Newcastle United is already a different club to the one that Amanda Staveley, the Reuben brothers and Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund snapped up last October.
In just six months the difference between the final days of Mike Ashley compared to now feels like night and day. Back then it felt like the powers that be were simply going through the motions.
The final game of the Ashley era was an awful 2-1 defeat at Wolves. After the game trudging back to the car in the rain being a Newcastle fan felt empty. It was a broken shell of the club that once was in the 1990s, head coach Steve Bruce saying after the loss: "Can we do better? We'll keep looking at it and working on it."
