Benwell Lad

Journalists telling us we won't be celebrating promotion. Journalists finding every negative angle they can on a 3-0 win against fellow promotion contenders. "It could only happen at Newcastle" as the man quite rightly says.

I think he is a top player (Argentina and La Liga on his CV would probably support that view) who had a difficult first season in a new country - just like many other top players have too. When he gets back into the PL I think we will see a much better player than last season. I really hope that's with us !

Thought we were very good yesterday, with 2 excellent keepers and yesterday's back four (Colo was superb) we will beat most teams at this level. Three very well worked goals too. Don't understand why some are moaning about the 2nd half performance, they are a useful side (e.g. beat West Brom away) and at 3-0 down they brought forwards on and got at us which is exactly what they had to do. I still think that we had the better chances and looked more likely to score during that part of the game despite them having more posession. Great little cameo from Pancrate too - he certainly seems up for it.

Wonder what Loiuse Taylor - that great supporter of civil rights who fabricated a tissue of lies about Newcastle fans allegedly abusing Mido at Middlesboro - will have to say about the racist abuse directed at Darren Bent's mother, and the Nazi salutes regularly displayed by supporters of her beloved Sunderland ? Will she go missing too ?

80 ish as a guess. i can remember it pre metro. i can remember them building it, but not sure of dates. Not entirely sure but I thought the metro work started in the 70's. They had artists (architects) impressions of how stations etc would look when finished in locations around town and I knew a lad who was a draughtsman and did some of them. In very small detail he had drawn a couple having a "knee trembler" against a wall somewhere and also someone getting the shit kicked out of them. It was not noticed and the drawings duly went up. You'd never notice it if it wasn't pointed out but we all thought it was hilarious. Maybe that's why all the boarding is up opposite the Gallowgate in the photo, it could have been because they wewre already working on the SJ metro station.

This has the makings of a great match. Must say I'm looking forward to seeing Swansea they sound like a very decent side and I suppose any team who win at West Brom must be. I hope the extra bit of "nouse" we have in our team will be enough to get a narrow win.

I think Kennedy may have been the best ever LB I've seen at the club, although I do like the present fella Enrique a lot. With Irving Nattrass at RB at the same time I don't think any team had such a good pairing and they could both score spectacular goals too. Clarkie was one of those players, more common in that era, who played hundreds of games for his local club, never let them down week in week out but was not fully appreciated until he left. It was fantastic that he went on to enjoy such success.

I first started to go when we still had the Popular, a name which is hardly ever mentioned these days. I also remember the Wressling hall opposite the Gallowgate before they built the Metro. I remember staying in the doorway of the wressling hall all night for tickets for some game, possibly the Fairs Cup. Just love that photo CP ! The hanging gardens of Babylon at the back of the Gallowgate The Popular was the moaners side of the ground, I remember Tommy Gibb and Frank Clark receiving most stick. Clarkie had a tendency to close down his winger rather than dive in and that used to frustrate them. They thought he wasn't good enough for us, so he left and went on to win 2 European Cup Winners medals. Some things don't change.

Hard to think that we are still on just about the same land now but with 52k seated stadium. The capacity at the time of the photo was aboout 47,000 iirc Prior to the popular being replaced by the "new" stand (East Stand) it was 60,000. The Leazes looks so small but I seem to remember it alone held something like 17,000 (it curved around the east side and seemed much higher than it looks in the photo). Being in there when it was full was an amazing experience as almost everyone chanted and sang and the old roof amplified the noise.

Should we have a thread every time a story comes out about someone getting a huge telephone or gas bill by mistake as well ? Better still why don't we have an individual forum like the chat and travel ones, for Sports Direct and Ashley casino type stories so those who get off on him can indulge themselves and leave this one for football.

It's an interesting comment on our situation that I'm not actually sure whether you're serious or not. That would make for a really boring promotion celebration. Couldn't we intersperse "sack the board" with "shoes off" , "stand up for SJP" and the hilarious "FCB" ditto ? That would be great and show the owner how we really feel. Under 16s only though - everyone else down the pub for a celebratory skin full !

Stan Seymour's and Frank Brennans were the only two sports shops in town iirc. Before trainers and replica shirts although I did get a B&W strip from one of them for Christmas.

Certainly the best LB. Will definitely be playing Premiership next year, just hope it's with us.

Haway lads, lets get back to petrol bombs, aggro on the terraces, transit vans full of pissed up fans and brighly laced up DM's. Action men FFS !

I don't think enough credit goes to the players or coaching staff for us being well organised. We have very little creative flair so the fact we are keeping clean sheets is crucial. I know it's fashionable to slaughter Jonas here - and I agree that he's one of the worst culprits for lack of decent service to the front players - but he does work hard defensively and it's easy to forget that. These lads aren't good enough for the premier but they give 100% in a team effort and that's why we are top. One moment towards the end when Ranger chased back, closed down and nicked the ball off a Preston player who was lining up a shot typified the attitude and credit to them all for it. I also think Smith is a big influence in the dressing room nowadays and anyone cheating would have him to deal with him as well as the management, in much the same way they'd have had to face Shearer a few years ago.

Nail right on f**cking head.

His competitive home debut against Liverpool has to be up there amongst the greatest ever days at SJP. Unforgetable, and Hibbit's contribution too. Hat-Trick, teeth kicked out, stretchered off , lol@ modern players. We've had better players since, but for sheer magic moments and raw excitement (Burnley semi final, Leicester home etc etc even Arsenal away after he was sold) nobody provided more than Supermac.

Inter Milan at home in the Fairs Cup. Fachetti the Inter and Italy right back commiting GBH on Wyn Davies every time we got a corner, in the days they got away with it and there was no TV evidence to resort to, and Wyn just shrugging it off and getting on with the game. Being in town on the afternoon of the Rangers semi final - some places looked like they'd been bombed. Woops !! that's the 60s ( well 69 anyway so it's nearly the 70s)

His competitive home debut against Liverpool has to be up there amongst the greatest ever days at SJP. Unforgetable, and Hibbit's contribution too.

On the bench. Brings the house down as he comes on with 15 minutes to go. Who'd have ever thought that ?

Funny how many people who were wailing on about us going straight down again and doing a Leeds United are now wailing on about how bad it will be and how we'll struggle IF we get promoted. It's got to be a personality trait. Must be fun people to be around.

Being very organised (credit to Hughton/Calderwood) and a smart finish won another pretty scrappy game. Although I'd love to see us winning easily theres great satisfaction in going away and winning 1-0 and never really looking like conceding once we're ahead. It's a hell of a long time since we could be confident at 1-0. Maybe we need a Newcastle version of "1-0 to the Arsenal"

There's a common theme with Bruce's team, wherever he goes he seems to start off extremely well, but after a while he goes stale and he's teams tend to. That happened at Brum and it was happening at Wigan. I think that's partly why he's moved around so much. Not saying that Sunderland wouldn't roll us pretty badly, the signing of Bent I think is a masterstroke. They are a good prem team now and all credit to Bruce for transforming them form the crap they were last year. But I would worry about longevity of it all, if I were a Mackem (perish the thought). Sunderland are lightyears ahead of us atm. Could very well last longer than we'd all like. Better football today (relatively). More of the same and the threat of the Nolanator is looking positive They're on a brilliant run of form (a bit like Hull were for most of last season), but if anyone truly thinks they're as good as their current results might suggest they're f***ing nuts. Definitely better then us at the moment of course. I reckon if we played them 10 times they'd beat us 5 times, 2 draws and we'd win three. A round about way of saying they're better than us right now. They're right up there with the Stokes and Burnleys of the world nowadays (or the Hulls of last year) Unfortunately for them because it's Sunderland they will never find sustainable success and the FGB will do no better there than he did at Wigan before moving on to another mid table club.

Sod Ashley, find me anyone who would bankroll us to the tune of £50 million on players to 'hopefully stabilise us'. Would be some fun wages to try an whittle off the pay roll if we slipped up again. This is no place for realism. Perhaps a supporter's organisation could take over, pay off the debt and bankroll us back to the top again ??

Their articles do seem crassly populist and I'd suspect they use their flimsy "fan" credentials to sell their rags on Tyneside. Perpetuating the "soap opera" makes their jobs easy. That said Caulkin does write some credible stuff.