Alan Pardew has blasted Newcastle striker Nile Ranger and questioned his desire to be a footballer.
The 21-year-old has been hit with a devastating public rebuke after Pardew’s patience ran out.
He has been banned from training with the first team until he has proved he can consistently turn up on time for training for a six-week period.
But Pardew fears Ranger will not rise to the challenge after a series of scrapes. The problem is he still has four years of his contract to run, and no one clamouring for his signature.
Ranger was handed a 12-month conditional discharge after assaulting two police officers last year.
He served 11 weeks in a young offenders institute in 2006 and was given a six-month conditional discharge in March of this year.
Ranger was loaned out to Championship side Barnsley and League One's Sheffield Wednesday last season, and is unlikely to figure in Pardew’s plans this year.
Pardew has got tough in public, saying: “This guy is late so often, it is unbelievable. He’s still at this football club and we’re still trying to do something with him.
“But he will still not get back in the team unless he has a period of six weeks where he isn’t late.
“I don’t think it is going to happen.
"It is important, I’m not going to let him train with my first team because he is letting the other players down.
“The bottom line is, we haven’t got four or five clubs queuing up (to take him) - in fact we haven’t got ONE club queuing up for him.
“That should be alarm bells in his head to get his act in order. But maybe he doesn’t want to be a footballer.”
Newcastle and Sunderland are preparing for one of the biggest games of their season on Sunday when they clash in the Wear/Tyne derby at the Stadium of Light.
And Sunderland midfielder Jack Colback has warned that Martin O’Neill’s men will be ready for the “intensity” of the battle.
Newcastle are vowing to start quickly and impose themselves but local boy Colback said: “Being from up here I know how much it means to the fans.
“The games are always big and intense, but we’ve got players right through our squad who have been involved in derbies. John O’Shea and Wes Brown have been involved in the Manchester derby.
“Everyone knows how big these games are. It’s an intense atmosphere - you can really feel it. These games are intense affairs and there’s a lot of pressure, but they’re the games you want to be involved in as a professional footballer.”