Middlesbrough 2 - 2 Newcastle - 26/08/07 - Post match reaction from page 18

[Adam]

What ever happened to the Monkey chants that were aimed at Oba at Everton last year ? Or is Islamaphobia the new big craze that everton is getting on with ? Talking to a mate who is a spurs fan and he says Mido used to get chants like that every week from away fans at the lane, plus if boro actually had any fans in the ground they would of made some noise and cancelled out the mido chants.

[Guest Pie]

What ever happened to the Monkey chants that were aimed at Oba at Everton last year ? Or is Islamaphobia the new big craze that everton is getting on with ? Talking to a mate who is a spurs fan and he says Mido used to get chants like that every week from away fans at the lane, plus if boro actually had any fans in the ground they would of made some noise and cancelled out the mido chants.

Are either right? It's all a bit childish to suggest that one discounts the other.

[Adam]

Neither are right, the chants at mido were wrong, but its like toon fans are racist hate all arabs, and no one else has ever done anything wrong or ever been racist in some of the news paper reports.

[Guest Morph]

TBH, I'm racist to fuck, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

[Guest Pie]

Neither are right, the chants at mido were wrong, but its like toon fans are racist hate all arabs, and no one else has ever done anything wrong or ever been racist in some of the news paper reports.

Perhaps. Personally I agree to some extent. However, the easiest way to avoid it is not to do it. Those (wrongly) claiming that saying an Arab/Islamic fella is a terrorist isn't racist are simply inadvertantly condoning it. Condone it and people will think it's fine. It's not. That's not liberal wishy washy nonsense, it's the fact that once we accept that, how far do we go? Not you or I, but the loons who follow any club and live in ponds up and down the country.

[Guest Pie]

My view is the same as the 3 Legends. Not to say that the chants aren't wrong, but they are NO different to chants against Irish people, or Scots, Welsh, French etc.

 

And I think tbh, no one actually cares. All these Middlesbrough fans don't care. They are just having a moan at something.

 

If I was their age and as poorly educated, I might agree too.

[Guest Pie]

TBH, I'm racist to f***, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

Congratulations.

[Guest Pie]

I think what people are missing is that no-one at the game actually thought Mido is a suicide bomber, it was just a joke chant. No-one actually walks round thinking 'oh no, there's a middle eastern man, he must be a terrorist'. The same way no-one actually thinks that all welsh people shag sheep, but no-one bats an eyelid when they chant that.

Again, I agree with the sentiment. However, the impact of sheep shagging is slightly different to the current state of affairs regarding Muslims. The fact that so many people are so dense.

If we accept that it's ok to call an Arab a terrorist, how long before the loons who attack innocent Muslims think that is ok? You only have to look at those who attacked a paediatrician to see how easy it is to see how ill-informed people are....

[Guest Morph]

TBH, I'm racist to f***, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

Congratulations.

 

Am I missing something here?  I'm guessing your not white?

[Guest Pie]

TBH, I'm racist to f***, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

Congratulations.

 

Am I missing something here?  I'm guessing your not white?

Pink with a bit of tan at present. Standard North Eastern complexion with full head of hair and own teeth. No idea if you're missing something. Suspect you might be, or maybe I am, but who knows?

[Keefaz]

TBH, I'm racist to f***, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

Congratulations.

 

Am I missing something here?  I'm guessing your not white?

 

A proper racist would know, surely? Part-timer.

[Paully]

Jeff piissing Winter is at it now 

 

Ferk me man.

 

 

http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8742_2693032,00.html

 

Ban The Brown Ale-Addled Geordies

Posted 29/08/07 13:08

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I don't know if you noticed the lack of coaches, vans and cars from Tyneside last Sunday, but instead a blue tardis parked behind the South Stand.

 

Yes, those Geordies all traveled Dr Who style to the Riverside. The thinking is that those 'magnificent' fans, weary of 40 trophyless years, have decided to travel back in time to the glory years when the FA Cup came to Tyneside and they were a really big club.

 

This was their first trip and as you would expect there were some teething troubles. In travelling back they inherited some of the problems of those earlier years, you know, like racist behaviour and other childish goings-on.

 

Remember when you were about six and you used to run around the schoolyard calling people names, usually in rhymes; well it was easy if the names were Bell which rhymed with Smell or Bob that rhymed with Knob but sometimes it was more difficult, for example Mido. That would really test even the most stupid Brown Ale-addled Geordie.

 

In those days Newcastle had a worse reputation than most when it came to black players. I even recall the Geordie faithful giving their own black players stick and it seemed for a time that they did not want to sign players who had the same skin colour as half of their famous striped shirts.

 

Thankfully, times have moved on now. We live in a multi-racial society where every colour and creed display their skills in the Premiership, but not for the space-travelling Geordies. Their behaviour on Sunday at once dispelled the myth that they are the loveable army but instead put them near the bottom of the 'Scumbag' fans league table. They are now on a par with those who sing about 'ice on runways' and the like.

 

Now don't get me wrong as not all fans from Newcastle are like this. They are loyal and deserving of more success, but 3,000 is not a small minority. Did the decent folk amongst the travelling support shout down the idiots who started their practised vitriol? Guilty by association then, I am afraid.

 

It will be very interesting to see what happens next. The silence from St James' is deafening. What action will the FA take? None probably.

 

A question for the Geordie dickheads. With Muslims like Emre in your side and with Big Sam's reputation for signing all colours and creeds, do you think players will want to come to a club whose supporters behave like this?

 

I have previously supported the call to give Newcastle fans the whole South Stand, sell the tickets and have a better atmosphere. It's not like we can sell them ourselves. But now; well perhaps next season we should ban the travelling support altogether? Let them take their tardis back into the dark ages where they belong.

 

This article first appeared on www. boronation.com and you can read more Jeff Winter at www.jeffwinterentertainmentandmedia.co.uk

 

 

 

 

 

[Wullie]

True Faith:

 

Apparently, there was almost an international incident on Teesside on Sunday. Early reports to the tf bunker claim the Foreign Secretary, David Milliband is working tirelessly to prevent the Egyptian Embassy from cutting off diplomatic relations with the Milburn Paddock and put a blockade on the export of fezes to Gateshead. Pyramid selling (geddit?) has reported some tumbling share values.

 

Louise Taylor, who has written for official Sunderland publications (Legion of Light) has something called Islamaphobia in The Guardian. The symptoms are half-witted football journalists and other media knackas talking shite about stuff they have heard on some late night telly and which they think makes them sound clever. And enlightened. Unlike those brutes in the away end. Tsk!

 

Gareth Southgate has managed to talk about "civil liberties" with a straight face. Mido has accused the away end of being "drunks". Drunks? How dare he? Temperance Mags are writing to the Home Secretary demanding an apology. Geordies? Over-imbibing on a match day? The very idea. Hic!

 

The most nauseating reaction however has come from fans of The Beas .... sorry, Boro who have displayed a sickeningly po-faced reaction to some chanting at a football match. I can't help but reflect on some white folks from Teesside complaining about some white folks from Tyneside chanting nonsense at an Egyptian lad and attempting to prove how much they care by ramping up their anti-racist rhetoric.Amidst all the attempts to climb onto the moral high ground, I've not heard one local Muslim - from Tyneside or Teesside pass comment. I'm sure when some of them have finished rattling off their hand-wringing bollocks (and I had the misfortune to read one blog yesterday which was sickening in its "end of the world is nigh" prophecies and couldn't be arsed to get to the end of before nodding off) they sit down with a nice cup of cocoa, smile smugly at their reflection and feel the glow of a world put to rights.

 

Was the chanting towards Mido racist? Hmm, maybe in that it labelled him as a terrorist on account of his Arabic-Muslim background by way of a crude link that really could only ever have been made in the rareified atmosphere of a football match. Were the people who were chanting the Mido stuff racists? Give me a break.

 

Should those chants be a regular feature of our away support? Absolutely not. But not because a puffed up, self absorbed millionaire footballer who maybe takes himself a bit too seriously doesn't understand the subtleties of football crowds on the wind up (Posh Spice Takes It Up The Arse anyone?) but because I wonder what a Geordie-Muslim might think were he-she to be in a crowd chanting that stuff or hear it on TV etc. If that kind of chant made them reflect Newcastle United wasn't for them, then I'd be more saddened by some dick-footballer who can't control himself. And I'd think exactly the same if there were songs about Jews, Hindus you name it. I'd just like to think Newcastle United is for everyone who lives around here, loves the city, the people and values their Geordie identity. That's all that matters, not the nauseating prose of attention seeking gimps who I'm pretty sure look forward to this kind of shite with morbid relish.

 

I'm sometimes left wondering what the media, the self appointed arbiters of morality and taste really want from football crowds. Answers on a postcard.

 

Real racism is evil. It diminishes the victim and the perpetrator but it is about denying access to jobs, homes, education, opportunities etc. Does Gareth Southgate know the meaning of civil liberties?

 

Since records began, English life has had a side to it which loves to get pissed, sing bawdy songs (that occassionally aren't very pleasant), insult people and revel in their misfortunes (here the media play a critical role in the modern age) and no-one takes it very seriously. That's not to underestimate real racist chanting and monkey noises which is bang out of order but for the mealy-mouthed mugs of Middlesbrough to start trotting out homilies about some of the horrid songs we sing at them only a matter of a few seasons after their number chanted "Town Full of Rapists" represents a strange kind of pick and mix morality that frankly, is easy to ignore. Prissy.

 

Move On.

[Taylor Swift]

TBH, I'm racist to fuck, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

 

We already know that. Not that it's anything to be proud of. And I'm brown btw, if that will make a difference.

[Wullie]

TBH, I'm racist to fuck, but there's no need to disgrace the name of NUFC in any way, shape or form.

 

We already know that. Not that it's anything to be proud of. And I'm brown btw, if that will make a difference.

 

Uuurrrrrr!

[Skeletor]

Jeff piissing Winter is at it now 

 

Ferk me man.

 

 

http://www.football365.com/story/0,17033,8742_2693032,00.html

 

Ban The Brown Ale-Addled Geordies

Posted 29/08/07 13:08

EmailPrintSave

 

 

I don't know if you noticed the lack of coaches, vans and cars from Tyneside last Sunday, but instead a blue tardis parked behind the South Stand.

 

Yes, those Geordies all traveled Dr Who style to the Riverside. The thinking is that those 'magnificent' fans, weary of 40 trophyless years, have decided to travel back in time to the glory years when the FA Cup came to Tyneside and they were a really big club.

 

This was their first trip and as you would expect there were some teething troubles. In travelling back they inherited some of the problems of those earlier years, you know, like racist behaviour and other childish goings-on.

 

Remember when you were about six and you used to run around the schoolyard calling people names, usually in rhymes; well it was easy if the names were Bell which rhymed with Smell or Bob that rhymed with Knob but sometimes it was more difficult, for example Mido. That would really test even the most stupid Brown Ale-addled Geordie.

 

In those days Newcastle had a worse reputation than most when it came to black players. I even recall the Geordie faithful giving their own black players stick and it seemed for a time that they did not want to sign players who had the same skin colour as half of their famous striped shirts.

 

Thankfully, times have moved on now. We live in a multi-racial society where every colour and creed display their skills in the Premiership, but not for the space-travelling Geordies. Their behaviour on Sunday at once dispelled the myth that they are the loveable army but instead put them near the bottom of the 'Scumbag' fans league table. They are now on a par with those who sing about 'ice on runways' and the like.

 

Now don't get me wrong as not all fans from Newcastle are like this. They are loyal and deserving of more success, but 3,000 is not a small minority. Did the decent folk amongst the travelling support shout down the idiots who started their practised vitriol? Guilty by association then, I am afraid.

 

It will be very interesting to see what happens next. The silence from St James' is deafening. What action will the FA take? None probably.

 

A question for the Geordie dickheads. With Muslims like Emre in your side and with Big Sam's reputation for signing all colours and creeds, do you think players will want to come to a club whose supporters behave like this?

 

I have previously supported the call to give Newcastle fans the whole South Stand, sell the tickets and have a better atmosphere. It's not like we can sell them ourselves. But now; well perhaps next season we should ban the travelling support altogether? Let them take their tardis back into the dark ages where they belong.

 

This article first appeared on www. boronation.com and you can read more Jeff Winter at www.jeffwinterentertainmentandmedia.co.uk

 

 

 

 

 

 

Classy. Doesn't he have better things to do like invent new reasons to call off Boro games?

[Wullie]

This review, coupled with the fact that he has his own "entertainment and media" website, pretty much tell you all you need to know about Jeff Winter: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/columnists/giles_smith/article726395.ece 

 

THE title of Jeff Winter’s newly published autobiography, as printed on the jacket, is Who’s The B*****d In The Black? A rare moment of enigmatic coyness, there, from the retired football official from Middlesbrough. Have you guessed what the missing word is yet? Buzzard? Blizzard? Biscuit tin lid? Keep guessing.

 

The book had to be tenderly handled in discussions on talkSPORT this week, where presenters felt compelled to refer to it as: “Who’s The (brief but pregnant moment of radio silence) In The Black?” Good to see a media outlet, in this day and age, taking people’s sensitivities into account. At the same time, if you can’t say “bastard” when talking about Jeff Winter on talkSPORT, where and when can you say it?

 

Interestingly, though, the question “Who’s the bastard in the black?” is not much asked in football grounds these days — not for reasons of nicety, but because when today’s fans wish to berate a referee to the tune of Bread of Heaven, they tend to ask a different question. Perhaps Winter figured that, as a title for an autobiography, “Who’s The W****r In The Black?” would have been an act of self-deprecation too far. Certainly it would have sent out an altogether different message.

 

Still, there is no reason why terrace chants in this area shouldn’t continue to present a rich seam for the titles of referees’ books. At any rate, one eagerly awaits publication of “The Referee’s A W****r: The Life And Times Of Graham Poll”. We can’t have too many books by refs, can we? Their struggles, their handball decisions, their games of Connect 4 with Paul Durkin during elite-list training days at Staverton — these things are the lifeblood of sporting literature and they come thrillingly alive in the 302 hardback-bound pages, plus index and plates, of Winter’s life story. I say “life story” because Winter’s book ostensibly takes the form of an autobiography. Yet, as readers will rapidly discover, it’s so much more than that.

 

Who’s The B*****d In The Black? is, in its own way, a work of fantasy fit to rank alongside such classics of the genre as The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien and Glenn Hoddle’s My 1998 World Cup Diary.

 

Here, for instance, is Winter on his last game in charge at Anfield: “I had mixed feelings. On the one hand I wanted to finish the game a little early and get off the pitch before people saw big tough Jeff Winter in tears. Then again, I didn’t want the game to end. Liverpool were 4-0 up, so it was in my hands. Nobody would care either way. In the end I played a little bit extra, waiting until play was at the Kop end, before sounding the final shrill blast — a bit like the Last Post. The fans behind the goal burst into spontaneous applause. It was longer and louder than normal, even for a big home win. Did they know it was my final visit? Was the applause for me? They are such knowledgeable football people, that it would not surprise me.”

 

Note the referee’s use of added time as a dramatic device — not something you often see openly discussed. One had assumed, perhaps naively, that when the fourth official held up the board on 90 minutes, the numbers on it represented a stipulated minimum period to be added on, rather than a notional, ballpark figure for the referee to adapt according to his emotions and his sense of the day’s narrative arc.

 

Does this seem shocking to you? Winter is clearly right that, with the score at 4-0, the material outcome of the match was unalterable at that point, beyond possibly trifling matters relating to goal difference. And even had a player, say, broken a leg in those added seconds while “big tough Jeff Winter” waited for the ball to go up near the Kop, I’m sure they would have reasoned that it was all part of the emotion of the occasion.

 

It’s an interesting question, though, that Winter asks about the fans. Do you suppose the appreciation heard at Anfield that day was for the club’s players and staff after a 4-0 home victory during a down-to-the-wire race with Newcastle United for the final Champions League qualifying place (a piece of context strangely absent from Winter’s tearful recollection)? Or was it the traditionally warm Merseyside send-off for a dearly cherished b*****d?

 

Bear in mind that the final day of the season, the usual time for fond farewells of all kinds, was still a fortnight away and that this was merely the Anfield leg of a schedule that Winter himself says “sometimes felt like a farewell tour of the country”. My hunch, for what it’s worth, is that, what with all the other distractions, remembering to acknowledge Winter’s curtain call would have taxed the concentration even of Liverpool’s “knowledgeable football people”.

 

Then again, maybe I haven’t been watching closely enough. I go to quite a lot of matches and did so throughout Winter’s professional career. Yet, to be honest, and much as it may shame me to admit, I can’t recall a single game I have attended that Winter took charge of. I mean, I know he was out there on occasions and I was certainly vaguely aware of him from time to time. But in terms of putting his face to specific matches — nothing.

 

It’s clear to me now that I must even have caught him on his farewell tour and didn’t realise. That is a source of bitter regret, obviously, after reading the autobiography. I would have held a lighter aloft — assuming it was a night game. Ah, well. I can use the book to fill in the gaps. It takes us all the way from Winter’s first appointment to run the line in the Football League (“Congratulations, you bugger,” a friend told him. “I knew you’d make it”), through to the climactic moment where he kisses the medal presented to him as referee of the 2004 FA Cup Final between Manchester United and Millwall (“I had lived the dream”).

 

In between, we visit the City Ground, Nottingham, for Winter’s first Premiership match, where the pictures in the foyer of Forest players with the European Cup seem daunting to the rookie ref on the way in, but not on the way out. “I felt relaxed and confident,” he writes, “and didn’t even glance up at the European Cup winners on the wall. I was in the big league with them now and didn’t need to feel inferior.”

 

And we join the official in his car when he takes the call confirming his Cup Final invitation. “I felt an inner calm. I felt exalted but in control. I sensed I was at the very pinnacle.” And to think that Steve Bruce, the manager of Birmingham City, called this man “an absolute prat”.

 

Sadly, of course, the story is over. But the legend lives on and, in the interests of tending its flame, we now ask, did you see Winter on his farewell tour? Were you there for Winter, one last time? At Fratton Park, say? Or Portman Road? How was it for you? Emotional? Did you keep the ticket stub, or any other memento of the occasion? Write in and tell us about it.

[Keefaz]

Think the TF article is the best thing I've read yet on this.

[Guest Knightrider]

All these chants prove is that we truly do live in a trivia obsessed overblown world and that I find is more sickening than anything chanted at the Riverside on Sunday.

[JH]

Ironically enough, there's actually an Islamic Awareness day at St James Park tomorrow - http://www.vonne.co.uk/events/#islamic - they'll be talking about on BBC Radio Newcastle tomorrow morning because I've been told I may be speaking on the Breakfast show trying to defend football in terms of racism and these chants.

[Guest Knightrider]

Why do we need to be made aware of Islam? After 9/11 the whole fucking world knows about it.

[Guest Pie]

All these chants prove is that we truly do live in a trivia obsessed overblown world and that I find is more sickening than anything chanted at the Riverside on Sunday.

So you're no just bored then? As for trivia obsessed? Well you havent had to waste the amount of time we have reading the shit you write! 

[Wullie]

Hypocrisy needs a kick it out campaign

 

It would be typical if the FA's bark over the racism directed at Mido turned out to be an ineffectual bite.

Marina Hyde

August 29, 2007 11:59 PM

 

Much as one hates to pre-empt the outcome of another of those famously sabre-toothed FA inquiries, the stench of inaction is already beginning to hover around the fact that a significant number of Newcastle supporters racially abused Mido during their side's 2-2 draw with Middlesbrough on Sunday.

 

Soho Square has begun an investigation, and is talking of banning orders if the police identify the culprits, but Middlesbrough will not be demanding an apology. Quite unforgivably, meanwhile, Newcastle have refused to comment. And already, we have been treated to the views of apologists for the fans who persistently chanted "Mido, he's got a bomb you know; Mido's got a bomb" at the Egyptian striker, along with other Islamophobic abuse that somehow contrived to be even less artful.

 

Speaking to this newspaper, one Ian Cusack of the Newcastle fanzine True Faith described the chants as "unsavoury". "But I don't think they were racist," he went on. "Newcastle have Muslim players. Emre is a Muslim . . . The chants should be placed in the context of local rivalry."

 

It takes a special sort of idiotic blindness, really, to downgrade racism to something that can be excused on account of geography, and it would be nice to think that Mr Cusack might dedicate the next issue of his magazine to expanding on this point, perhaps extrapolating his argument to notable episodes in civil rights history.

 

In the meantime, there is only his we've-got-a-Muslim-too defence, which some might find redolent of the attempt by The Office's Chris Finch to bat away those tired charges of misogyny. "How can I hate women?" is his triumphant staple. "My mum's one."

 

Yet it is the mention of Emre that elicits associations of a different sort. The Turkish midfielder is arguably not regarded as the Premier League's poster boy for tolerance. For reasons upon which we can only speculate, accusations of racism have dogged him at several turns. Last season, he was accused of racially abusing Bolton's El-Hadji Diouf and Watford's Al Bangura, though neither claim drew a charge. But it was the claim made by Everton's Joleon Lescott and Tim Howard that he had racially insulted their team-mate Joseph Yobo - and the FA inquiry that followed it - which is perhaps more significant. Lescott stated in his written submission that Emre had called Yobo "a fucking negro"; Howard that he had called him "a fucking nigger". This proved just the discrepancy the lawyers needed. Emre denied the charge and the FA committee pronounced itself "not satisfied that the charge was proved".

 

Lescott subsequently gave a disillusioned interview which should be required reading for all of those who subscribe to the view that the English game has so totally eradicated racism from its pitches and stands that its only remaining work is to sit in morally superior judgment over the rest of Europe's baying savages.

 

Immediately following the incident at Goodison, it became apparent to Lescott that people were attempting to play down the incident. As for the inquiry, he "didn't agree with the way it was dealt with. It felt like [he and Howard] were on trial as much as Emre was . . . I felt hurt by [the result], having gone to the trouble of making a complaint, attending the hearing, making a stand."

 

Back to today, and Newcastle's failure to issue a statement at the very least condemning Islamophobia in football speaks volumes. The FA making the chanting a police matter should not be used as an excuse to let the club's distasteful mulishness slide.

 

It doesn't help that Mido was booked for holding his finger to his lips in front of the abusive fans, who will inevitably go largely unpunished - though the referee, Mike Dean, is understood not to have heard them. But it just doesn't look great, just as it looked suspiciously topsy-turvy when Fifa fined Cameroon £86,000 for wearing the wrong kit in the 2004 African Cup of Nations, and the Spanish FA £45,000 for the racist chanting during England's friendly in Madrid the same year.

 

Of the Kick It Out campaign, Lescott now says "I probably would think twice about wearing one of those T-shirts again." That is a profoundly depressing statement, and one that should force the FA to embark on a newly energised drive to eradicate the continuing and morphing instances of racism from the game. They could start by condemning Newcastle for their silence, and ensuring that events at October's Kick It Out Week of Action highlight these kinds of shaming failures, rather than dwelling solely - complacently, even - on the success stories. That is, unless they're all T-shirt and no trousers.

 

More from the Guardian. Jesus.

[JH]

Fucking hell. We really are hated aren't we? I doubt there'll be many National newspapers backing Newcastle or letting us have our say on it. Fighting a losing battle, that's why the club aren't releasing a statement. They know it'll make no difference.

[Newcastle Fan]

f****** hell. We really are hated aren't we? I doubt there'll be many National newspapers backing Newcastle or letting us have our say on it. Fighting a losing battle, that's why the club aren't releasing a statement. They know it'll make no difference.

 

Imagine all the load of crap i've been getting latley, even my dad who never follows football calls me going "Why are you supporting a club with racist fans"

 

 

"Fuck off. Dad"...