Ne change pas une équipe qui gagne.
The well-known French saying directly translates to: One does not change a winning team. Or, similarly, if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.
It’s fitting that a saying originating in France can be aptly used to describe the French revolution that has been underway at Newcastle United for the past couple of years.
For Robespierre, see Graham Carr. For Napoleon, see Alan Pardew.
Newcastle has collected 30 points this season and find themselves in sixth place, just below the Champions League zone and ahead of the likes of Manchester United and early-season swashbucklers Southampton.
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To say most of the Magpies’ recent successes and failures have been a result of a few Frenchmen would be an understatement. In fact, it would be putting it lightly.
There are 11 French players currently in manager Alan Pardew’s squad and Newcastle have only had one non-Frenchman – Welsh defender Paul Dummett – find the back of the net this campaign.
Head scout Graham Carr’s brave – yes, brave – transfer policy has seen the Tyneside club look across the channel for new imports. Carr arrived at the club in February 2010, when Newcastle was languishing in the Championship.
Years of doling out high wages (for their relative size) on the likes of Michael Owen and Xisco only to see no end product had taken its toll on controversial owner Mike Ashley. The 2009-10 season ended with Geordie legend Alan Shearer brought in as manager to save the club from relegation. He would fail and many of the team’s high-earners dropped down to the Championship.
Carr’s arrival signaled a new approach. Players such as Kevin Nolan, Joey Barton, Andy Carroll and Jose Enrique began to get phased out. Lesser-known names (to Newcastle fans, anyway) such as Yohan Cabaye, Cheik Tiote, Hatem Ben Arfa and Davide Santon began to arrive, as Carr looked for value abroad.
Critics thought that this transfer strategy would cause tension in the dressing room. A contingent of foreigners would develop and become increasingly isolated from the British players. Well, Carr only saw one solution: bring in more French players.
Carr has taken it to the next level in the last year, bringing in key contributors Yoan Gouffran, Moussa Sissoko, Mathieu Debuchy and top scorer Loic Remy. Debuchy, Remy and Cabaye are all locks to be a part of the French contingent at the 2014 World Cup, and it would be wise for les bleus coach Didier Deschamps to turn up at St. James Park on a regular basis as the season progresses.
Remy is tied for fourth in league scoring with eight goals and only one Ligue 1 team has more goals from Frenchmen than Newcastle. Yes, that’s correct. Newcastle have indeed benefitted from more goals scored by Frenchmen than 19 of the 20 clubs in the French top flight.
The perfect storm
A French contingent like this hasn’t converged in England since Emmanuel Petit, Thierry Henry, Robert Pires and Patrick Viera helped Arsenal become a modern force. Arsene Wenger, a French manager plying his trade in North London, was the obvious link to those players. Wenger enjoys the backing of the Arsenal board and his job security is rarely in question.
Carr alluded to how he overcomes that familiarity in an interview with The Guardian in 2011.
“People will all look at Arsene Wenger and say he’s got the French market covered, but we’ve got a good handle on it, believe me,” said Carr. “The key is to react quickly – that is what will get us our targets … that and the fact that Newcastle United is a big, big draw overseas.”
And what about Pardew?
He deserves a lot of credit for merely surviving, let alone doing extremely well, at Newcastle. Pardew has been in charge at St. James’ Park for three years, making him the league’s second-longest serving gaffer behind, you guessed it, Wenger. He’s also the longest-serving Newcastle manager since Sir Bobby Robson who departed the club almost a decade ago.
Newcastle isn’t the model of consistency from a bureaucratic perspective. Just this year, Ashley has banned certain journalists from attending matches, announced a plan that will see national newspapers pay for media access and brought back the unpopular, divisive Joe Kinnear as Director of Football.
But Pardew has shown the unique ability to ignore boardroom turmoil and win matches; his team has already beaten Manchester United, Chelsea and Tottenham this season. Cabaye, Remy (twice) and Gouffran scored in those wins. The timid manager continues to defy expectations alongside his Gallic contingent at a club that considers itself the biggest in the Northeast.
It’s almost poetic, isn’t it?
Sasha Kalra is a Toronto-based writer. Follow him on Twitter.