I Wish I Was A Geordie - The Blog of Newcastle United in the US

PROUDLY APART, OR COMING TOGETHER?

American fans awoke today to the startling sight of Newcastle United being featured in the soccer section of the online New York Times. The angle of the story, for Newcastle fans in the U.S., may have come as even more of a shock. Headlined "In Newcastle, a Place Proudly Apart, Skepticism About Change," it maintains that "...the current team is not everyone’s cup of tea. Its squad draws on players from more than a dozen countries, in keeping with the polyglot makeup of virtually all the clubs in the Premiership, but at odds with the dream of Newcastle’s rearing its team of locally produced 'Geordie lads.' "

Hmmm.

We get the part about geographic isolation and local pride. In our ESPN Soccernet interview the other day, Tom and I talked about how, as Green Bay Packers fans, we identified with Newcastle for just those reasons.

But, from our distance at least, it's hard to discern anything but full acceptance of the French legion that has helped transform Newcastle United into a contender so far this season. Banners that say "Le Toon"? Hashtags that say #CabayeDreamboat? In fact, it seems like the foreign invasion was welcomed even before it happened, even before Newcastle started winning. Summer had hardly begun when the mere rumor of Kevin Gameiro in a black-and-white shirt was enough to send Newcastle message board commentators into spasms of cybernetic glee.

Yet the Times article rings with detail and authority. The author seems to know his history. He effectively evokes the days of Hall and Keegan, contrasting them with the regional bias against the current management as background for the fans' discomfort with the strangers on the pitch. And the story isn't a polemic: it's well-written, even beautifully written, to this journalism teacher's ear and eye: "The steep banks of the ground are as high as they can be, the roar of the home crowd cascades down onto the field, and it would be a strange player who was not moved by that sound to give 100 percent of what is in his or her soul."

So we can only ask our Geordie brethren across the sea: are we missing something? On the streets of Newcastle, among those fans who socialize in a pub like normal fans and not at a keyboard, is there widespread grumbling, muffled only by victory, about all these Frenchmen and their cautious style? Will calls for deportation arise if the club slides back toward mid-table? If foreign players aren't welcome, what of foreign fans? Or is this story, lyrical though it may be, an anachronistic disservice to an army of supporters that has come to consider passion and loyalty equal to geography as its binding force?

BROWN ALE FOOTBALL TASTES LIKE CHAMPAGNE

As Newcastle United clung desperately to a one-goal lead in the second half Saturday against surging Everton, on American television Steve McManaman allowed that it wasn't exactly "champagne football."

Well, Newcastle isn't famous for champagne. When adversity has struck this strong but un-aged squad, time and again, brown ale football is precisely what's kept them on top.

We'll hear once more this week that Newcastle was lucky to come away with three points. It's the first thing my co-blogger texted me after the match. Commentators will continue to label the club as being on borrowed time, pointing at the quality of opponent and the style of victory. Oddsmakers will continue to peg Newcastle outside the top six.

I don't buy it. Not anymore. I'm of the opinion that after this many matches, the table is close to an accurate portrayal of the strength of the clubs up and down it, including the one I support.

You can say Newcastle's squad is thin. But replay Saturday's match and watch the many non- or not-yet-regulars on the pitch Saturday - Sylvain Marveaux, Danny Guthrie, Sammy Ameobi, Dan Gosling, Hatem Ben Arfa - come up with the well-timed interception, the correctly positioned block, the perfectly placed clear, over and over and over. Even on what many will say should've been a penalty when Gosling's arm deflected an open shot in the box, at least he was in the right spot, and to my eyes as well as the ref's it looked less deliberate in real time than in slow motion - an illustration of why we should be thankful soccer hasn't been subject to the incessant buzzkill in American sport called further review.

You can say Newcastle hasn't played anyone yet. But that now covers more than half the league. If Newcastle hasn't played anyone yet, it's because there are only a small handful of someones in the league, and Newcastle is one of them. Newcastle could come away with hardly a point in the next three matches and it wouldn't change my mind. We'll be playing the only three clubs in the league clearly equal or better than ours.

You can say Newcastle was lucky Saturday. But there was no comparison between the sides until injury struck one of them. Lesser clubs wouldn't have entrenched the way Newcastle did, unpretty as it may have been. Lesser clubs would've choked on champagne rather than crack open the ale.

Legendary baseball executive Branch Rickey said famously that luck is the residue of opportunity and design. Newcastle's players have been exquisitely scouted, chosen and coached. The wild cards have been tossed away. Alan Pardew is known as being impossible to please in practice - I witnessed that in America this past summer - and the attention to detail is written all over the performance. There will be down stretches, perhaps just ahead. No club is safe from a rash of injury or misfortune. But Newcastle United's ability and willingness to play basic workingman's football when necessary has pulled it through so far, and with reinforcements expected in the new year, there's not much reason to believe it can't continue.

WHY NEWCASTLE? SHARE YOUR STORY

We recently had the privilege of appearing on ESPN Soccernet in the form of an online interview with Newcastle United correspondent Marc Duffy (@MarcSDuffy on Twitter). You can read the entire piece here. The part that seems to be generating the most comment on ESPN and elsewhere is where Tom and I talk about why we became Newcastle fans at such a distance from Newcastle:

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Q. Why Newcastle?

Tom: Most American fans tend to support Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea or Liverpool because they're on TV the most.

Bob: Also, most American fans are total plastic glory-hunting bandwagon-jumpers.

Tom: When I first started watching the Premier League, I kept an eye on both Arsenal and Chelsea. But I've never been one to root for the frontrunner, so I quickly ditched those two once I learned a bit more about English football. I didn't have a club team for a couple years - my main interest was the U.S. national team - until I learned that my girlfriend (now my wife) had been to a Newcastle match while studying abroad in Alnwick. So I figured it might be a mutual interest for us (I've since realized she isn't as consumed by soccer as I am).

Bob: No one on earth is as consumed by soccer as Tom is.

Tom: The more I read about Newcastle and watched its games, the stronger the connection felt. I grew up less than an hour away from Green Bay, Wisconsin, home of the Packers, so I could identify with Newcastle fans living in the northern part of their country and only caring about one team.

Bob: I identified with Newcastle almost instantly when English matches hit TV here. As Tom said, Newcastle is a natural for a Packer fan: a northern town, distant from the major population centres, associated with beer, famous for the devotion of the fans. That may be one reason we have a disproportionately large handful of Newcastle fans here in Wisconsin. I fell in fast with that crowd in the soccer pub near my house. They were the least pretentious and most fun. Newcastle fans looking for an NFL club to follow should consider Green Bay – they’d feel right at home, except that in terms of trophies, the Packers are the equivalent of Manchester United.

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With fans jumping in to share their own "Why Newcastle?" stories, we thought we'd set up a post for that purpose here, as Newcastle enjoys its best start to a season since The Entertainers roamed St. James' Park. American fans enjoy sharing these stories with one another when we meet, but all fans - including fans fortunate enough to live in Newcastle - are invited to comment below and tell us about when and why Newcastle United became your passion.

(P.S. to inquirers: Green Bay Packers tickets are hard to get - there hasn't been an unsold seat for a game since 1960. But if you're interested in coming, there are ways of making it happen: drop us a line and we can advise.)

STURDY NEWCASTLE SLAMS STOKE

We all knew back in August that this season's Newcastle United team was more skilled than its predecessor. Who would have thought it would be tougher, too?

While watching Newcastle's rugged 3-1 win over Stoke City at the vaunted Britannia Stadium, I found myself continually marveling at United's sturdiness. Not to mention its steadiness. The consistency with which Newcastle has gone about its business game after game - home or away - is the most impressive part of its sizzling start to the season. It takes a certain level of mental fortitude to continually perform at that level.

And for all the tenacity Kevin Nolan and Joey Barton brought, last season's team was prone to flat performances. Of course, this United team will slip up at some point against an opponent you'd expect them to beat - all teams do. But it's showing the sort of resolve that you'd generally associate with Manchester United.

That's tall praise, but keep in mind Stoke had lost just once at home in the Premier League in 2011 before Monday and the last time Newcastle visited the Britannia, it was pummeled 4-0. Newcastle didn't produce its prettiest performance of the season, but that was never going to happen on Stoke's small pitch. Still, United controlled the first half and defended resolutely, even when Stoke dialed up the pressure in the second half. Despite repeated Rory Delap missiles into the box, Newcastle didn't allow more than a couple genuine scoring chances.

Both teams benefitted from incredibly soft penalties - Stoke's probably had more legitimacy, but not much - but United was clearly the better team. Demba Ba produced his best performance as a Newcastle player (even apart from his hat trick, his link-up play with the midfield and general movement were superb), while the same could be said about Gabriel Obertan. Yohan Cabaye and Jonas Gutierrez didn't see as much of the ball as they usually do, but both ran themselves into the ground. Danny Guthrie reminded us all that he's a solid passer and that a new contract might not be such a bad idea, after all.

And then there were the Taylors. Ryan shook off body checks from Jonathan Walters and Robert Huth, while Steven played the full 90 minutes with a mask to protect his broken nose. Perhaps their showings summed Newcastle's performance up best.