Non-Geordies, why do you support Newcastle United?

[Jonas]

What an interesting read all this is.

 

Only by the mackem definition can I contribute, Gateshead born, Washington raised. Started going as we were being relegated, second full season was our lowest post-war average, third our worst ever season

So it was glory hunting with me.

 

Dad's a 'Durham Mag' too. Predating not just Keegan the player, nevermind manager, with us, but Keegan actually being a player.

[SiLvOR]

Born and raised in South London. Dad was a Millwall fan ( ) so guided me gently towards his club. I'm 6 years old and Euro 96 is on. Shearer instantly becomes my hero. We all know what happens next, joins Newcastle, so I nail my colours to the mast and support the toon. Dad still takes me to Millwall games, guess he figured I'd grow out of it  

 

Finally when I was 9 (I think) - I used to take part in the Wimbledon FC academy school... things. Anyway, they gave out tickets after the course was complete, and guess who Wimbledon were playing. Newcastle. So we sat in the home end, Shearer scores first and I had to pretend I wasn't on cloud 9. Then Wimbledon equalised and it finished 1-1. So I got to see my club for the first time in the flesh, and by that point, I'm already so in love with the club it was painful. Haven't looked back since.

[Kanji]

Played FIFA as a kid and got into footie through my family, who lived in London and Leicester in the 60s and 70s. World Cup 94 was my first time really watching the sport and I was hooked. My dad used to travel to England to meet biz partners and came back telling me about Alan Shearer + talking about him with his brothers in front of me as being the best striker in the world and maybe England has a chance in Euro 96. One uncle was a massive Liverpool fan when he lived in England and would also tell me about Keegan's Newcastle at the time as KK was his idol. He tried to get me to like Liverpool, but I was always a contrarian. I was torn between BB and Newcastle as I played as Blackburn and Newcastle in the FIFA game as 1) Shearer on BB and 2) the B&W stripes were awesome.  I was 10 at the time. ESPN covered the tourney on ESPN2. I fell for England and Shearer then. I followed him to Newcastle and it officially became my club. And so began the love affair. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by Kanji

[Astroblack]

My mum liked Kevin Keegan and supported whichever team he played for or managed. In 1993 that was NUFC so they became my team.

 

Edit: Might have been 94. I was either three or four. Andy Cole my was hero and all I did was try to fill up my Merlin sicker album. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by Astroblack

[Darth Crooks]

18 minutes ago, adamjk007 said:

Not far from me I'm in Tamworth

sympathies but then again Atherstone is a shithole ?

[HaydnNUFC]

I won't be a Geordie due to living in Chester-le-Street if you ask the massive lads fans despite being born in the RVI so here goes. My fatha wasn't arsed about football despite going to nigh every Newcastle home game between 1969-75ish like most men in the north east outside the proud English white city of Sunderland but then all of a sudden on a sunny day in 1992 King Kev knocked on his Gateshead door with a free Sky dish and declared the North Sea was retreating so he could now support Newcastle. So here I am.

 

Nah but seriously this thread is great.

[Daaaavvvvve]

As a swede born in the mid 80s, grow up with English football every Saturday,

Don't know exactly what it was that got me supporting Newcastle, but I remember that I liked the fact that it's a northern club that the Swedish pundits said was really hard to beat at St James' Park.

Had no other friends supporting Newcastle.

Also liked the name St James' Park by some reason ?

The first game I really remember, and got me really hooked was the Liverpool game 1996 ? (dad supports Liverpool)

The rest is history...a couple of travels to Newcastle, 15 years of a rollercoaster,

A lot of people supporting Liverpool, Man United etc asking: Why Newcastle?! ?

Bulit a "Newcastle mancave"

(Now sadly gone)

1000s of hours spent here at N-O

 

 

 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

It'll be hilarious in the future when people became fans due to Eddie Howe and Isak scoring the winner in the Champions League final. 

[Miercoles]

30 minutes ago, madras said:

Go on.......

https://newcastle-online.org/topic/30356-how-does-newcastle-online-fit-in-to-your-quotofflinequot-life/

 

Here's the original thread, the thesis was about how forums can support an individual who is learning a new skill (in this case, football fandom) by helping them develop their identity as a legitimate practitioner. It sounds belabored as fuck typing it out now, but that's grad school for you.

 

I used this forum and the old Sherdog grappling forum from my other hobby (Brazilian Jiujitsu) as examples of online communities and interviewed members to use as case studies.

 

Funnily enough, Mike was one of the key case studies for the project. Would you believe he's not even from Newcastle? 

[BergenMagpie]

Im from Norway and I didnt really have anyone in my family who was into english football, so no influence there. Like 60-70% of the kids my age I was into Man Utd in the early school years because of OGS. When I got FIFA 2004 I played a season with almost every club and I really enjoyed playing with NUFC. We had to write a self-biography in 7th grade and I included a page about NUFC. 

In 9th grade I had a work-week at the cinema and I didnt really have much to do so I watched a lot of movies. I saw Goal! there which helped my interest as it was basically the first time I saw any real footage of the players/SJP. 

Then I stopped playing football games for a few years until I started playing FM(09) where I created a save with NUFC. As it was the first time I played FM I googled around for some tips for a NUFC save and I found and signed up for the norwegian discussion board. About a week later (as my dad had finally gotten a pirate TV box) I saw what must have been only my 2nd or 3rd PL game, which was Pompey 0 - 3 NUFC. Went balls deep in anything NUFC after that and begged my mom for a kit, which I still wore proudly at high school the day after we were relegated a few months later

[Displayname]

Alan Shearer.

Im told I was a Blackburn fan before he came here, cant really remember it though since I was like 5-6years old.

 

Norwegian btw.

[B-more Mag]

Did it in ‘06, as a grown ass man. The World Cup got me into watching football. I had played (very poorly) as a kid but had never really gotten into it as a spectator. Figured I needed a PL team, as U.S. soccer is … well U.S. soccer. Picked Newcastle because it was furthest north, which is as reasonable as anything else, and hadn’t won anything major in quite some time, which is apparently a requisite for all the teams I support. So I guess it was the heady days of Glenn Roeder and Obafemi Martins what roped me in, anarl. Also, I got on here, and on here is class. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by B-more Mag

[Mike]

3 minutes ago, B-more Mag said:

Did it in ‘06, as a grown ass man. The World Cup got me into watching football. I had played (very poorly) as a kid but had never really gotten into it as a spectator. Figured I needed a PL team, as U.S. soccer is … well U.S. soccer. Picked Newcastle because it was furthest north, which is as reasonable, and hadn’t won anything major in quite some time, which is an apparently a requisite for all the teams I support. So I guess it was the heady days of Glenn Roeder and Obafemi Martins what roped me in, anarl. Also, I got on here, and on here is class. 

 

Genuinely almost beat for beat my origin as well.

[Bellars]

For me, it was 2003 when Jenas scored the opening goal vs Man Utd. That young team had so much promise (Bellamy, Dyer, Jenas, Viana, Woodgate, etc) and some very charismatic players (Shearer, Robert, Solano, Speed, Bernard, LuaLua, etc). Unfortunately, that team never fulfilled its potential, but I was hooked at that point. They made you think anything was possible.

 

 

[RodneyCisse]

For some of the Americans did the NFL thread on the forum bring anyone here?

[Groundhog63]

Great thread ??????

[Flip]

15 minutes ago, Mike said:

 

Genuinely almost beat for beat my origin as well.

Saw no mention of Liverpool...

[FinnMag]

It was Keegan era and Shearer for me. And living in a north Finland, supporting team against southern clubs is in my veins 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by FinnMag

[Cronky]

I was born in Newcastle, but we left when I was 6 months old. The family moved around a lot, but eventually we settled in Manchester when I was 10. I had the option of going for Man U or Man City, but decided on Newcastle. That's a choice that I've occasionally regretted, but not now. 

 

Looking back, I think I was proud to have come from Newcastle, because with all the family's travels, my Mum always said that the people of Newcastle were the kindest and most helpful that she came across.

[pinkeye]

I was born and raised in West Philadelphia and spend most of my youth in the playground playing B/Ball.

Did a fair bit of maxin' and relaxin' but, once day I was confronted by some bigger boys and my mom decided that was that so she moved me to Newcastle to live with my Aunt and Uncle.

 

That is pretty much how I remember it.....

[Ridman]

(born in Poland but moved to Iceland when I was 4.)

 

I had great passion and love for football from a very young age. I remember still being in pre-school and begging my mom to tape the Italy games for the world cup 94, so that I could watch them the day after as the games were played past my bedtime.  Roberto Baggio was my first footballing love and my first heartbreak when he missed that penalty. 

When I was like 7-10 years old we visited Newcastle four years in a row. There were these regular shopping trips to Newcastle from Iceland during that time, similar like you go to Boston nowadays or something. We always stayed at the same hotel and having gone there couple of years in a row we started to get know some of the staff. There was this one guy in particular who always came to check on us and make sure if everything was okay. He asked me if I was into football, I nodded and he told us everything about Newcastle and said we should go to a game if we had time. We didn't manage to go to a game that time but before we left for home on one of these trips, he came to us and gave me a Newcastle Kit with "9 Shearer" on the back. And there was no turning back after that as I religiously started to follow Newcastle ever since.

 

So that's how the ball got rolling for me. Just a shame I wasn't quite skillful enough to make it as a footballer, would have been a great story if I had gone on to play for us. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by Ridman

[Ameritoon]

After the 2006 World Cup I wanted to start watching more football outside of the WC and Champions League. Spent a summer looking into which Premier League club I connected with the most. Pretty earlier on it was clearly Newcastle.

 

Connection with where I grew up—Detroit—was easy to make. I also loved the stadium, the black and white stripes, the idea that were was room to grow (which is finally being realized), and also I loved Goal . Just wanted to support a club with a really passionate fanbase and a good history. The first season in Championship when I would listen to illegal radio streams of most games was when I knew I was hooked.

 

Now I've been to three league matches and loved every second of it and the city as well. Couldn't have been a better fit.

[timeEd32]

The short answer, like many others, is Alan Shearer.

 

The longer answer is I was born in America, but my mom is English. I have dual citizenship. As a kid I spent every summer and Christmas in England. I started to become obsessed with all sports between '92-94. Around that time before I left England each summer I would fill out my fantasy team for the Telegraph (I think it was the Telegraph) and my grandma would mail it in. I have fond memories of my grandfather looking up the football scores on Teletext. World Cup '94 took things to another level and in between that and Euro '96 Shearer became my favorite player, but I didn't really care about Blackburn. I was in England on July 30, 1996 when Shearer signed and that was that - NUFC became my club. I still have the 96-97 shirt with Shearer's name on the back, but it's for a child. 

 

It was hard to follow in those days, but the internet and Soccernet.com (eventually acquired by ESPN) helped. My grandpa thought it was incredible when they would visit in the late 90s / early 2000's and I could read him all the scores, including the 2nd and 3rd division (Sheffield United and Rotherham were of most interest to him). Unfortunately I followed most of Shearer's career and the good times from looking at scores and the table with the occasional tape delayed match, except for when I was in England. Around 2005 TV coverage started to improve a bit, plus illegal streams became easier to find and it's around that time I became even more obsessed. I think I joined this forum in 2007 right when Ashley bought the club. 

[Kanji]

22 minutes ago, RodneyCisse said:

For some of the Americans did the NFL thread on the forum bring anyone here?

 

Nope. I'm OG though. 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2023 by Kanji

[Memphis]

Born and raised in the US, you can probably guess where from my screen name, one of the few that loved soccer but was energized by the 94 World Cup here. Began to drink at that age and loved this particular brown ale from England. Was delighted to learn that there was a team that wore a shirt that had the brown ale I loved to drink on it! This was the infancy of the internet so I started learning about Newcastle United by reading and following results, and watching whatever limited video I could find. They started showing more Premier League on satellite here in the mid 90's and obviously we were very easy on the eyes at that time. Combine all those things and I was completely hooked. Early Champ Man helped me to learn about the league, the other teams, too. Had an English friend through college who brought me shirts. And I signed up here almost 20 years ago. I've also attached a picture of the groom's cake at my wedding in 2008, my wife made the badge herself.

 

Proud to be a supporter.