JUST A few weeks after his increased commitment might have been enough to keep Shay Given at the club, Joe Kinnear suggested yesterday owner Mike Ashley’s enthusiasm for Newcastle has been rekindled by a rare meeting with players at the training ground.

Ashley, the manager said, “hadn’t seen players train and work first-hand before but he told me it has opened his eyes. It is a new world for him, eating his lunch with them and giving them the kind of reassurances on their contracts and their future that they’ve needed to hear.

“And he’s definitely willing to back up his words. I know people still have to be convinced about things, but there is a sense of unity at the club now.”

Kinnear’s words did not strike a chord with Given yesterday as he felt there was precious little unity and not too much constructive support from the owners during his decade or so around the place. For the bulk of those 11 and a half years he kept his head down and silently did his utmost to get on with things as best he could.

And, as the Donegalman was unveiled by Manchester City ahead of a likely debut against Middlesbrough this weekend, the goalkeeper’s frustration, not least with the way he had been treated in his final few weeks in England’s north east, was all too obvious.

“People were saying I was so happy and comfortable,” he said. “I was happy in a sense but I was not comfortable with the way it (life at the club) was going.”

And matters weren’t helped, he insisted, by the club’s reaction to his decision to leave. “I just felt that after I’d been there for nearly 12 years and the service I gave the club, the regime at Newcastle could have handled the whole thing a bit better.

“They made me do things I didn’t want to do and this was an opportunity to further my career and pick up more silverware.

“The first contact I had with Mike Ashley was on January 26th,” he continued. “There were a few things they could have tried to do to convince me to stay but they didn’t. In the end they were happy to take the money and move on.”

In less than a dozen years on Tyneside, Given had worked under a third of the managers the club had and while he didn’t single Kinnear out for any criticism, it was under the present manager that the club suffered the 5-1 drubbing by Liverpool. It was a defeat that had finally made up his mind to leave.

“Over the last six months things have been fizzling out,” he said. “It has not been enjoyable going into training but that Liverpool game at home was such a low point in my career. Walking off the pitch I was so low I would have been quite happy if I had never seen a football again. It was a real kick in the teeth.

“Maybe it is selfish but I felt I deserved better than that. I went to Newcastle to try to win something but it hadn’t materialised and I felt I should be at a club that is challenging for honours.

“As it is there is an interim manager up there until the end of the season. The club was up for sale and now it isn’t but they are going through another difficult period. The fans deserve better. All I can do is wish those supporters well because now I have to move forward to a new chapter of my life.”

It has been suggested the 32-year-old Irishman has, in choosing to join City, opted to leap from the frying pan into the fire, but Given insists that the buzz around the club just now, as well as the proliferation of expensive new players like Robinho, Wayne Bridge and Nigel de Jong, provides a clear sense it is moving in the right direction.

“This is a club that will definitely go places in the future,” he said. “The manager has talked me through where the club wants to go and it’s very exciting. The training is already a step up from the level I am used to. I’m honoured really that the manager has picked me to be part of it all.”

Asked about Given’s comments yesterday afternoon, Kinnear said: “I have always had a great relationship with Shay. He is one of the best goalkeepers in the world.”