I don't normally go in for hyperbole, but are we about to witness one of the most important weekends in the history of Newcastle United?

Think about it for a moment. If we're being honest the club has been in steady decline since the departure of Sir Bobby. Falling crowds, falling league positions and a general decline in the overall quality of the squad. All presided over by the incompetent fat Freddie and a host of rubbish managers at a time when the gap between the top four and the rest became increasingly unbridgeable.

Last summer Ashley comes along, sweeping Freddie aside and promising the return of the good times and our place in the top four. Since then however, progress has been slow at best. At first this was put down to the ill-effects of Big Sam's reign (not Ashley's appointment), and later down to Fat Freddie leaving the club in a much bigger mess than anyone realised. The summer arrived and we all hoped to see the much promised radical overhaul of the squad. To be fair we certainly have got rid of a lot of deadwood and undoubtably brought in some quality replacements but overall a squad deemed too thin last year now looks positively anorexic. Despite this Newcastle have got off to a good start on the playing front and cautious optimism began to appear until the sale of Milner and lack of further buys. From reading the 606 boards it is clear that our fans are now split over this. Some thinking Ashley is wonderful and this is all part of his masterplan, some thinking he is the worst thing to have ever happened to our club.

This weekend we now play away to Arsenal, (somewhere we could potentially loose badly/heavily), while we have our last opportunity to bring in the players to plug the numerous gaps in the squad. Should Newcastle bring in several quality players and perform well at Arsenal then maybe this will be the moment we will look back to in the future as when we turned the corner on our previous road to mediocrity and obscurity. Should Newcastle get stuffed and buy no-one, it is likely to be the be the moment when the most ardent support of Ashley disappeared, and with it our last chance of achieving greatness. Hence my original question, is this one of the most important weekends in Newcastle's history?