Wallsendmag

Top image looks class. Would be happy with something similar to that with a 70,000 capacity.

Think he said he was out running on the grass.

You can't knock their ambition but aye, given their fanbase and their historical crowds it does seem a bit on the big side. I suppose they'll look at Birmingham being the 2nd biggest City in the UK so they'll think the people are out there and it's just a case of tempting them in. If you look at Sunderland as an example. Their average gate in the 10 years leading up to building their new 42k stadium was around 16,000 so on the face of it building a 40k+ stadium seemed ridiculous but they hooked people in through novelty factor, extremely cheap (and in many cases free tickets to schools/colleges/Unis etc) and pretty much built themselves a brand new fanbase due to a new stadium and more than doubled their crowds. Assume Birmingham will go down the same route.

Eh? St Andrews has been Birminghams ground for 120 years! There's no reason why Birmingham fans wouldn't think of it in the same way as we do with SJP.

Just seen Birmingham have announced plans (and released images) to build a new 62,000 stadium. Pretty sure their owners arrived a couple of years after ours as well and have just came out of League One so fair play to them.

We were just to the right of the goal and Solanos goal would probably have near enough hit us if it hadn't been for the net! Remember we went down with Barrett. Got dropped off at the Central afterwards and ended up taking part in the biggest snowball fight known to man absolute carnage!

I was in the 2nd from front row right in line with where he put the ball. Unbelievable week that. Leeds were top of the league at the time and we'd just gone down to Arsenal a few days earlier and beat them as well.

European away games, plus mackems away, will be the only away games this season where there's pretty much zero chance of a ticket check.

Tbf this is a fair point. Certainly noticed a lot more tickets come available since the club basically coming out and saying it's not a particular safe place. Obviously the soft shites in our support were a bit put off by that.

No I agree with you. I'm not sure the punishment fits the crime. He's been banned from 5 home games and effectively been locked out of all away games now since they've reset his loyalty points to zero. Is that really a fair punishment for trying to move your ticket on at face value? I'm not sure it is. One thing I will say is that clearly a lot of people bought Marseille for the loyalty point with no intention of going. Never seen so many spares for an away game since before the takeover.

Aye but then they'd lose that precious loyalty point. Ironic really as the in the case that @SteV has quoted there it appears that the seller has ended up losing over 50 of them.

Seen loads of people selling Marseille tickets on Facebook. Very foolish thing to do. It's common knowledge that the club monitor social media.

Ballot fail for Chelsea.

Must be why 12,000 turned up at SJP when we played them in 1990 then! I'm 47 and genuinely have never given a shite about Middlesbrough. Was always just another game. Honestly don't know a single NUFC fan who gives an toss about them. I was actually quite pleased for them when they won the League Cup 20 or so years ago. Compare to when the mackems got to the Final in 2014 and went 1-0 up I felt physically sick!

Got sorted eventually after a prompt telling me I needed to log in on a desk top rather than my phone. First time that's happened.

Got an email from NUFC about an hour ago saying the Chelsea ballot was open. Gone on the website, clicked Ballots and just get a message saying there are no ballots currently open.

It does feel somewhat manufactured. When we go to watch PSV if we can we'll also try to watch Borussia Monchengladbach if we can fit both games in on the same weekend as it's an easy train ride away. Always try to get a seat above the huge 16,000 capacity terrace where their ultras go and basically they are only allowed to sing what the person who stands on the raised platform at the front tells them to sing, and when he tells them to stop they've got to stop. They can't break off into smaller groups and start their own chants. It does give it an unauthentic feel and it's certainly something that I would hate to see over here. Remember last season we managed to do a double header, Monchengladbach v Leipzig on the Saturday and PSV v Ajax on the Sunday. Monchengladbach was just bizarre. They all stood there in total silence for the first 20 minutes, not even roaring their team on when they were attacking. In the end I had to ask what was going on and it turned out it was a protest against Red Bull owning Leipzig. It's really frowned up in over there. Then as soon as the scoreboard hit 20 minutes everyone just starts going mental and bouncing about. Was all just a bit strange.

North Shields Juniors definitely got 400. It's on their Facebook page.

Decent crowd but it seems it was padded out with lots of freebies. North Shields Juniors alone were given 400 tickets. Good for kids who are usually locked out of SJP to at least get to see the inside of it for once though.

Aye that's a shame for them like but I suppose if people went last time and didn't think much of it they're unlikely to return. To put it in perspective even a 15/16k crowd is excellent going given the fare on the pitch.

Watched 10 mins of it on YouTube but switched it off and got Hungary v Ireland on now. If that's the usual standard of the womens team I dof my cap to all those who sit through that every week because I thought it was dreadful as a spectacle. Standard is abysmal and there's just zero intensity to it. I'm sure in the small part I watched a Sunderland player pulled a Newcastle player down to the ground by her pony tail as well

Aye they did. Was almost right in front of us as we were penned into that corner but behind the goal line. Sure the fire brigade ended up having to put it out. They were mental like. Best atmosphere I think I've experienced.

Police were right twats after the game. We were staying in Cannes and just got bussed in and out for the match so never had a pint in Marseille. Remember having to walk through a sort of warehouse to get in and out the ground.

They were 6th in the League and unbeaten in 3. Their previous 8 games before playing us was W4 D2 L2. That's not terrible by any stretch of the imagination.