Heed

Unbelievable! Did even Ferguson ever get a contract that long?

More the merrier. We already have a lot of fans who watch both Newcastle & Gateshead.

I'd say the majority of fans of other non-league clubs dislike FC United of Manchester. The Manchester area for example had lots of existing non-league clubs (Droylsden, Hyde, Ashton, Curzon Ashton, Stalybridge Celtic, Altrincham, Salford, Traford, Maine Road), and whilst you can't but admire the passion of the FCUM fans, to see the other teams around there struggling for support whilst they thrive doesn't go down too well.

Watching Gateshead at AFC Wimbledon the last couple of seasons, their fans have been friendly and welcoming. Certainly more so than at most of the ex-league teams in the Conference.

A shameless plug whilst you're all in a good mood... The FA Cup proper starts next Saturday with the 1st Round seeing Gateshead away at Notts County. If anyone fancies coming, Gateshead Supporters Club are running buses to the match, leaving from Gateshead Civic Centre at 9:30am - www.GatesheadFCSupportersClub.org.uk

Any more news on the new stadium? Watching football at the International Stadium is hard work. Not much new news. Now the club isn't looking to move in until the start of the season after next, they're in no rush to submit a planning application. 1 to 2 months was mentioned at a recent talk in with the Chairman.

With no Newcastle match this weekend, if anyone fancies a football fix: Gateshead FC v Tamworth FC Blue Square Bet Conference Premier League Gateshead International Stadium Saturday 9th October, kick-off 3pm

If anyone's not going to Wolves tomorrow and fancies taking in a local match, Gateshead travel to Darlington for the first league match between the two clubs in 50 years (Kick-off at Darlington Arena, 3pm). The Heed fans are in the away end (East Stand). Match preview - http://www.gateshead-fc.com/2904/darlington-v-gateshead-match-preview

The planning application shows signs on the front of the Milburn Stand reading "SPORTSDIRECT.com @ St James' Park" http://i759.photobucket.com/albums/xx240/TownPlanningNE/Misc/sdsjp3.jpg

Apologies if mentioned elsewhere - http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?p=62579131#post62579131

Good player, unfortunately with him being small he just couldn't cope with the physical nature of the Conference. Should score a lot of goals in the Northern League, him and Cogden did well together at Durham in the Unibond League 1st Division.

He left last weekend to join the coaching staff at Plymouth. Terry Mitchell has been appointed Assistant Manager today, leaving Hartlepool.

Highest crowd was 1,304 on the last day of the season against Wimbledon. Under 16s get in free when accompanied by an adult.

Unfortunately it's the nature of the beast. The Conference set a minimum admission price and Gateshead are one of the cheapest in the league, last season some of the ex-league clubs such as Cambridge were charging £18 to get in. With the likes of Luton, Grimsby, Darlington, Cambridge, Wrexham, York, Mansfield, Rushden, Kidderminster and Oxford last season all having been league clubs until recently it's seen the standard of the Conference massively leap up (and prices), effectively making it League 3. It's a completely different World to the last time Gateshead were a Conference side (mid-90s), then the big teams were the likes of Kidderminster, Woking etc who averaged just over a thousand, now you have the likes of Luton & Oxford last season averaging 7 and 6 thousand fans. Gateshead just need to keep on building for the next couple of years to become competitive at the top end of the league, but that will depend a lot on the Tyneside media / local populace starting to take them seriously as a professional football club.

Should be an interesting season, hopefully a comfortable midtable finish this year and then build further on it. It's a hard league to judge, with some teams like Luton signing up a lot of good players and the emergence of Crawley paying transfer fees of £100,000+ for players. Then you have the other end of the spectrum, teams like Histon and Hayes who's squads will be made up fully of young academy players released/on-loan from Football League clubs.

That link seems to suggest he is an academy coach at the Northumberland FA who've setup the match. Blue Flames is the Northumberland FA HQ.

He went to Gateshead College through their Academy for Sport. Wonder if that Kris Thackray lad's still over in Italy. Gateshead College will be making up half of Gateshead's reserve side next season, so hopefully in the future we may see a few of them coming through to the Gateshead first team instead of heading away.

Bertram briefly appeared for Gateshead in pre-season of 08/09 just after he'd been released by Newcastle. He then resurfaced at Northumbria Uni playing for Team Northumbria in the Northern League. They seem to be basing their setup on the USA College system whereby you play for their team and get a funded education at the same time. A few other ex NUFC Reserve/Youths have appeared for them in recent times, Dean Critchlow? and I think Kieron Wrightson maybe there now.

The Marwood signing comes as a bit of a surprise as he was at Blyth last season with Sadler, then left for Team Northumbria when he went there. As Sadler is our new number two, he must see potential in him. When Kris Gate, Craig Baxter and Phil Cave joined us from Newcastle Reserves a couple of seasons back, they all struggled for the first 10 to 15 games due to the physical nature of senior football. But once they got used to dealing with it/toughened up, their class shone through. The above does make me wonder why Newcastle and Sunderland appear to wrap their young players in cotton wool, rather than sending them out on-loan for short spells to toughen them up. Some Reserve matches I've watched, it's almost as if the players are going through the motions at times with an unwritten rule not to tackle heavy. Maybe more would come through to the first team if they had a bit experience?

Darren Lough and James Marwood have apparently agreed terms with us (Gateshead) - http://www.gateshead-fc.com/2791/gateshead-land-hartlepool-united-defender Marwood is a bit of a surprise, but what's Lough like?

The design of the stadium has slightly changed from those pictures, the main stand will now be on Prince Consort Road. http://www.gateshead-fc.com/content/Image/stadium/New_Stadium_1.jpg http://www.gateshead-fc.com/content/Image/stadium/New_Stadium_2.jpg http://www.gateshead-fc.com/content/Image/stadium/New_Stadium_3.jpg There's an article here on how the club plans to finance it and run it - Gateshead FC Website