Absolutely incredible view from the new tier in the Leazes. Just breathtaking. We have twice the legroom we had in the lower part of the stand (you can pass one another without having to stand up)and a bit more shoulder room as well (the bloke next to me last season was also quite stocky so we had to watch the games sideways on so we could fit).

The pitch is like subbuteo from up there, with the vertical elevation being so steep that you actually get a really good idea of what people are up to even if you can't make out facial expressions. Problem is that the view is so much from above that Derby's last shot looked in to us and we were well into hiding our faces before we realised we were still ahead.

The view over the City is just phenomenal, though. Bearing in mind how big the Gallowgate is as it towers above you as you walk up the hill, you can imagine how amazing it is to look down over it. We have a beautiful view of the Tyne Bridge and Gateshead (I'm sure you can see the Angel as well - must bring some binoculars to confirm it) and all the way out to the coast. I can clearly see the gas risers on the hill above my house which will lend it a special poignancy when I can keep an eye on my family and football team at the same time.

The only niggles are that despite the amazing amount of legroom and what have you, the access steps are way too narrow and will be an absolute deathtrap if we ever need to evacuate for some reason. The new facilities are also a bit cramped for the numbers using them (the bogs are awful - first home game and lads were pissing in the sinks already) and they need to get an extractor fan in the main concourse as it was unpleasantly thick with cigarette smoke. I have somehow managed to get stereo smoking again this season with the people either side of me totally incapable of curbing their disgusting habit for a couple of hours, although how they got up all those stairs in the first place is a mystery.

The lad in M514 has a fine and lusty voice (although he cannot carry a tune) and the man to his left in M515 joins in if the chaps in N512-N515 join in with M514. M513 and M512 wouldn't know what a song was and the wife in this combination clicked her tongue a few times when M514 started bellowing encouragement. Perhaps this is why she felt the need to smoke so much. Row L is entirely made up of pay-on-the-day seats, 2 of which remained empty, and not one of the buggers sang throughout. Hopefully the 6 of us happy to make a noise will recruit a few more as the season gets going, but it was hard work last night.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Answers

Hopefully I'll be in row L one day this season Softie bellowing out so much that you'll be gald I'm not there the next home game ;0)

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Hope so DB, it would be so much better than the lot there last night. The worst thing is that they were all clearly mates so they had no reason to feel intimidated or self-conscious, especially with my dodgy singing behind them. There was a chap beyond them who was very animated, mind, with "Suck Funderland" on his back who I had seen in the Strawberry before hand.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Do the new seats 'in the gods' have cushioned seats Softie?

The new seats in the lower East Stand - where the boxes used to be - seem to have them. Very nice.

I've got the new TV camera gantry directly above my head. This nicely blocks out ANY sound from the PA - partial blessing as last season it was bloody deafening. Last season they also placed PA loudspeakers directly above the counter of the refreshment kiosks in the East Stand such that orders to those trying to serve were entirely inaudable.

To accomodate the ladder to the new TV gantry they've moved my seat about 9 inches into the gangway, which means I've got more leg room and a somewhat better view. However, to accomplish this they've simply narrowed the exit aisle to the row behind (my seat is in the 2nd back row) to about 12 inches wide - and as one wag said "I better cut down on the cream cakes or I could get stuck in here for life!".

Given all the contruction work in the vicinity, the seats of course were all absolutely filthy. I'm sure it never occurred to anyone that most of the filth and detritus should perhaps be scraped from the seats before the paying customers arrived to use them!

The 'coups de grace' for lack of consideration however goes to the poor sod who sits behind me who now has to sit with the new gantry ladder between his legs, and bob & weave either side of the ladder to watch the game - I kid you not! Brave new dawn?

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

I have a theory on this singing lark. It seems that to be in regular good vocal spirit you need a couple of things. You need good opposition that scares you so much that you do actually realise that getting behind the team may actually work. Playing a drossy team who you expect to beat is a hinderance to good atmosphere.

It also helps if you are crap...and haven't won anything in ages. You build up a kind of siege mentality when it come to support. Big clubs and winning clubs with Johhny-come-latelys and bandwaggoners and day trippers etc DO NOT have any history of seeing their team shit and being baited by the opposition....so when the baiting occurs....e.g. "you're supposed to sing at home" many of them turn and stare and wonder what that is all about.

Many people actually see football as a form of entertainment....quite absurd actually. Personally speaking I do not go to be entertained...but many many do..and as such they see their role as spectators and not supporters. In this new era of all seater stadia you can all too easily get hundreds of these people mixed up with maybe 10 (TEN) old school hard-core supporters...and 10 singers will not generate a right aol ball surrounded by folk who actually have no idea what to do.

At our club we have actually tried to address this problem. The fans have been asked who wants to sing(can U feckin' believe that.....but nowadays that's the way it is..singing and SUPPORTING isn't a prerequisite of being a fan anymore) and they have been allocated in the new stand. It will work and it will get better (God knows why they put us in the heavens tho...groundside would surely have been better)but at least it has been addressed.

You can tell things are bad when 51,000 Geordies were quiet for long patches of your game last night. Ok..had that been us playing Derby I could have had a conversation with Sam....in the Scoreboard end :-)

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Minor niggle - the public address is absolute pants. Never made out a single word of any announcement all night.

Surely it wouldn't have bust the bank to include a video type PA even if only to put up the starting lineup and substitutions, etc.

And replays of the goals would be nice.

Even one of those shift register thingys like they've got up outside the ground showing ticket availabilty etc, would be better than the row that passes for PA at the moment.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Agree Pit Bill. Got deafened by sh*te "music" as soon as I walked in but couldn't hear the team line-up at all.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Major niggle that turned out (I hope) not to be. As Softie says, the leg room is just what the doctor ordered, but it worried me a bit that the terraces are so deep that the backs of the seats in front only show about six inches, and it struck me that it would be a doddle to stumble forward and trip on the six inches and keep going till you hit the touch line.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

No cushions for us, but the PA was very audible at the top. Perhaps that's what they were concentrating on. Couldn't hear a word last season, mind, and could have strangled the moron reading score updates. They had a habit of throwing in a remark like "Everton Southampton goalless but extra time being played"

Argh!!! The only way to read results is:
Team Name - number - Team Name - number

You manage to decipher that as long as they don't break the pattern, but they kept on doing it so you had no idea what the scores were until you got to see CEEFAX in the Strawberry.

The singing thing is infuriating. I get embarrassed singing on my own and stop if nobody else joins in, but I feel even more self-conscious sitting in a quiet area if they are singing nearby. I find football infinitely more enjoyable when you are all making plenty of noise even if the game is a bit shite. Not singing is like leaving early: a self-defeating habit which simply denies you an essential part of the experience and actually detracts from the occasion for other people round about you. Sing out and stay to the end.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

That's where I love the away matches, you get this sense of being the minority, which of course you are but you feel you have to do something about it! Like sing for as long as anyone will join in with you.

Xmas being a paticularly good time but I will be back home seeing my parents for the Xmas period! Derby away on the way up the M1 though! great Idea

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Re singing - you always see a few (thankfully normally just a few) who look disapprovingly when the volume rises. Are there any people here that understand this mentality. I don't want to have a go, I just want to understand.

As a complete aside, do any others start writing a reply, only for that annoying thing called work to get in the way, so you end up actually posting what you started about an hour after you wrote it (if you don't scrap it, that is)?

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Re. the scoreboard I wonder if the club still has the old "dancing space-invader" scoreboard locked away somewhere. It'll give us a little reminder from where we have come to resurect it at the top of the Gollowgate. Idet you couldn't read it from the Leases upper tier though.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

As I've said elsewhere I am really happy with the location of my seats (next to the platinum club) on line with the grass behind the goal in the Milburn Stand below the boxes.
The singing was a concern of mine, there were a few of us in each row around me trying to join in but every time I started bellowing the old fella to my right got startled and it put me right off. After a few drinks my eyesight deterioates, hence I awarded Speed the third goal with "Speed can hit them from there can't he". The tannoy was unclear, I thought the mackems had drew when it was announced on the way out and only the huge cheer convinced me otherwise.
A small annoyance is the "Stand up if you love the toon/hate Sunderland" chant, I feel blackmailed into this every time.

I was unimpressed at the amount of Platinum members that took the extra 5 minutes to finish their half time refreshments, if I can neck a pint of Guiness without missing so much as a kick of the ball surely they can do likewise especially when they have the facility to have their drinks waiting for them at half time.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Actually, the atmosphere at times was awesome, However, my theory is that we are better at getting cross about things. Best atmopshere last season was Shearer getting sent off. Fury gets us going. More than the singing, I was delighted at the individual examples of people getting apoplectic sbout things. Felt like it was about 15 years ago.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

I really wonder why the non-singers go. I presume they'd say "for the atmosphere". But we ARE the F*****G atmosphere! The non-singers are freeloaders and really drag down the experience for the rest of us.

Also some so-called "fans" in the Gallowgate had nowt but abuse for some of our players last night. These tossers should be forcibly ejected and sentenced to attend the SOL where their bile would be more appropriate.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Family Enclosure was fine. 91 steps higher than my old seat but still a good view.

Would have liked them to have opened the trunstiles before 7:15 though. I eventually went to the safety steward, told him there were kids getting distressed in the big queues that were forming, and that HE was responsible for it and had to open the turnstiles NOW. The poor guy looked like he was about to have a panic attack but the tuirnstiles opened instantly. (Don't cross me eh)

Tried to buy burgers in the new area. Got served quickly but amazingly inefficiently. First attampt at till was #3.70, too low I told him. Tried again ... #11.00. Too big, try again. #17.70. No you need to cancel the old one, but your total looks to be about #6.30 or #6.70. Tries again. #24.00 okay so it's #6.30 for sure. Confused look from server, as to how on earth I can work out it is #6.30. Let's call supervisor over. I tell her she'll need to cancel the existing total. I KNOW what I'm doing sir. New total of #30.30 supervisor strops off to get replacement till despite my suggestions that the on/off switch may help.

Tasty though.

Oh yeah, tannoy is perfect at this level, every letter of the Toyota number plate from Rutherford Street could be heard.

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Sounds like quite an amazing view up in the Gods, Softie! You'll have to get a few pictures on a clear day. Shame with all the fuss about being the 'finest stadium in Europe' or whatever they seem to have missed so many details. Steph...what was Jon's impression of his seat? I hope there's some singers there!

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Don't get me wrong, the overall impression was that it's excellent, but they know as well as we do that there are things that will need to be perfected in the next few weeks: I'd have thought getting some air in the concourse would be relatively easy, although I quite understand their not wanting to open any windows :-)

One thing that I do miss is people being able to bang on the side of the Leazes like a great drum: Boom! Boom! Boo-ba-boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! "Geordies!!!"

Howay Freddy, how's about getting a f*ck off great civil war drum in there like Thin Lizzy used to use..."Down from the glen came the marching men!" Yeah!

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

I was a lot higher up than I expected to be, I was dead centre of the leazers end, midway up the block between the Sports bar and the family enclosure. Perhaps they've given me softies old seat? Actually it was a very good seat to be in. The pluses were a good view of the whole pitch, an audable PA system, an awesome view a the rest of the toon now the roof has been raised , being within earshot of the away fans and to top it all some good lads and lasses most of whom sung their hearts out for the lads, or didn't frown on me when I did. The negatives about my seats, and my views on the stadium in general:- Couldn't make out many of the players at the far end due to the distance from the pitch, the bad language from some of the fans behind me ,(I was with my bairn) and the fact that I couldn't take my son into the Family enclosure lounge at half time. OK ..... so I see their point that they want to keep it a family area and don't want it overun by drunken foulmothed fans, but hey I had my kid with me so I would be on my best behaviour..As for the stadium, it was quite spectacular when full, and could potentially become very noicy. A couple of minor improvements could be made by locating 3 large screens facing inwards suspended from the new roof in the Milburn, North west Corner and upper SJH stand, with replays of incidents being shown for those too far away to see properly. If the Screens were large enough they could be used for beembacks? Another thing that spoils it is the unfinished look to the roof where it joins the East stand and Brown ale stand. Perhaps some extra large Brown ale advertising hoardings would be better than the skeleton of the old roof? Overall though I'm really pleased that my origional application for two higher priced seats in the gods were refused. I've got better seats in a better part of the ground (atmospherically speaking) than I was expecting to get, and my nightmares about beeing seated next to a fan from hell that comentates incessantlty through the game slagging off our players at the slightest oppotunity were unfounded. Rik's a happy chappy

-- Anonymous, August 24, 2000

Jonno is spot on. Never mind the wet blankets with faces like slapped arses. Drink an extra pint for them before the match and just keep singing yer hearts out for the lads. I'm sure at least some of them will get the gist and join in as the season progresses. Maybe they just need to learn the words of the songs ?

I pity any off-duty librarian who tries to shush me at my first game in four years ! ;o))

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000

I've been guilty on a few occasions of taking along mates to a game who are neutrals, and hence don't participate in the singing. The last time was the West Ham away game last season - so I don't think his lack of performance had much of an effect overall ;-)

The worst instance of bizarre looks was at a pre-season game at Reading. I really don't think many of the people there had ever been to a game before (but don't tell LR ;-) )

-- Anonymous, August 25, 2000