My best mate is an Aston Villa fan, along with a lot of the people living round here in the midlands.
I’ve never liked Villa and with good reason.
One of my kids was scouted by them and played for them for a while. The coaches were ok with him but the other kids who had been together for a while were unkind.
Imagine your lad telling you he’d asked to sit with the other kids and they told him no, so he sat on his own. How would you feel seeing and hearing that, or trying to be pleasant with the obnoxious parents who seem to elevate themselves to a level of self-importance based on how well their kid played.
Like I said, I don’t like Aston Villa. Add in the bed sheets etc etc and it’s a club I really want us to beat. We didn’t last weekend. I was gutted.
Alexander Isak has ruined our season in my opinion.
We limped from one potential striker signing to another, begging them to join us, they all said no. Apart from one who subsequently got injured for months and another who doesn’t play in that position anyway. And this was meant to be Champions League, cup winning Newcastle ready to hit the top four with our new signing…
PSR stands in our way. I actually find the whole set up abhorrent. The way a club like Manchester City with a half-filled ground can buy players who have played already in a cup but then score against us in that same competition.
But the worst thought is, that maybe this is as far as Eddie Howe can take this team. Money was spent in key positions but this season we haven’t looked half as good as we did in Eddie’s first full season. We just don’t seem the same.
I am writing this article mainly as a reaction to an article (‘We might as well give up if this comment reflects what Newcastle United fans really think’) earlier this week on The Mag by Dean Wilkins.
Dean was reacting to my comment in the instant reaction piece on The Mag after Aston Villa, with him saying: ‘One contribution really stood out. It was from GToon and his reaction to the Villa match was: “Rubbish. Is this PSR ? Is it the Isak debacle. Is it the limit of Eddie’s ability? God knows, but what I do know, is I can’t wait for this season to end. I couldn’t care less about Europe but the headlines I want to see are in the league not some money spinning event.”
I haven’t enjoyed this season. The feeling of euphoria I get from beating Aston Villa 3-0 far outweighs beating PSV 3-0. I don’t know any PSV fans. I have no axe to grind with them, there’s no rivalry. I don’t care about Europe tbh. I’d much rather beat the mackems 3-0 than PSG. Just my choice.
So, the dummy is back in, toys all arranged in the pram. If we win our next league game against Liverpool it will be the highest high. If we lose it will be the lowest low. For me and I’m guessing an awful lot of other people, football is like that. Something you just can’t stop being obsessed with no matter how it treats you.
You know that famous poem by Kipling (I thought he just made cakes…) about treating triumph and disaster just the same. Well I can do that in nearly every walk of life. Just not football. Geordie passion? Madness?
Who knows? My final quote is from Ripping Yarns and is from Golden Gordon. He says, whilst wearing his scarf, “I’ll probably give up football.” Watch it Dean and then you’ll understand. And just like Golden Gordon I gave my daughter a middle name of Shearer. Geordie passion.