Terry Venables tipped to come to the rescue at Newcastle
Published 22:30 24/09/08 By By Mirror.co.uk
Terry Venables last night emerged as the shock favourite to take over at crisis club Newcastle.
With the north-east giants in Premier League freefall, Venables has had his odds slashed from 33-1 to 2-1 to go into St James Park and steady the ship.
Newcastle, put up for sale by owner Mike Ashley, have been without a manager since Kevin Keegan was ousted earlier this month.
Ashley is now believed to be closing in on a deal to sell the club for between £350-400million to a consortium of Nigerian entrepreneurs.
But while negotiations are taking place the team are continuing to flounder in the League under caretaker manager Chris Hughton.
And with Ashley's focus solely on his escape bid, fears are growing among fans that the club could plunge into relegation trouble following defeat at home to newly promoted Hull and away to West Ham.
Venables' last role in football was his ill-fated involvement in the England set-up, where he acted as assistant to head coach Steve McClaren.
Both men were sacked after England failed to reach the 2008 European Championships.But he did go into another struggling north-east club, Middlesbrough, eight years ago to help save them from relegation under Bryan Robson.
Meanwhile the spokesman for the four-man Nigerian consortium bidding to buy Newcastle insists the group are willing to stump up around £50million for investment in the team.
Chris Nathaniel said last night: "I think it may be okay to have another £50million to buy players when the deal is done."
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