Benwell Lad

Which is in Newcastle upon Tyne

Only seems like a couple of seasons ago he was as important as Izak to us. Couldn't face going into games without him.

City status gets diluted each year as more towns which will never be anything more than "towns", often shitholes, get upgraded. One of the best examples just down the road.

We actually have a pretty decent shout with Tynemouth and Whitley Bay's beautiful sandy beaches, which any sensible person and even the occasional sane mackem realises are part of the greater Tyneside/Newcastle area

So harsh but with a sad ring of truth

As it has for most of the strong Brexit supporting areas and regions. Totally conned by the billionaire tax avoiders and yet, amazingly, they look ready to lap up more of it.

Not sure why quite a few people think Wolves could be relegated ? I thought they looked really good towards the end of the season.

Certainly was Another great memory was Jackie Milburn, who worked for the News of the World often walking in, and on occasions apologizing to spectators for the bad language his nephew Jack was using It really was a different era, but brilliant.

Dublin actually but right island

One particular moment I remember was Jackie Charlton saying to Peter Beardsley "Peter I've forgot my cigars, run back to the dressing room and get them for me" and off troops an England international to the dilapidated hut in the corner running an errand for the gaffer. Incredible really One of the first things Keegan did was insist that the changing rooms were upgraded.

Overall our recruitment has been superb since Howe and PIF arrived. Bruno, Trippier, Botman, Tonali, BDB, Tino, Hall, Izak, Barnes, Osula all excellent acquisitions. Not only ability but great character and attitude too. That level of success in the market is down to a whole team of people. We're actually quite good at this transfer market stuff nowadays. Maybe just a bit of patience needed right now.

I'd expect a much more significant contribution from Miley and Osula next season. But with CL group qualification and LC games that's probably no more than a statement of the obvious.

Yeah it was very open and used to attract crowds of hundreds, if not a thousand plus, especially during school holidays. That was after the Magpie Group take off. Benwell often had a few dozen passers by just walking in and watching, right up close to the games etc, hearing everything that was said and interacting with players and coaching staff freely. Pretty amazing really in comparison to today.

I'm going for Grumpy Old Man. Similar condescending manner.

You'll have to tell me which part of that, or anything else for that matter, is "inaccurate nonsense" ? It's obvious you have red and white eyes, there's nothing wrong with that, but you need to develop thicker skin and stop being so sensitive id you're going to post on a Newcastle forum as a Sunderland fan. Telling us your name from RTG would be a great start.

He's very fickle, continuously spitting the dummy, then returning when it suits. But that is a trait of many Sunderland fans. Sunderland boy made good and former chairman Tom Cowie nailed it decades ago.

They really didn't. Professional teams don't throw games. Granted their focus may have waned, but that's a bad sign at any level. It may have caused a downturn in performance, and that coming from a starting base of never beating anyone convincingly was enough to see them lose to teams in lowly positions. Nor were they capable of instantly switching it back on when the important games returned. They struggled and were very lucky in all three play off games.

Amazing to think that anyone could just wander into the training ground and watch the full session, practice games, set pieces etc

Have the people on here who fancy them to stay up really factored in that they were fourth in a very poor league last season, 24 points off automatic promotion, looked very unconvincing in the play off games and had the fans shouting for the manager's head even after they'd reached the playoffs ? Additionally they've lost one of their most important (albeit very limited) players and the only one I saw who looked like he truly had PL potential (Watson). Similar levels of optimism applied to ourselves will have us nailed on to win the Champions League.

It's not quite as comical as Giacherini in mackem twang but there's definitely shades of it in Habib Diarra.

Drinking Cruzcampo, listening to Dualipa under a super moon.

Quite decent and entertaining to watch Wolves. Man Utd must have taken pity on the mackems and not wanted to put them in a category of their own at the bottom

Whaat ?? He tried to maim two of our players man Mind that lunge at Izak was a perfect microcosm of where the two clubs are in football standings.

O'nien could seriously hurt someone. He's a reckless snidey player to cover his inadequacies, and will be so out of his depth in the PL his recklessness could be dangerous. He also does horrible things like kissing opposition players and laughing about it. There's a clip of him on youtube jumping on someone's back after he had been done for pace (not unusual for him) and that was in the lower leagues.

Of course strange results can occasionally happen but recently even teams which have been promoted automatically, on merit over the season, have struggled terribly to bridge the huge gap in quality. Sunderland finished 24 points behind the automatic places and 16 behind the team in third position. In both play off ties the other teams looked better than them, but they somehow fluked it, assisted massively by horrendous errors which led to them scoring. They may fluke a win against West Ham as well but their players are light years away from being PL standard.