As some of you may know, I went to the Millennium Stadium on Saturday to see Port Vale beat Brentford in the final of the LDV Vans Trophy. A truly memorable day out even though it absolutely p*ssed it down from first thing in the morning.

I thought some of you might be interested in the follow up. One of our English teachers at school had arranged a “Football Day” for today and had roped me in to help out because she knows bugger all about football! She finds it difficult to get written GCSE coursework out of some of the lads and she did this last year very successfully. Anyway, a while back the Port Vale club captain Tommy Widdrington (ex Southampton) had agreed to come in for the afternoon to be interviewed and take part in various activities with the kids. Much to the delight of the kids he brought his medal and the trophy with him – they got dead excited and these are “hard” 15 year old lads and lasses!

Of course the key thing about this, and the reason I’m telling you all, is that Tommy Widd is a Geordie! When asked which club he had supported as a boy he said Newcastle – talked about how he and his mates started going just about the time Keegan came to the club as a player. Several kids asked him about the most memorable game he’d played in but I asked him which was the best game he’d ever watched and he said “Newcastle 1 QPR 0 when we sucked Keegan’s goal into the net!” He talked about Alan Shearer, whom he knows well from his time at Southampton and is still friendly with. He said what huge admiration he had for the guy because of all the rubbish he’s had to take from the press at times when the reporters don’t know anything about what’s going on behind the scenes in his life.

This bloke is, by Premiership standards, just a journeyman footballer, not a superstar. He was, however, a superb ambassador for his club and for the Geordie Nation!

-- Anonymous, April 25, 2001

Answers

Great story, Jacko. And congrats on the win! :-)

-- Anonymous, April 25, 2001

Nice story Jacko :-)

-- Anonymous, April 25, 2001

Smashing story Jacko - was thinking about on Sunday in the rain.

I think much of the garbage spoken about Alan Shearer is based on pure envy, and/or the fact that he is just normal, clean-living, happily- married Geordie blerk, not newsworthy - in fact a veritable Mary Poppins. Sad, but there you are.

-- Anonymous, April 26, 2001