Official NUFC Site Reports Fabricio Coloccini To Stay

After multiple failed endings to this long and somewhat irritating story, it appears that we now have a definite end... at least for now. Alan Pardew was apparently able to convince Captain Colo that "he has a big responsibility here to fans and to families of this Club" and as such, he has agreed to stay through the end of the season. The club have also stated that he will remain as captain for the remainder of the season.

If we can have focused, Bobby Moore Coloccini, this is undoubtedly good news. The addition of Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa and "new signing" Steven Taylor (we hope) will add depth and solidity to our center back situation, but this is strictly contingent upon a fully functional Coloccini.

Since his arrival, Fabricio has been one of the best servants of the club in recent memory - not even bailing after the debacle at ownership level that helped to send us down to the Championship. He stayed through that Championship season. got his game in order and has been nearly ever-present since. Because of this, it was always going to be unfortunate if his time on Tyneside ended at this point in this way... but on the same token, it must speak to the volume of the "personal issues" that are troubling our captain - which in turn gives you to wonder if we will get fully focused Bobby Moore Coloccini.

There have been and will be those who wonder if he should remain as captain given the events of the last month. For me, it's a very complicated situation. You could very well assure yourself that you will get a disinterested Coloccini if you strip him of the armband, yet he has always been professional enough to give his level best every day. You could very well wreck team morale if you strip him as well. You could very well wreck team morale if you don't. It's a very sticky wicket that we are going to have to hope has been handled by 2011-12 Alan Pardew and not 2012-13 Alan Pardew, or else we may not be as much better off after our TransferPalooza 2013™ as we thought we were.

What do you think? Would you keep Coloccini as captain? Would you strip him and give it to someone else? Let us know below in the poll and the comments!

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