THE TOON V THE BILBAO BASQUE BRIGADE*** CHAMPIONS LEEGUE GROUP STAGE GAME 4

 Posted ‘high noon 🔔 bells’ Bonfire Neet 5th Novembaa 2025

We switch competitions once more in this hectic period when we take on old friends Athletic Bilbao in The Champions Leegue at ‘8.00 🔔 bells tooneet at SJP!

If we play lke we played against Sporz last Wedinzday we will win! BUT! if we play lke we did against West Ham on Sunday we will surely lose!

Typical Toon— yi never naa wot yih gannih get!?

It’s crazy that we are higher up in The Champions Leegue table in 11th place, than wot we are in The Premyaa Leegue, where we are 13th and nearer a relegation place, than a Champions Leegue qualification place!

Should The Toon win, then we will be back in the top 8 qualification places again! (Last neets results knocked us from 8th to 11th place!)

SO!—-Let’s hope we play well and finally ‘kick start’ wor season!

We understand that Bruno could miss the game through illness, while Bilbao have at least 3 key players oot through injury!

NUFC need to take advantage of this to give us aall a lift after Sunday’s debacle! ⬅️(We naa aall the big words!🤪👍)

Bilbao will have a followin’ of 2,500 fans, who will march to SJP from The Bigg Market at ‘5.30pm 🔔 bells’! (It should be quite a sight!)

A Geordie Times match report will appear here sometime on Thorzday 

Az per usual! “WATCH THIS SPACE!” ⬇️

THE JELLIED EELS MOB OF WEST HAM 3. THE TOON 1 *** 2025-2026

 Posted from 1.00pm bells' onwards Munday 3rd Novembaa 2025

(Will be updated with match pix pub crawl pix later and details of wor exhaustin’ jorney to east London and back!) 

“THE CURSE OF THE GREEN STRIP!” 🤢

One things for certain!  It won’t take lang to write this match report!—Will take much langer to write how we got to London and back, however!

Az soon az aa saw the startin line up for NUFC and strip we would wear, aa woz in dispair!

The startin line up before the match showed Dan Burn wearin'  wor green away strip!—Honestly I 'Fink' we are cursed when we wear it, az we have done for 4 of wor 5 away Premyaa Leegue games this season!

We wore green at Bournemoooth and drew 0-0

We wore green at Villa and drew 0-0

We wore green at Brightin and lost 2-1

We wore green at West Ham and lost 3-1

The anly away Premyaa Leegue away game this season that we didn’t wear green iz when we wore wor blue 3rd strip at Leeedz and drew 0-0

Indeed, the anly time this season when we wore wor famous black n white stripes in an away game and won, woz at USG in The Champions Leegue, where we triumphed 4-0!

In wor recent history we have worn black n white stripes against aall the above teams in away games apart from Brightin who play in blue stripes!— So why can’t we wear WOR stripes when thee isn’t a colour clash?

The answer of course iz ‘strip sales’, meenin that nearly aall wor away games will be in change strips! (100% so far, domestically!)

Anyway!---enough of that!---to the match!

The alarm ⏰ bells started ringin orly on when 'The Jellied Eels Mob' hit the post in from of the 3,000 Toon fans in the away section behind that goal in the 4th minute! (Jellied Eels used to be a favorite delicasy in the east end of London)

Almost imediatleee we responded when we raced up to the other end of the pitch where Jacob Murphy hit a great shot across the box to put us 1-0 up!

TOON FANS CELEBRATE WOR GOAL!—HOWEVER!😱

But thats az good az it got az soon after West Ham were awarded a penalty when Thiaw woz adjudged to have fouled Bowen in the box near the touchline!---Luckily for us, the ref oweturned hiz decision after a lenghty VAR check and chalked the goal off!

This woz just a reprieve az the home side pounded wor goal with every Toon player on the pitch havin a nightmare game!

The equaliser woz comin and when 'The Pope' in The Toon goal punched the baall oot, instead of catchin it, Paqueta woz at hand to hammer the baall straight back and into the corner of the net! 1-1

5 minutes of stoppage time woz added because of the VAR check and just when it looked az though NUFC would gan in level at the break, disaster struck when West Ham's Bissaka crossed the baall and somehow Sven Botman managed to put the baall into hiz own goal at the near post 🫣 to put us 2-1 behind at the break! 

The 2nd half woz even worse az Eddie Howe made 3 changes at the break, substitutin Waltermade, Gordon and Krafth for Osalu, Schar and Ramsey! (Aall 11 could have been substituted, we were THAT bad!)

Despite dominatin this half, we could hardly muster a shot on goal az we attacked 'wor end' of the groond!---It woz aaful and wor misery woz completed deep into 2nd half stoppage time when Soucak scrambled the baall ower the line after The Pope fumbled the baall🫣, to put the final nail in wor coffin!

In Eddie Howe's time az wor manager, this woz the worst performance aa can remember---and for the forst time aa thought that hiz job could be on the line if results divvint improve!  It woz like gannin back to the days when Broken Nose Bruce woz wor manager!—Horrendous!

Az we are progressin in The Champions Leegue and Leegue Cup hiz job iz safe for now, but the PIF will NOT be happy with us langushing in 13th place in the table, with the gap between Champions Leegue qualification next season widening az the games pass!---Even qualifyin for the lesser European competitions looks a long shot now!

FT 3-1 to them!

Thiz woz the forst time that West Ham had won at home this season after sufferin 4 previous defeats and 1st home win in 9 months and WE made it '8 in a row' failures to win an away Premyaa Leegue game since beatin' Leicester last April, some 7 months ago! (We played in aall white with green trim that day!)

The curse of the green strip continues!

Attendance given az 62,441 but this must have been on ticket sales az there were loads of empty seats!

3,000 shell shocked Toon fans, who thought we would win easily!

The complicated return jorney to Tyneside woz another reason for wor misery!  (See below for details later!) ⬇️

“TRAIN 🚂 TERROR!” 🔪 

To get to this game, we had to get the train to Darlo from’The Central’ ( station)the afternoon before the game (1.03pm bells 🔔 train 20 minutes late—30 minutes jorney)

Get a bus from Darlo (Darlington) to Donny (Doncaster) (2 hours)

Get back on the train at Donny (bus parked a canny walk from the station)  

Miss wor connection by 2 minutes (because of the above!)

Wait for another train, got to King’s Cross in London (2 & a half hours)

Tube to Highbury and Islington (10 minutes)

Overgroond train to Hackney Central (20 minutes)

Arrive at hotel and dump bags at 8 bells 🔔—7 hours to get there!

Heed for local boozers to find oot that 2 hours after wor train from Donny to London, that 10 passengers had been stabbed on the train near Huntington! (Lucky we were on an earlier train I thought)

Gan to match on Sunday 2 stops in overgroond from Hackney Central, then after game, same carry on back on Sunday neet!) Got to Central at midneet and just missed last bus yem £12 in taxi)

Including match ticket, train tickets, hotel, tubes rides and taxis —-£230 altogether —-plus food and booze on top! Ny on £300 spent to watch 💩! 

(Most expensive London trip in 57 years, since mee 1st visit—-to Arsenal in 1968!)

PUB CRAWL REPORT* 7 DRINKIN DENS VISITED ⬇️

THE PENBURY ARMS,HACKNEY, LONDON

THE COCK TAVERN, HACKNEY, LONDON

THE OLD SHIP, HACKNEY, LONDON

BAXTERS COURT, HACKNEY, LONDON

BEER MERCHANTS TAP, HACKNEY WICK,, LONDON

BETJEMAN ARMS, ST PANCRAS, LONDON

THE DALESMAN, DARLO, (WAITING FOR TRAIN BACK TO THE TOON!)

PS: It wasn’t aall doom and gloom for Tyneside teams in London ower the weekend az non leegue Gatesheed won 2-0 at Wimbledon on Saturday in the FA Cup 1st roond!

The draw for the 2nd roond haz The Heedbangers at home to Walsall!👏

IT’S HALLOWEEN FOLKS! 🎃

 Posted ‘4.00pm bells 🔔’Halloween Friday 31st Octobaa 2025

A WARM WELCOME AWAITS YOU AT GEORDIE TIMES HQ!

We are off to a hotel in Hackney in London tomorrow afternooon the day before wor game v Jellied Eels Mob of West Ham at London Stadium at ‘2.00pm 🛎️s’ on Sunday!

The main reason we are gannin doon to London a day orly iz because the forst train from The Toon on Sunday iz at 8.00am 🔔 s’ and then a dreaded replacement bus between Darlo (Darlington) and Donny (Doncaster) and then we have to get back on the train to King’s Cross!  Tooo late to make the kick off az it will take five and a half hours to get to London!—and then 2 tubes to Hackney Wick, near to the groond! (Another hour, includin the walk to London Stadium!)

So Saturday it iz!

West Ham are in turmoil at the moment and there gannin to be a fans protest after the game, when they will stage a ‘sit in’ for 45 minutes after the game haz finished!

They sit 2nd bottom of the table and are in a relegation battle for certain!— This can anly mean ‘good news’ for NUFC, coz IF we can score orly in the game, then the atmosphere will become toxic! ☠️ 

Hopefully we can get the 3points to move up the Premyaa Leegue table!

Match (and booze!) report on Munday!

Meanwhile, back at Geordie Times HQ ⬇️

THE TOON 2. THE SPORZYs 0 *** LEEGUE CUP 4th ROOND

 Posted ‘high noon 🕛 bells’ 🔔 Thorzday 30th Octobaa 2025

A minutes silence!—We will 

🌺 remember them! 🌺 

“HEEDS YOU WIN!” 

NUFC went into this game aiming for a ‘hat-trick’ of home wins in the space of 8 days!

And we weren’t to be disappointed!

8 changes were made by ‘us’ from the startin line up on Saturday, when we beat Fulim 2-1 (Sporz made 4 changes)

Orly on az we attacked the Leazes goal, both Jacob Ramsey and Harvey Barnes had chances that went close, az we dominated the possession!

The breakthrough came in the 24th minute, when a Sandro Tonali corner foond the heed of Fab Schar—-and he sent a powerful heeder past Kinsky in the visitors goal—-az the Sporz players protested that one of their number woz tyin hiz boot laces, which they said, should have delayed the corner!

The ref woz havin ‘non of this nonsense’ and pointed to the centre spot! 1-0 to us!

Sporz then had a couple of really good chances to equalise at the other end, but their ‘star man’? Richarlison could’nt get onto the end of crosses into the box!

Harvey Barnes then had a spectacular owerheed kick, which rebounded off the crossbar to safety!

HT 1-0 to us!

Az we attacked The Gallowgate goal in the 2nd half, Joe Willock missed a great chance orly on, sendin hiz close range heeder wide of the mark!

He made up for that however in the 50th minute, when he crossed the baall and ‘The 2 Metre Messi’ Nick Waltemade rose above their goalie to send a looping heeder into the net, in what looked like slow motion!         2-0 to us!

The near 5,000 Spurz fans in the top deck of The Leazes End had sung “No noise from the Saudi Boys!” orlier on—and the Toon fans replied “2-nil to the Saudi Boys!”

Aaron Ramsey who deputised for The Pope in goal, made 2 fantastic saves to keep wor visitors at bay!

4 minutes stoppage time woz added at the end, but we held on for wor 4th victory in a row ower Sporz at SJP!  AND  Sporz forst away defeat in any competition!

This woz aalso wor 11th home win in a row in the Leegue Cup! (This includes the 0-0 draw v Palace when we won on penalties in the 1st game of this sequence!)

We watched the draw for the qwaataa finals in The Bodega on Westgate Road and it woz very kind to us, giving us a home tie v Fulim, which will be played in mid Decembaa!

Attendance:51,216 (4,900 from ‘norf Landan’)

*

THE TOON v SPORZY *** LEEGUE CUP 4th ROOND

 Posted '6.00pm bells' Wedinzday 29th Octobaa 2025

MORDEN STREET IN THE HAYMARKET AREA OF THE TOON

The Forst team games are every 4 days apart at the moment, in a hectic period! Tooneet we play wor 3rd game in a row at SJP when we take on Sporzy at SJP in the 4th roond of the Leegue Cup for a place in the qwaataa finals!

If the scores are level after 90 minutes, then a penalty shootoot will take place to decide who progresses!  There will be 4,900 Spozy's in The Leazes top deck!

Sven Botman iz doubtful to play, but hopefully aall the rest who played in the Fulim game on Saturday will be available!

For future reference, aall domestic Cup game tickets will automatically be downloaded to Season tickets! (But NOT for Champions Leegue games)

The draw for the qwaataa finals takes place after the game iz finished!

A match report will appear here sometime on Thorzday!

Az per usual---"Watch this space!" 

 

376 gander green lane, sutton (v palace u21s)

 Ground number 376 (377 if you include Motspur Park from outside) 142nd ground that has staged League football 

Date of First Visit: 27th October 2025

Gander Green Lane, West Sutton, London

Crystal Palace U21s 0

Newcastle United U21s 2 ( Munda, Brayson)

Premier League 2

Attendance: 700 (estimated) (100 Toon fans---mostly locals)

5 NUFC mad-sad groundhoppers who had travelled from the North East

“GANNIN FOR A 'GANDER' DOON GANDER GREEN LANE!”

To avoid an owerneet stay in London , it woz decided to travel in ‘Blondie Alan the Morris Dancers’ ‘jam jar’ to Donny (Doncaster) and get a train to King’s Cross and then onward on another train to West Sutton, where the game woz bein played at Sutton United FC

The reason to take a car to Donny, woz because the 11.31pm train back from King’s Cross terminated at Donny! thus avoiding a hotel stay by taking a car doon to drive back!

My jorney woz a train to Durham where Blondie Alan picked me up, a train from Donny to London---Another train to West Sutton, which woz 18 stops and took ann hour!

Anyway! In total the jorney time doon took ower 7 hours in and we arrived at wor destination some 2 hours before the ‘7.00pm bells 🔔 kick off time! (Left Toon at ‘10.30am 🔔s’) )

We heeded for the nearest boozer which woz caalled The Gander Inn, where we met fellow ‘mad-sad groundhopper’ 'Alex of St George' (Middleton St George near Teesside Airport) 

I needed a ‘gypsies kiss’ in ‘the toolshed’, but the sign on the door said ‘Toilet out of order’! I asked the barman where there woz another toolshed and he just told me just to use the one that woz out of order? “So why’s the sign on the door if it iz OK to use?” I asked him!

OOT OF ORDER—-BUT IT’S NOT!???

“The toilet’s in use now, but we just keep the sign up!”, he replied! (Make sense of that IF you can?🤔)

It woz soon time to heed for the floodlights which were glowin in the dark in the distance and in the clubhoose there were more Toonhoppers in the shape of ‘Glennn from Ashington’, ‘Biffa the Beer’ and Toon fan caalled Dale who lives in Fulham in west London!

The game kicked off and there woz the usual 500-700 in attendance that you get at these games!—(Selhurst Park iz some 8 miles north of here!)

The Toon were on the front foot from the start az we attacked the right hand goal from where we were at the front of the old lookin main stand!  The rest of the groond had smaall covered stands and it looked like a typical smaall club setup!

We had quite a few chances, before taking the lead in the 20th minute when Anthony Munda opened the scorin with a fine heeder from a Alex Murphy cross! That’s the way it stayed til the break! 

Seung-soo Park had came close before that with a fine shot that woz saved by Lee in the Palace goal!

At half time aa heeded back to the clubhoose for some more ‘liquid lubrications’ and a Toon fan who I’d never met, enquired “Are you the famous Glenn?” ((Glennn from Ashington) Quick az a flash, I replied, “NO, I’m the famous Fink!” (Or should that read infamous Fink?)

Anyway! I foond Glennn and introduced them!  He lived not far away in Carshultan and woz soon ‘christened’ ‘Carshultan Mick’ by me!

The second half woz well underway and like the forst half wor U21s ran the show!

Wor U21s doubled wor lead through Joe Brayson (son of ex Toon player Paul Brayson) who hit a fine shot into the corner of the net from a Neave pass!

The teamsheet says that the game iz at Borough Sports Groond, which iz a misstayk

That’s woz the final goal of the match and then we faced the complicated retorn jorney, eventually  arriving back yem at ‘3.00am bells’ where motorway closures near Selby on the A1M added to wor travel sickness!

Another groond off the list and mee 25th in London!

We managed to dee 4 drinkin dens on the way to the match and back!

The Leopard, Doncaster on the way doon!

The Gander Inn, West Sutton, London

Rolens Bar, (Sutton United clubhoose)

The Barrel Vaults, St Pancras, London, on the way back

"WE WOZ THERE!"---THE PROOF!

GANDER GREEN LANE UPDATE

 Posted ‘7:07pm 🔔 bells Tuezday 28th Octobaa 2025

Grovelling apologies for not deein the match report from Crystal Palace U21s v NUFC U21s at Sutton United FCs Gander Green Lane last neet in south London!

Because we didn’t get back til 3am 🔔 this mornin ,aa woz completely’cream crackered’ and ‘under the weather’ and have been in bed most of the day!

I will endeavour to dee the match report where NUFC won 2-0 with goals from Munda and Brayson tomorrow dinnatime!   And then a review of wor Leegue Cup tie v Sporz at SJP, which kicks off a ‘8.00 bells’ tomorrow neet!

Watch this space intentleee!

It woz an horrendous jorney by train, car, train and train to get there —-and the same back!

LETS HAVE A ‘GANDER’ TO A NEW GROOND!

Posted ‘9.00am bells 🔔’ Munday 27th Octobaa 2025 🪿 

“A GANDER TO THE GREEN!”

We are off to Sutton United FC tooneet, where wor U21s play Crystal Palace U21s in a Premyaa Leegue 2 fixture at Ganders Green Lane! (Palace’s Selhurst Park iz 8 miles away!)

The reason for the visit of course, iz because it’s a new groond for ‘The NUFC mad-sad groundhoppers’ and this will be mee 25th London groond to see The Toon! (If aa get there? 🙏🏻)

Bein an ‘old timer’ it’s costing the princely sum of ONE QUID for me to get in, but to get that £1 ticket aa had to create an account to join the Palace ticket scheme, to get one downloaded onto mee telling bone! 📞 What a carry on to get tickets these days! (For some of these games you MUST buy a ticket online, or you won’t get in!——-Crazy!😵‍💫)

The travel plan iz!—-Get the train to Durham where ‘Blondie Alan the Morris Dancer’ will pick me up in hiz ‘jam jar’ at 11.00 🔔s’ (He lives not far away in Langley Park, where Bobby Robson came from) and from there we drive to Donny station (Doncaster) and get the train to London King’s Cross —and then onward to Sutton in south London from St.Pancras, (next door to King’s Cross), for the ‘7 🔔s’ kick off! —-After the match we dee the same 2 retorn train jorneys back to Donny, arriving at ‘1.30am 🔔s’

That’s az far az the train gans, hence leaving the car there!—Drive back from there and get back in the hoose at aboot ‘4am 🔔s’—Blondie then haz to drive back to Langley Park and he should end hiz jorney aboot half an hour after dropping me off!

Hopefully it will be worth it with a favourable result!?

Match report sometime on Tuezday! (Allegedly!?)

THE TOON 2. THE COTTAGE PIE BRIGADE 1 *** PREMYAA LEEGUE 2025-2026

 Posted ‘high noon 🕛 bells’ 🔔’ Sunday 26th Octobaa 2025

“FOR A CHANGE, A WINNER AT THE DEATH!”

Followin wor great 3-0 win against Benfica in The Champions Leegue on Tuezday, it woz vital that we kept up the momentum against Fulim yesterday!

They’d lost 3 in a row in The Premyaa Leegue, so we were odds on favourites to collect the 3 points!

Of course this doesn’t aalways happen with NUFC and it looked az though we would have to settle for a 1-1 draw!

However! it didn’t pan oot this way and the sequence of events were az follows:

3rd and 5th minutes: Both Nick Waltemade and Jacob Murphy had efforts that hit the frame of the goal az we attacked The Leazes goal!

18th minute: The breakthrough!---Jacob Murphy races past the Cottage Pies defence (their nickname iz The Cottagers) and he faces a 'one to one' with Fulim goalie Leno and hits a precision shot, which went in off the post! 1-0 to us!

We really couldnt get oot of 2nd gear and struggled for the rest of the half az wor visitors tried to level things!

40th minute: Jacob Murphy haz an identical run to goal and again faces Leno in a 'one to one' , but this time its the goalie who comes oot on top az he deflects Murphy's shot, which went oot for a corner! HT 1-0 to us!

Like aa say, we werent at wor best in the forst half against a poor Fulim team who actually started to dominate the 2nd period!

They had quite a few chances and of course the invertible happened!

56th minute: Jiminez hits a shot that ricoshades of the crossbar and in the melee that followed, Sven Botman got clattered and ended up in the back of the net with the baall! 1-1

The 1,700 Fulim fans high up in the Leazes gods, rubbed it in by singin', "No noise from the Saudi Boys!"

After lenghy treatment for a cut to the heed, Botman leaves the field with concusion, holdin a bandage to the cut! (Replaced by Fab Schar) 

64th minute: An unmarked Bruno haz a glarin miss at The Gallowgate End, when hiz heeder gans inches wide, az we groaned in dispair!

90th minute: Just when it looked az though the game would end in a draw, super sub Will Osula latched onto a Sandro Tonali pass and hit a sweet shot which woz parried to Bruno by Leno---and wor captain had the easy chance of firin' the baall into the net to send the vast majority of the crowd into raptures! 2-1 to "The Saudi Boys!"🤪👍

6 minutes of stoppage time for Botman's treatment woz shown on the 4th official’s board, az the crowd whistled for the ref to blow for full ttime! Nerves were janglin and finger nails were chewed az Fulim tried in vain for a very late equaliser!---The ref who woz crap again, actually played 9 minutes stoppage time, before finally blowin' for full time, to the relief of the faithful! (Makes a change from the very late home defeats to Livaapoool and The Arse!)

The win lifted us to the top half of the table briefly, but later on, a 'smaaller club' from west London caalled Brentfaad beat Livaapoool  3-2! (minus 'yee naa who' through injury) Az they say: "Instant karma's gonna get you!"

*(Livaapoool manager Arne Snot had said through the week that NUFC were a “smaller club’, and implied that to woz ‘wor fault’ that Isak wasn’t fit!—He went on strike, remember!— Hardly wor fault!)🥶)

That result meant we slipped to 11th place in the Premyaa Leegue table! 

Attendance: 52,152 (1,700 Cottage Pies who were 'pie eyed' after wor late goal!)

*Happy fans leave the groond!⬇️

 Honestly!  How iz this not a foul on Waltemade?  The ref waved ‘play on’? ⬇️🥶