TheBrownBottle

Gateshead finished 5th in the 1960 re-election vote to the league - only the top four were re-elected in these annual votes. The thing is, Gateshead were 11 votes behind Southport - so even if NUFC didn't vote for them (and there is no record of who voted for whom - and note that you didn't vote teams out, you voted them in), it was hardly the decisive vote. More mackem conspiracy theories. Newcastle United had the some of the highest average crowds in the country on average in the 50s - why would Gateshead / South Shields even have been deemed a threat? I bet every social club in sunderland has heard this 'fact' farted out at least once a night for sixty years, mind.

Mackems tend to be obsessed with pulling %s out of their arse for the NUFC/SAFC make-up of anywhere from the Tweed to the Tees outside of Newcastle and Sunderland themselves. Obviously Gateshead will have mackems living there, and some who support both - but the idea that it would be a significant chunk is laughable. Traditionally, it made more sense once you're getting towards 'Jarra', but the %s were always pulled out of their arses. Even deepest darkest Durham never seemed quite as 'mackemy' as they loved to claim. Give it a decade or so, and those numbers will dwindle even further. Anyone who was around in the '90s saw it.

ASM isn't as good as he thinks he is, but he is better than his current performances suggest. I don't doubt that with better players he'd be better - but that's applicable to everyone. Those comments are pure knobheaddery, mind. Have to say, unlike the previous 14 years, I wouldn't be too upset about any player leaving at any time - namely because I'd know it was the manager's call, and not just an accounting decision. Ambitious clubs still sell players, even good ones, if they aren't the right fit or a better option is available. Under Ashley, selling ASM would have just been about the bottom line.

I love all the displays and flags Wor Flags do - but the giant surfer is marvelous, just from a sentimental / nostalgia POV re Keith Barrett's surfer flags in the 90s

Chelsea lose money hand-over-fist. They aren't financially viable - they're a financial black hole. They require a sugar daddy to stop them from folding. I don't follow the logic of a club losing 100m in one year being viable because they're turning over 300m.

Not only does this not happen, it will never happen whilst there is a disparity between the matchday / sponsorship / TV etc revenues. I can't see why this would be a problem if the women's game grows - nor why it would be a problem if the women's game did. It is unlikely to grow if the stranglehold you're proposing was applied. It is worth remembering that one of the reasons women's football never grew in the first place was that the FA (and the wider game) strangled the women's game and banned it for half a century. I think the clubs have a moral duty to try to repair decades of damage. Remember, a football club is meant to be a club. This is accepted as standard on the continent and increasingly in the UK. Of course there should be an NUFC women's team - as well as the same youth teams etc as those for the men / boys.