TheBrownBottle

I’ve watched cricket in Sydney in those temperatures, and they have no roof at the SCG

Fuck it, I’m going for a positive result, we’re due one there, a 2-1 win with the usual finger-biting nervousness in the last ten mins. And Howe to make a double substitution on exactly 60 mins.

I wouldn’t select Pope ahead of him. Then there’s Man Utd’s back line. Trippier would be the only guaranteed starter there. Varane is comfortably better than Schar. Botman or Martinez? Perhaps Botman on pre-injury form. Shaw is better than any of our left backs. Bruno G is the only midfielder we have who gets in Man Utd’s midfield. Isak is better than Hojlund; though I’d take Gordon on current form ahead of Rashford, that’s form-based only. Rashford is the better player. So I’d say we have three players who’d definitely get ahead of Man Utd’s starting XI, with two others dependent on form.

It’s not about crowd such only. Adding a few thousand to the back of the Gallowgate (which I doubt is realistic) wouldn’t get us any closer to them. It’s the lack of corporate and the lack of commercial revenue generated by the current SJP. It isn’t fit for purpose.

I work in civils. It’s a complete folly.

SJP still has a noticeable slope, despite ‘fixes’ being made in the past. Nee-one will say owt

I know someone who has worked on NEOM mind - it’s a fantastic way of pouring money down a drain. But your point absolutely stands - it’s money, not KSA (which doesn’t really train its own construction specialists in any case) which makes the difference.

Straightforward cut-and-fill exercise - perfectly normal in construction projects of this sort of scale. Potential ground contamination makes it a bit more of a pain in the arse, but unlike the SJP site (where listed buildings exist and the civil issues with trying to build a structure on a Metro station - which require multiple disparate corrections, solutions and sign-offs), money is the only hindrance at the Skinnerburn / Scotchie Road site.

If he signs if we finish top 15, then the decisions not to play him despite at times not having a fit first team XI available become even more marked. Watching our midfield being bypassed with young Miley in it week after week, or BDB having a horrendous spell of form at LB, and Hall not getting a single minute looks like either poor management or that the lad isn’t close to being good enough at this point, in which case he’s a complete waste of the £30m we’re about to spend on him. He might become the world’s best LB in five years, but for now this looks like bad business.

Pickford is definitely the better keeper for me, despite being a Mackem charva. I don’t think Southgate has been wrong on that one.

Let’s start with the goalkeepers. Pickford is better than Pope or Dubravka. So that’s that one knackered.

Yeah, it’s fucking awful. There are some really creepy, scary fuckers on there

The replies to that post are grim. A lot of men on the internet who think that convicted rapists aren’t rapists, or that it isn’t really rape to rape someone If I was a woman, I don’t think I’d want to leave the house if I was on Twitter

That he’d killed himself

So glad we knocked their wheels off. They haven’t been the same since that cup game.

He’s past the ten season mark already - so in the traditional sense, he should have had one

We could take Spurs’ stadium apart brick by brick and relocate it to Beamish

I’m all-thinking, nee dancing these days

How about if we demolish London, throw the bricks in the Thames, and then move the Theatre Royal to Beamish

Rogan Taylor advocated for this in Total Football about 25 years ago, suggesting that clubs would make far more money if they did. Not sure if that would be true today, when the value to an adidas or Nike is even more in advertising than it was then (much bigger worldwide market etc)

True, but we normally walked in from Haymarket for match days (once he had moved to Cramlington) - we only travelled from Central to get to the Arena. When we used to travel in from the west end, we’d sometimes head to the Black Bull first

Yep, it’s daft really. When I do tender analysis at work, I want to see at least three contractor or subcontractor quotes for the works, as well as my own estimate - that’s how I test market value. But they’re doing the same thing with the same outcome - that’s not how sponsorship works.

I spent several years accompanying my uncle with severe MD to SJP on a match day - believe me, getting to the Leazes end was no picnic for him. He struggled with that. Walking from central station to the arena (as we did for boxing one night) was a shitload easier.

Agreed re the centre - but that’s not what matters on a match day. What matters is where the bars & restaurants are. And SJP is no better placed than the arena in that regard (with apologies to those who spend pre-match in Fenwicks ) I agree, there’s a gap from Time Square to the arena. It’s ripe for redevelopment in fairness I don’t think the elevation counts for much tbf. It’s not on a steep gradient - not sure who would be affected by it. We’re unlikely to move there, so it is moot

You could say that about Newcastle College tbf - it wouldn’t make it any more true. Newgate & Percy Streets are the effective end of the part of the city centre where shoppers and people out for the day go. Of course the arena site is dead too - there’s nowt there at the moment. That’s sort of the point. But it’s hardly a difficult trek to get there from the city centre.