all that he did have his flaws (stock substitutions, playing favourites), this is a man who planted himself right in the heart of the city, understood the club as well as anybody who was ever a part of it, and worked himself half to death to win us an honest to god trophy.

Ideas of how to correctly honour KK have been bandied about in the days since his death.

May I put forward my (only slightly tongue in cheek) humble suggestion of an Eddie Howe statue outside of St Keegan's Park?.