... and it DOES seem a day too much. Actually, it often feels like 40 years too much. :-)

I'm over the moon (quite literally Brian), to see us drawn at home in the FAC Round 3. This game will mark the 40th anniversary of my first visit to SJP on January 6th 1962. The 11-y-o, beardless (then as now) Jonno, sallied forth with friend David Athey on the number 11 stagecoach bus from Seghill to alight at the Haymarket and take the hallowed walk up to Gallowgate through that narrow cobbled cut (which I fear is about to disappear as the demolition of Hewitsons Tile Works looked imminent last time I looked).

I remember marvelling at the climb up the steps at the Gallowgate end, and noting the similarity of the floodlights to the ones you could buy for your "Subbuteo" game. (The players spinning around aimlessly, completely missing the ball and lying prone on the turf was also somewhat reminiscent of the table football variant, although it was disappointing to note that the keeper wasn't operated by a wire through the back of the goal.)

It was a glorious start to my Toon career. Second division United were up against Peterbro, newly elected to Div 4 (replacing Gateshead if memory serves, hoyed oot the league because of their location in the far north one suspects - other clubs had successfully applied for re-election more often). "Posh" won Div 4 by a country mile with record points and goals. Sadly, they also won through to Round 4 as well as they dumped the Toon out by a single goal from Terry Bly in the second half.

Team Hollins; McKinney, Ferguson; Wright, Thompson, Dalton; White, Harrower, McGuigan, Allchurch, Tuohy.

I can recall nothing of the game itself (traumatic amnesia, or possibly just senility presumably), but I do recall the 1/6d entry(7.5p for the benefit of younger readers), the cone-shaped "Tanner-a-bag" (2.5p) peanuts and yes, being quite awestruck by the climb up the hill at the Gallowgate end (well I was a bit smaller then), the half-time scoreboard, the 5-minute and 10-minute flags, the rattles (how I longed to have one of those), the bovril, the Romans (oops - kept the rewind button on too long there). Yes 0-1 to Peterbro. I should have packed it in then and there and saved myself a great deal of grief in the intervening period. But once you're hooked ....

So I shall certainly be there on January 6th (or whenever SKY deigns that we shall play the game), and, if I'm spared, and if my zimmerframe will fit through the door, I will be in the Strawberry (unlike that distant day in 1962) to sign autographs, provide photo-opportunities, and give media interviews to mark this auspicious occasion. I look forward to seeing many of you there when I can regale you all with tales of derring-do and many FAC round 3 exits selected from the last 40 years of unswerving and almost entirely unrewarded fanaticism.

(Right lads and lasses - that's made sure we'll have a bit of room in The Strawberry before the Palace game. See you there!) :-)

-- Anonymous, December 09, 2001

Answers

2002 will mark my 18th anniversary as a toon attendee. Not quite in your league Jonno but I believe that we serve our time in dog-years compared with the fair-weather fans in other clubs who can look forward to the occasional trophy every 20 or 30 years....

Sorry I can't make it for your big day. I just hope we bloody well win...

-- Anonymous, December 09, 2001

Jonno , after reading your post the first thing I did was check out my shift pattern , bliddy working that week-end or I would have come down for your 40th seeing as you were my `Pusher` when I was down for my 50th, seems a long way back now. I was also at the game -v- Posh, did we not go for Tommy Robson (left winger and local lad) after that match?. As you climbed up the steps to the Gallowgate that eventful day in 62 , the posters would show at the St James Hall that the main attraction that night was a regular visitor to Newcastle, the one and only Massambula , he was wrestling our local hero , one eyed Dave Armstrong on the top of the bill. Was everyone a Robson or a Armstrong in those days?. Correct me if I am wrong or save it for regaling on your day, but the strips worn that day were of the frills?

Coming from Seghill you alighted at the Haymarket, I was a Marlborough Man and one of my most lasting impressions of those days was waiting to go home at the bus station and receiving our fortnightly dose of carbon monoxide poisioning,3 way battle between Northern, Venture, United to see how many supporters they could gas. If the driver was a Mackem you were in deep sh£t, non stop revs, till the battle song of the Geordies rang out, "Hey man Hoo man, what de ye think ya deein lyek", Later one became more sophisticated and went to the Chinese next to the Stoll, excuse being "lets the traffic get away pet", that was us,the archtypal Geordie, fed,wattered, hic, seen the match,all that remained was to spend 2 hours behind a Football Edition , sink more beer,and mek sure you got to the Miners Welfare Hall for 10pm and The Bradford Barn Dance,90`s man you got it made!!,tough in those days I kid you not.

-- Anonymous, December 09, 2001

Buff pulls rank on a Jonno-come-lately there and puts me in my place. Shame you can't make it Buff - I was rather hoping you would be tempted - what if I can make sure Suzie Brown Ale will be there ...?

Frills? I can certainly recall no frills on the park that day (although Ivor Allchurch was a canny player). I'm sure if I saw the strip in question it would come back to me - it is jogging something at the back of my mind.

Massambula? I recall the name, along with the likes of Billy-two- Rivers, Mick McManus and Jackie Pallo, etc. I've always had a great aversion to violence due to traumas in infancy so I'd watch Kent Walton's programme on TV with my hands half covering my eyes!

Tommy Robson didn't arrive till 66-67 some 5 years later. He came as part of the threesome brought in by St Joe Harvey to replace £60000 Alan Suddick, the most exciting (and infuriating) player of his time. The other two in that threesome were Elliot (from Sunderland) and the legendary Sha-la-la-la McNamee. So we replaced a heartbreaker with a leg breaker. ;-) Brilliant trading by Joe Harvey. It broke our hearts to lose Suddick but we were 22nd in Div 1 and after he was sold we soared to 20th and avoided relegation, qualifying for Europe the following season and the rest is history as they say.

Suddick. Who can forget his 7 match run in 65-66? Absolutely on fire. Won 5 drew 1. Climbed from 20th to 15th and rescued our first season back in the top division. Suddick scored nine in those 7 matches concluding with 2 against the Mackems in a 2-0 at SJP. An awesome player on his day - just that he didn't have too many days ...

Carbon Monoxide poisoning? No - we lived on it in them days man - in those days of leaded petrol, coal fires, pit heaps and the word "environment" still to be invented, I rather think it was the shock of any fresh air that used to cause problems. :-)

Aaah - we used to have some nice reminiscing here - what happened to all that...? :-)

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

You two have got the tears streaming down my legs. Think I'll go and have a lie down. :-))

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Sounds like it's a sit down you need PitBill. :-)

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Suddick. Absolutely gutted. He was my one real hero when at school and I cried when he left. It improved only (IMHO) when we bought Wyn "the Leap" Davies. I had a new hero then. But as you say Jonno, it was "good business" before footy became a business.

PS. I also have to admit to a moistening of the eye at the Reebok earlier this season when Wyn came on at halftime to acknowledge both sets of fans. Will it be the same with Shearer in 30 years time (or will he still be manager by then??).

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

BTW Screach, Suddick and Wyn were in the same team together for a short time. Davies came in late October 1966 and Suddick's last game was on 17th December. I remember the Chronic saying that Joe Harvey had put the entire team up for sale apart from Suddick and Davies. They played 6 games together in that short time, w1 d1 l4. :-(

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

See how much it affected me!! Didn't realise Wyn came before Sooty left. Mind, I was only 5 at the time (give or take 10 years).

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Could it have been Tommy Knox that came from Peterborough a year or two after the cup game, rather than Tommy Robson? He was also a left winger (after a fashion), who I remember as the least popular member of the promotion squad in 1964/65. After the final game of the season, which I recall as a goalless draw against Man City (I haven't got the book) but enough for us to go up as champions, the players threw thir shirts into the crowd massing on the pitch. I distictly remember saying to my mate that I wasn't going to bother going onto the pitch because if I got a shirt it would only be Tommy Knox's.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Slightly more recent history - I see from nufc.com that it was 4 years ago today we stuffed chicken Kiev. That was the day I first met Softie!

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Tommy Knox arrived during the promo season as you say Dr Bill.

As for crowds massing on the pitch and shirts being hurled into the crowd, this happened after the Bolton match which clinched promotion. Stan Anderson threw his shirt from the stand into the crowd below and the rest of the team followed suit. The expense! I guess that's why we never bought anybody afterwards! The Man City game was a tedious draw and as I recall we waited ages for a lap of honour but they seemed too embarrassed to come out after such an anti-climax of a game.

BTW, if you want to check old results, nufc.com now shows all results (but sadly not teams yet) since the beginning of time (shortly after I became a fan). It's in their "archives" section.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Gents, I have to tip my hat to you. Been just 20 years for me (my first season as a regular was KK's first season as a player - I'm just a glory hunter) but to go 40+ years without forsaking the cause is a great achievement. Yes I know, some might say if you had any intelligence about you then you would have long since have grown out of a deeply unsatisfying hobby, but bollocks to that. I'm raising a glass right now to your 40 years. Here's to 40 more.

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Here's to 40 more.

NOOOOO! Have I not suffered enough?????!!! :-)

I'm reminded of The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Our heroes are blasted through the traditional "warp in the space-time continuum" all except for Marvin the Paranoid Android who goes the long way round and waits for them umpteen million years and meets them at The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

"How have you been Marvin?".

"Terrible - the first 10 million years -they were the worst - the next 10 million - they were the worst as well - after that I went into a bit of a decline".

As they climb in a time machine to leave Zaphod says to Marvin "Come on Marvin - there's a whole new life opening up for you kid" to which Marvin dolefully replies "Oh no - not another one".

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

We haven't had a reminscence thread in awhile. Nice to read! Unfortunately, I won't be around for your 40th, Jonno. Perhaps a preview of your tales before the Chewsee match? Or will you be joining us on the road to OT? (Providing the gods of the NUFC ticketing office have smiled kindly on my app)

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Oh dear - you've heard them all before Ciara - on here - several times over! Never mind - maybe I'll make up some new ones. :-)

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Talking about cr@p left wingers, does anyone remember Colin Taylor. Signed from Walsall, he was only about 5'6", but stocky. He couldn't play footy for toffee, but he had the most incredible shot I've ever seen.

I still recall him hitting the crossbar in a game at SJP, against Preston I think it was. It was from a good 35 yds out, and went like a missile onto the crossbar and straight back into play. The crossbar was still vibrating after the game had finished, or so selective amnesia tells me. ;0{]

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Jonno - I'm astonished to discover I beat you by 10 months - 11 March 1961, 1-1 v Manure. Charlton (R) missed sitter when falling on his @rse six yards from goal at the Leazes End.

Funny - I thought you were so much older than me!

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Talking of anniversaries .....

12-Dec-1908 1 Chelsea 1 - 2 Newcastle Utd

Wednesday will be the 93rd - is this an omen?!!

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Colin Taylor. I think if you fish through the Greenspun archives you might find that what you've written here Clarky is almost a cut and paste of my mentions of Taylor. Couldn't pass, head or dribble but had a shot like a cannonball.

Yes I recall the shot against Preston. From the left towards the Gallowgate goal, and captioned in a subsequent program as "The hardest shot I have ever seen."

There was a character in a boys comic of the day (The Victor maybe?) called Gorgeous Gus who seemed to have been modelled on Taylor (or vice versa). He strolled about the field doing nothing at all until presented with a shooting opportunity. He would hit the ball straight at the keeper with such colossal force that both ball and keeper were blasted through the back of the net! (The goalie's internal injuries must have been immense but this was never mentioned in the comic). :-)

So you thought I was older than you Jacko? I think it must be the air of calm authority I project. Rest assured it's a facade and the real me is a little boy lost in a department store and looking amidst a forest of legs for his mam. (a persona which feels increasingly ridiculous inside this 51-y-o frame) :-)

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

51??? You young whipper-snapper you - things were different when aah was a lad! ;0{]

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Gorgeous Gus! I remember him! He was a Lord wasn't he and the bloke that did all the running for him up and down the wing was his butler - can't remember his name - but he used to cross the ball into exactly the right place and Gus wouldn't move if it was a bit off-target. I suspect he was French!

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Exactly so Jacko! He was a multi millionaire and he bought the entire club and loads of top internationals to play for them. He couldn't have bought very well though as he was the only player on the entire team who could ever manage to score. :-)

But Roy of the Rovers was the king of the football comic strips. You will remember that in the 60's these johnny-foreigner types learned to bend the ball from free kicks. Roy's Melchester Rovers were playing in the European Cup and the opposition had one of these feared Garrincha-style free kick specialists who was much talked about before the match. During the game the keeper is injured and Roy deputises as the Melchester custodian. A penalty is awarded against Melchester (the only one I can recall in 5 seasons of reading the comic!) and the drama unfolds in 3 pictures of the comic strip.

1. Roy is pictured diving to his left as Johnny-foreigner hits the ball to his right. A speech bubble goes up in the crowd. "Oh no!- Roy's gone the wrong way!"

2. Roy continues his dive to the left and the ball suddenly starts to bend in mid flight and is now heading for the opposite corner of the net. Speech bubble from crowd "Wait a moment - the ball's bending!"

3. Roy is now tipping the ball round the post! Speech bubble in crowd "Great save Roy!" Thinks bubble from Roy "Yes - I thought he might bend it".

Absolutely brilliant. Me and my mates were in stitches for days. A penalty is all over in a split second and yet the fans had had a conversation during the shot!

Any more favourites from the comics?

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

How about Bily's Boots. Billy was rubbish unless he wore the late "Dead shot" Keen's boots. Every week he lost them in increasingly unlikely circumstances, but always managed to recover them by about half time to save the day. And of course it finally turned out that he could actually play without the boots after all. Or Mighty Mouse - a short fat bespectacled hospital porter with an incredibly bendy banana shot. Or how about Hot-Shot Hamish, who used to break crossbars on a regular basis. Does Roy of the Rovers still exist? Is he "Director of Football" these days? Or are Roy & Blackie Gray's sons now terrorising defences? And does anyone remember when Roy got shot?

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Gorgeous Gus??? Oh purleeeeeeeeeese. Don't you remember the photos???

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Well OK, Shchrhehahchhehrh. You did not hear it from me!

The description is spot on though, 5'6", stocky, can't play football for nuts, christ I haven't even got a shot that would break a piece of paper!

-- Anonymous, December 10, 2001

Aye, but I here you're a dab hand with the video remote.

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

Rot of the Rovers and Billy's Boots were great. Does anybody remeber Raven on the Wing? I think it was about a gypsy who played football with bare feet and kept oon getting in toruble.

However, the best sports related comic strip has to be Alf Tupper, Tuff of the Track, who trained on fish and chips. He was the first true working class sports hero and the stories were always about either an upper class oik or a foreigner, and the always tried tp cheat Good Old Alf out of the race.

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

Limp-along-Leslie was my favourite. Undernourished, with one leg shorter than the other (or perhaps it was because he had had polio). Anyway, his dribbling skills were amazing (similar to Pit Bill's I reckon) due to the asymmetric nature of his gait.
What about the guy (Briggs?) who rode around on a motor-bike with a tin bath as a side-car and played football and cricket for England despite crushing asides from the snooty aristocrats who apparently infested both teams. I remember him taking a catch at Lords (wearing odd shoes and a torn pair of whites) into the sun by leaning over and taking the sunglasses of a startled Member and hastily donning them before taking a spectacular catch. Needless to say he was disciplined for his outrageous behaviour.


-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

You're right Nick, Alf "tough of the track" Tupper was a legend. Sydney clique may be able to back me up on this, but does anyone else think that Ken (Muzzainoz) may actually be Alf Tupper???

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

True, can you remeber what comic Limp Along Leslie was in?

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

One of Wizard, Hotspur, Rover or Adventure. These were text based comics - hardly any strips.
The Mighty Wilson
Braddock
Cannonball ?
A most peculiar story line was of a cricket team unsder the Svengali like influence of an evil manager. They were chained to their bats - apart from the hero who managed to free himself from the hypnosis every now and then.
Also of an athlete who would run all his races before they occurred in his head and then not bother if he lost!
Am I of this planet?

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

Does anyone remember "Goalmaker"? I seem to remember it was in a comic but was also a book. It was about this gypsy bloke called Pickford or summat like that. He was an ace footballer but one of his team noticed a marked similarity between him and some bloke who'd played 30 years previoulsy. Anyway, when he dug a bit more he found two more "clones" of this bloke from back in history. Every so often he would disappear and be reborn again - he was one of the "people of the phoenix". It was a mint book, I read it umpteen times.

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

Sounds terrific Jacko. I remember Braddock I think, but not the evil cricketing manager. There was also one called something like Have boots will travel. It was about a footballer who would play for a different struggling team each week (a bit like Dean Windass really) - he had a business card that said "Matchwinner for hire" and aprice list - $500 for a win, $1000 for a goal and no fee for a lost match.".

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

Goalmaker! Jacko your reading experiences in youth bear an uncanny resemblance to mine. This is getting spooky. I read the book - wasn't he a sort of phoenix - reborn from the ashes? Great story - read it more than once.

Braddock was Matt Braddock who was a flying ace (Biggles on steroids) and nowt to do with football. The character was in "Rover & Adventure", (subsequently "Rover & Wizard"). This comic was indeed text based, not comic strips. I'm sure me mam (bless her) must have chosen this comic to ensure my reading development (and I'm sure she made a good choice - I read them avidly, cover to cover). The footballer in R&A was "Wally Brand - the ball of fire". The story was written in an autobiographical style by Nick Smith(?) who was the inside forward who played alongside him for Mancaster(?) and England.

All right Jacko - you know Goalmaker and Gorgeous Gus. If you ever read "The Seven Men of Belford" then you will really freak me out! This story was in some comic annual (Eagle? Boys Own?). Belford (presumably fictional and not the Northumbrian village) needed a win in the last match of the season to avoid relegation or something. At half time a gas leak in the dressing rooms rendered 8 players unfit for the 2nd half leaving 7 men fit on each side. Some time during the 2nd half the 4 opposition players come back out but the Belford lads remain incapacitated. The 7 heroes of Belford resist all thrown at them and win 1-0 with a breakaway goal! I recall the story as being very exciting and it has fired my imagination ever since, sneering scornfully when substitutes were first allowed in the game. :-)

R&A also had a cricket hero whose name I forget. He couldn't bat or bowl but was such an ace fielder that he played for England - could catch anything and could knock the stumps over from anywhere on the ground. Most of the opposition were run out!

Another creation of R&A was a character discovered in an African jungle juggling about 12 balls at once. He was taken back to England and converted into a goalkeeper. He was unbeatable and every game his team played finished x-0 (except, of course, when the dastardly opposition prevented him from reaching the ground on time or he was abducted by aliens or whatever). I think the poor African country he came from reached the latter stages of the World Cup with a single 1- 0 victory and a series of 0-0 draws against vastly superior opposition. I've a sneaking suspicion that the story inspired TSM's managerial career. :-)

-- Anonymous, December 11, 2001

Nick - after extensive research i.e. I Googled, Limp-Along Leslie (one leg shorter than another due to a car accident) was revived by a soon to be defunct comic called Buddy in 1981. The site claimed that it was originally in the Beano. Perhaps so - but I have this memory remnant of reading the stories rather than looking at pictures - although the artistic potential of a lop-sided delicately framed footballer weaving his way through crowds of neanderthal defenders would be hard to resist.

One other story stays with me. The footballer hero - the name Cannonball lingers but may be wrong - had been told by a very reliable fortune-teller that he would score in the 89th minute. However, his team were losing 1-0 and needed to win in order to escape relegation/win the league/etc..
As the 88th minute dwindled away our hero pondered and then realized what he had to do, which he duly did. Scored twice in the 89th minute.
Brilliant - this was my first exposure to lateral thinking.

-- Anonymous, December 12, 2001

Jonno - do you remember The Wolf of Kabul? He was some army under cover guy in Afghanistan in the last century and he had this local who helped him out - the guy was called Chung and his only weapon was an ancient cricket bat which was fastened together with string. Being a Johnny foreigner this bloke couldn't actually say "cricket bat" so whenever the two of them were ambushed (which seemed to happen with monotonous regularity) Chung would swing the bat above his head shouting "Clicky Bah wields in my hands Master!" It was great!

My mother used to try to get me to read Bunty and School Friend but I much preferred my brother's Victor and Hotspur. I remember one week they gave away a free gift in Victor - it was one of those rings that squirted water at people. I think I must have gone to every newsagent in Whitley and Cullercoats but failed to track on down!

Inicidentally, did any of you ladies ever read School Friend? Do you remember the Four Marys? Where they really that thick - I mean they were at that school for years and years and never made it out of the fourth form. Thank God for SATs I say!!

-- Anonymous, December 12, 2001

Well I couldn't have recalled the name "Wolf of Kabul" but I certainly remember "Cliki Ba"!

Who was that character in The Victor, a soldier in WW2, who would lose his temper at some point in each story and throw one of his "raging furies"? This would result in him charging out of his carefully dug out position and storming the German lines through a hail of machine gun fire (to which, apparently, he was immune in a raging fury) and demolishing the Germans with his bare hands.

-- Anonymous, December 12, 2001

I think that might have been Michael Owen!

-- Anonymous, December 12, 2001