Leaderboard

My oldest laddie goes to this thing called Feet4Footvall which is all small- sided games and drills using a futsal ball. Anyway Sean and Matty Longstaff used to go and last night their Mam was there at the start of the session and gave a nice little chat about hard work and effort paying off. What a nice, down to earth lady she seems. I know, I know, good family. But it does seem like we have a great set of grounded lads who work hard for each other. I know we’ve got some too quality players we’ve brought in, if you look at Botman, Isak, Bruno, etc. But I love how we’ve got some local lads doing the business for us too who get what the city, club etc is about. I think that helps instil those values in the rest of the squad. Anyway, I’m rambling. But it’s fucking great having a side we’ve all got pride in who care, instead of a bunch of mercenaries

Am reading through the hidden thread to see their reactions and IMO it was more muted than usual (mostly because anyone who posted in the thread was roundly attacked by 5 or 6 other posters because Sunderland were playing too and no one should even be thinking of our game). Came across this though: I just want to take a moment to call this out for what it is. It's cowardice. Fear. Terror, even. The reality he is putting forward is that we have ceased to be a football club anymore, and are now something different, thus negating our rivalry with them. We are no longer Newcastle United. He's right that the rivalry has died in terms of the true meaning of the word. We are now untouchable to them in a very real sense - after a certain point this will be cemented for all time IMO, not that we're quite there yet. He knows this, we know this. It is no longer a rivalry not because we are no longer Newcastle United, but because they are so comprehensively outclassed by every aspect of our club, that the word no longer has meaning. There aren't 3 clubs in the North East anymore, there is one + a few smaller outfits like Gateshead, Blyth and Sunderland. He can try to reframe this however the damn hell he wants, but he is fucking terrified of the day he can't keep reality out anymore. The day we line up against and then absolutely obliterate them. Truthfully we are already doing this, we are obliterating them in relative terms every day of the week - but eventually it'll come through on the football pitch. This is why they don't want promotion. This is why they want to tell themselves that this is no longer a rivalry. This cowardly, weak, pathetic response from them dressed up in "humanitarian concerns" is transparent and obvious. Die on your fucking feet Sunderland fans, you lying, dismal, cringing excuse for a supporter base.

'I see. Is this 'mate' in the room with us now?'

I'm not apologising for the truth I had indeed had a few when I wrote that though, and it disturbs me a bit that you could tell

Richards is going crackers about it on the latest Rest Is Football. Atmosphere, the whole occasion. Tells Shearer off for downplaying how good it was then describes it as "One of the best nights in the history of football"

Carragher was enjoying himself but there's a bit of a condescending tone underneath the surface, 'Yous like a Gregg's up here'. A pastie or a sausage roll.' 'do the dance, we'll do it with you.' Aye it's just a laugh but imagine a cockney ex-pro interviewing him, 'ere, Scouser, you lot laahve a bit of Beatles mania daahntcha? Go on my saan, sing me sergeant peppers lonely hearts claab, I'll join in, daahnt worry.' Or how about, 'Excellent game in midfield today, Roy. You single handedly won that midfield battle for Manchester United, but you love the old blarney don't you, eh? Eh? Why don't you give us all a little Irish jig, I'll join in. Gwaan, gwaan, gwaan. Lol.'

Pissed up and googling the correct spelling of Blyth on a Thursday night. This is what rock bottom looks like, Rayvin.

Rayvin last night: Rayvin this morning: "it disturbs me that you could tell I was drunk"

You two couldn't pull a donut in Krispy Kreme's

What an epic photo!

Quoting this for when you've sobered up!

I wish I'd never fucking asked now.

I remember my mam spending fucking ages on teletext trying to book cheap holidays

Ireland is only switching off its version of Teletext next week. We really do invite the stereotypes on ourselves.

Looking back I enjoyed one of their lads in the first few minutes putting his studs on the ball and backing off basically saying "Come on then, are you gonna try and press us". And we were like "We'll get to that mate. Are you ready?" and then just fucking squeezing them til their pips squeaked for the next 90 minutes.

I liked everything apart from "however the damn hell he wants". That was a bit too Joan Collins in Dynasty for my liking.

I can't believe you didn't ask her if she knew UM? A school boy error, Alex.

Don’t get ratty ffs

Jermaine Jenas (the fucking rat)

My takeaway was how normal our players are though. That interview would never have happened with Chelsea, Arsenal, Man Utd players. You wouldn't see Sterling or Kane doing TikTok dances for a laugh. Whilst fans and managers of other clubs are full of fume against us, I think most pundits and journos think we are class

RAT VAN DEN HAUWE

Is it Gazza?

Yep, you never know when you might need to respond to one.

Yeah…. Southgate loves us though 🤷🏻‍♂️

He's as plastic as anyone. He would sing with the Galatasary fans one week and then slag them off with the Dirty Leeds fans the next.

big meeks is a mag, pass it on

I fucking knew I spelled that wrong - I even googled it afterwards cos it felt wrong. But then I think google returned the results for the word blythe and my inebriated brain just didn't sweat the details from that point

What is sports washing anyway? I've been lurking here for years, but had to sign in to ask this. I understand the concept, but in practice the idea just doesn't bear out. If Saudi are trying to improve their image on the world stage, buying Newcastle is not helping with that. If anything more people are talking about their human rights abuses as every time Newcastle are brought up a bunch of jealous butthurt Newcastle hating tools start banging on publicly about their transgressions bringing even more attention to the Saudis, possibly even to people that maybe were not aware. To me this doesn't seem at all like a "sportswashing" situation and more like a prestige endeavour and local rivalry with other Middle East and Gulf nations. Every time I see sunderland fans banging on about this crap it just comes of as a huge amount of cope. Like Rayvin said in his beautiful soliloquy their entire world is crashing down and this is the only way they can cope with the increasingly large chasm between us. Over my 30 or so years of being a Newcastle fan it seems sunderland fans have been unable to present an identity of their own without it in some way being tied to hating Newcastle and its funny and tragic at the same time. Sorry for the essay, I'm just tired of hearing the term "sportswashing". Of all the criticisms being thrown around like "oil money" and "buying the league" it seems like the most ridiculous and implausible idea.

Young Miss Fist asked Mrs. F. to get her some drinks to take to a party tonight. She’s previously taken fruit ciders, but said she didn’t fancy them tonight, but has no idea what else she’d like. Mrs. F. said “ Leave it to me petal. “ So, she’s off out with 4 cans of Pina Colada and 4 cans of Strawberry Daiquiri I have buckets, hair bands and her Insta password ready and waiting for her return.

You're thinking of that Arsenal blokey Rodent Van Persie

Honestly though, how much of this land was bought under market value or under CPOs, only to be resold a decade later when land and proprty prices have soared. This looks dodgy as fuck, I hope people are paying attention. Labour are going to inherit a catastrophic mess, and it's intentional. What else can you call these people but traitors?

Richards are great fun on the podcast with Shearer and Lineker. You lot bite so fucking easy.

Yay! Success in the Palace ballot

100% this. demand is off the scale because we were a zombie club for more than a decade under ashley. depressing as fuck. i used to watch the match on saturdays on a shit stream out of a sense of duty. there was no fun in it. the wife thought i was mad for torturing myself watching that shite week in week out. i barely even did that the last year or two before the takeover, let alone watch motd. look how active the newcastle forum is on here - it's a good barometer. it was like a ghost town the past 10 years or so, while we all hung out in general chat talking about brexit and covid. i'm so fucking bored of politics, it's a relief to have a good football team to distract from all the real world nonsense again.

I'd imagine it's because in those years we were used to a certain level of success. Qualifying for Europe was pretty much seen as standard. Remember when the fans booed the team for finishing fifth? When you've been starved of any level of ambition or decent football for a decade there's always going to be a huge demand for tickets to see a good side.

This is good https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1709900591185445041.html

Aye this is PL and TP moaning about xG in their car pool Prius, while me and The Fish are doing donuts in our Ferraris in the car park.

They’re doing a prequel to the film ‘The Equalizer’. It’s called ‘One Nil’.

Yes, but I am German. 😉