IN the six days since Newcastle United’s chronic capitulation at the hands of Liverpool, a great deal of attention has been focused on Alan Pardew’s future.

Is the Newcastle boss the right man to take the club forward, or has his tenure run its course? Would a new boss be able to extract more from the players at his disposal, or is Pardew still capable of turning things around?

Opinion in the stands is divided, but I would argue that the question itself needs addressing. It is not Pardew’s tenure that should be coming under the microscope at the moment; it is the much-trumpeted blueprint that shapes everything that happens at St James’ Park. Unless that is modified, the identity of the manager is something of an irrelevance.

We all know how Mike Ashley wants Newcastle to operate by now – allow transfer policy to be heavily dictated by a senior recruitment group that includes managing director Derek Llambias and chief scout Graham Carr, look to exploit European markets, most notably in France, where a competitive advantage is perceived to exist, and ideally sign players aged 26 or under with a high sell-on value.

Last season, when Newcastle were riding high, it was being hailed as a blueprint for success. Twelve months on, however, and the system’s inherent flaws have been exposed.

First things first, this is not going to be a diatribe against French footballers. Some of what has been said and written in the last week has been jingoistic nonsense. It is absurd to suggest that the French character, if such a thing can be said to exist at all, mitigates against commitment, passion or effort.

No one doubted Olivier Bernard’s commitment to the cause when he was a Newcastle player, just as no one was questioning Yohan Cabaye’s willingness to lay his body on the line last season.

‘You need some English players in there because when the chips are down, they show much more character,’ is the call. To which the immediate response is, ‘Sign more English players, and you might end up with a team of Nile Rangers’.

Yet even taking all of that into account, the events of the last two home games have highlighted two deficiencies that have their roots in Ashley’s blueprint. The first is a lack of leadership; the second is a lack of communication. Both have been greatly exacerbated by Newcastle’s signing policy in the last two or three transfer windows.

The lack of leadership was particularly marked on Saturday as Newcastle collapsed to their heaviest home defeat for 85 years.

As Liverpool’s dominance become increasingly emphatic, there was no one in the Newcastle side taking control of the situation or urging and inspiring their team-mates to dig in and stem the flow of opposition attacks.

Had the likes of Alan Shearer or Kevin Nolan been wearing a black-and-white shirt, you can bet there would have been some harsh words exchanged and some ferocious tackles initiated.

The same would have been true of a Vincent Kompany or a Nemanja Vidic, so it is not an English vs foreign thing. It is, though, a matter of age and experience, and buy committing themselves to only buying young, emerging talent, the Newcastle hierarchy have presented Pardew with a team that is far too callow when things are going against them.

None of Newcastle’s starting XI at the weekend were aged 30 or over, and Jonas Gutierrez was the only player older than 27. It told.

The irony is that Pardew had pushed for the purchase of some older heads last summer, only to be told that the transfer policy would not be changing. Privately, he must surely be wishing that his words had been listened to.

Instead, Vurnon Anita was the only senior player to arrive last summer, with five Frenchmen arriving in January in an attempt to steady the ship. It remains to be seen how effective they turn out to be, but by signing Mathieu Debuchy, Massadio Haidara, Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa, Moussa Sissoko and Yoan Gouffran in the space of a month, Newcastle’s rulers helped create the communication problems that were abundantly evident on Saturday.

It’s not that the five players are French that is the issue – it’s the fact that they don’t speak English. Or at least that their mastery of the language is very limited.

Newcastle’s back four was all over the place on Saturday, but it must be extremely hard for someone like Steven Taylor to strike up a relationship with Yanga-Mbiwa when the latter can only really speak English through an interpreter.

It certainly didn’t look like the pair were singing from the same hymn sheet against Liverpool, and while the likes of Yanga-Mbiwa and Haidara have claimed that the language of football is universal, in as technical a position as centre-half, it surely can’t be as simple as that.

Similarly, while Pardew has also claimed that language is not an issue, how can he possibly have passed on detailed, tactical instructions to Yanga-Mbiwa during the half-time interval of Saturday’s game?

He had ten minutes at most to make changes – had he attempted to speak to Taylor and Yanga-Mbiwa together, most of that would have been taken up by the translation of his words.

None of that is to suggest that Newcastle’s transfer policy has no merit. As last season’s fifth-placed finish proved, it is possible to pick up bargains from overseas.

But the inflexibility of Ashley’s approach is saddling Newcastle with problems. And at the moment, they are too intractable for Pardew or any other manager to solve.

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CHAMPS OF THE WEEK

DARLINGTON

It might only be a small step, but Darlington have set off on the long road to recovery after claiming the Northern League title. The Quakers won 40 of their 46 league matches, a remarkable feat in any division.

CHUMPS OF THE WEEK

RUGBY’S CHAMPIONSHIP CLUBS

Somehow, the 12  Championship clubs failed to select a single Newcastle Falcons player on their three-man shortlist for Championship Player of the Season, even though the North-Easterners finished 24 points clear at the top of the table. A dose of jealousy coming into play perhaps?

PERFORMANCE OF THE WEEK

Joe Root’s match-winning 182 for Yorkshire against Durham was a magnificent exhibition of technique and temperament. Not content with that, however, the England batsman duly smashed 236 against Derbyshire in Yorkshire’s next game.

TIP OF THE WEEK

I’m not exactly sticking my neck on the line here, but Dawn Approach looks like being flat racing’s next superstar, and Jim Bolger’s colt is a strong fancy to win tomorrow’s Qipco 2,000 Guineas. His Dewhurst win last October was eye-catching, and odds of around 6-4 are fair.