Crosstown Traffic

Public transport is in crisis on Tyneside. The bus companies are trying their best against appalling odds, while the Metro continues to be a dirty, dangerous and unreliable eyesore; the owners NEXUS remain a blight on our landscape and a drain on the public purse. We need action; fast.

Regular readers will know I lack detailed knowledge about the nuances of the 15-man code. That said, I do regard myself as a fan of both the Falcons domestically and Ireland internationally, even if it is a theoretical rather than active support. However, when news of a spare ticket for the Falcons versus Sale Sharks game at St James Park happened my way, I seriously thought about attending. Factoring in that the only time I’ve seen Falcons live they lost 75-3, after taking the lead, against Exeter and that my experience of rugby league’s Magic Weekend at SJP was akin to a mini break with the family of Shannon Matthews, I really did fancy this game. You would have thought the deal breaker would have been the 17.30 kick off, which would theoretically allow me to enjoy my beloved Benfield’s home game with Ryhope CW (we won 2-1 – yay!), before taking a pew in a sanitised Gallowgate End, uniformly attired in Ralph Lauren and refreshingly purged of Ashley’s Army of drooling simpletons.

Sadly, there was the most predictable of spanners in the works that would preclude me from seeing the Falcons maintaining their recent upsurge in form with an impressive comeback win. The Metro was off. That phrase, whether for reasons of sabotage of the overhead lines, stock failure, staffing issues, sociopathic teenage skagheads on the rampage or supposed engineering works, is one of the most repeatedly uttered and maddening clichés regular commuters are forced to mouth to bosses, colleague, friends and loved ones to excuse unfashionably late arrivals at everything from work to wedding receptions. For those of us reliant on the Metro to go about our daily affairs, we have no choice but to use a dirty, dangerous and unreliable system that is completely unsuited to the purpose and unsuitable for the people it was intended to serve. I speak as someone who does not own a motor car, so is reliant on either two-wheeled power or the tragicomic farce that is public transport north of the Tyne.

Of course, the underlying cause of the impending regionwide collapse of Metro is the chronic lack of investment in the rolling stock and infrastructure required, because of successive Government cuts and, it has to be said, disgracefully incompetent management by successive internal and external executive appointments. The German company DGB Regio who were tasked with improving the failing system from 2010 onwards and were relieved of their duties 4 years early in 2017, after consistently failing to deliver on performance targets or reliability and customer satisfaction, stole millions of pounds from the public purse and provided nothing in return.  Of course, the Metro has shown no tangible improvement since DGB Regio were sacked off; indeed, rather in the same way Cameron’s ConDems lied through their teeth at every opportunity from 2010 onwards, blaming Labour for the supposed need for swingeing public cuts in the name of austerity, Nexus continue to dishonestly load responsibility for every driver on the sick, train with malfunctioning doors, gang of North Face radgies throwing Frosty Jack around the place or theft of overhead cables on DGB Regio.

Not only that ex-officio owners NEXUS do this in such a curt, arrogant and dismissive way that suggests they are actually affronted when a customer has the audacity to complain about the appalling level of service that makes one feel defrauded every time you waste money on a ticket. Whether it’s the high-handed and contemptuous faceless control centre bods on the other end of the help point buzzer, phone line or running the Twitter account, you can feel sure that you’ll never get an apology for anything that goes wrong. These call centre contemptibles are utterly unsuited to all public facing duties, as they hate the general public. Mind, at least they are semi-sentient beings unlike the bovine spacehoppers in turquoise fleeces and slate wifebeaters, who are laughably known as mobile revenue control operatives. The hated Checkies, who are so low on the evolutionary scale that Piltdown Man would regard them as dull-witted. Cursed by backsides the width of a retirement bungalow, these bespectacled behemoths are wedged into doors to stop fare dodgers alighting. They don’t frighten me. In fact, they are an utter waste of money. The way to increase revenue is to have 2 staff at every station selling tickets and 2 more on every train. The increase in people paying their fare would make their appointments economically sensible. However, don’t expect planning or forward thinking from NEXUS.

For many years, I’d believed that the most corrupt, incompetent and contemptible set of evil bastards around were Northumbria Police, with a couple of exceptions of course. This opinion was based on their slavish obsession with satisfying the despicable needs of a pair of vile lunatics whose personal enmity towards yours truly resulted in the intellectually-challenged flatties from Forth Banks and Middle Engine Lane jumping to their beck and call, by effectively persecuting me when another specious, dishonest and utterly baseless allegation was made against me by either (code names) Fumima Fumami or Hosiery Hitler. I would contend that the coppers are useless because the bosses are corrupt and the uniformed dross haven’t the brains they were born with; unlike the despicable higher ranks of the legal profession, Edgar Wallace don’t exude oleaginous, arrogant privilege and egregious, mercenary mendacity. They just get hard when they can push people around; those who’ve taken silk are more concerned with taking lives. However, both the cops and the LLB robbers are given a good run for their stolen money by the Metro Nietzsches in the back-office roles and the sub-human space hopper Checkies.

The last week of February wasn’t a good one for Metro. I was on lates that week, meaning the 22.52 from Four Lane Ends towards the Coast was the appropriate service for me. Monday 25^th, it didn’t show. I used the help point at the station to ask why; the operative cut me off without a reason. Tuesday 26^th, the 13.02 from Tynemouth to Four Lane Ends went out of service at Cullercoats. I made a complaint by phone to a poor sap called Christine Bulmer, a Customer Communications Assistant who got the short straw of being my go-to Metro drone all week long. She was very sympathetic but offered no explanation. Wednesday 27^th, a completely plastered middle-aged woman was falling all over the carriage. Eventually she sat down and promptly threw up all over herself and the seats. A predatory, baldy, roid-head, swigging from a Carling carry-out managed to inveigle himself into her company and wrestled her off the train at Northumberland Park. I wasn’t going to front him up about this, for grounds of my cowardly personal safety, so I called the help point when I got off at Tynemouth, warning the reasonable person on the other end of the phone about the potential abduction, as well as the carriage being waist deep in vomit. Typically, there had been a large gang of cowardly, fat Checkies at Four Lane Ends, messing about on their phones and looking to intimidate anyone who looked week, rather than fronting any of the criminals running riot on the system. Thursday 28^th, the 22.52 didn’t show up. No reason. No explanation. I tweeted the @MyMetro account. No response. By next morning I was blocked, so I got back on the phone to Christine Bulmer, who promised to investigate.

Luckily, I was on earlies the next two weeks, so my bicycle came into play and I had both exercise and equilibrium on my way to graft. Eventually, I got a letter of explanation from Christine Bulmer, but no apology and no money off vouchers for my inconvenience. Still, I never buy a ticket anyway, so that’s no loss. Amusingly I got another letter, from Huw Lewis, the Customer Services Director no less, who confirmed I deserved to be blocked on Twitter for being “disruptive.” However, if I am a good boy for 3 months, I can ask them to reconsider. The really amusing thing is that I’m no longer blocked and can interact with @MyMetro, an account which follows me, should I wish. Such abject disconnection is typical of an organisation that is collapsing in on itself. Despite promises of £390m worth of new investment and a fleet of trains coming into use by the start of 2022, I doubt the Metro will last that long. I’ve got some news for Huw Lewis; neither will he.

You know what? The utter incompetence of the Metro is one of the main contributory causes of the gridlock on the roads north of the Tyne. Monday to Thursday rush hour is bad enough; the closure of Killingworth Road causing nose to tail traffic both round Four Lane Ends and Haddricksmill roundabouts, the on-going excavations at Silverlink that have taken longer to complete than Machu Pichu did, the unmusical vehicular statues on Jesmond Road and, worst of all, the absolutely disastrous lights at Billy Mill that have doubled the length of most homeward journeys to the Coast since they were completed. However, despite these nightmare conditions, more and people are choosing to drive because the alternative provided by the Metro is so unpalatable that only a rank fool of hopelessly naïve optimist would rely on NEXUS to get them to work in a timely fashion and home again safely after dark, especially as the Byker to Shields line is a feral jungle after dark.

Unfortunately, the dirty, dangerous and delayed Metro experience means that local bus companies must also bear the burden of Metro’s incompetence. Every time the trains go off, Metro tickets are accepted on buses. When does that happen the other way around? Every time there’s a planned weekend cancellation, generally coinciding with a major event at SJP, we get replacement buses. When do we have replacement trains for out of commission buses? Instead, what we get are buses snarled up in the north of the Tyne gridlock. There are so many people opting to use motor cars because the Metro is a disgrace that the pitifully marginalised and ignored bus companies suffer a straitening backlash, though I believe we’ve moved on from the motorist on Carr Hill Road in Felling, springing from his vehicle after being cut up by the 649, announcing to the bus driver, in a time when attacks on staff were a regular occurrence; “Nee wonder yeez cunts get fucked.”

There are 3 distinct companies running services north of the Tyne. The service I use most regularly is the Tynemouth to Newcastle 306, which is operated by the long-distance Arriva fleet, which were United when I was a bairn. Reliability is decent and the new fleet, with Wi-Fi and charging points as standard, are comfortable. Stagecoach are the real community company, operating all the east to west PTE services. While the 38 is a jewel of a bus, the 1, 62 and 63 are punished by the Four Lane Ends to Chillingham Road and then New Bridge Street logjam. Reliability is deplorable, but not their fault. Apparently, the services dedicated to the lower orders, specifically the 12, 22, 39 and 40, are always full to capacity, which is good to see. I don’t know much about Go North East, the old Northern red buses, other than the fact the 1 and 1A are pitiful and the bus are really uncomfortable. I prefer not to travel on them as they let the side down. That said, any bus is better than every Metro. Certainly, the plaintive graffito All Buses Are Shit scrawled across the timetable at a stop on Melbourne Street in around 89 or 90 seems rather anachronistic.

Of course, geographical reasons mean we can’t run trains up Westgate Hill and that way out of the city, but it’s a disgrace there aren’t bus only lanes on all the major arterial routes into and out of the city. The West Road, Gosforth High Street, Shields Road, the Tyne Bridge; make them bus only 6.30-9.30 and 16.00-19.30. Make bus transport a viable and attractive alternative to sitting in a massive tailback or squashing onto a massively delayed Metro.

Either that or give everyone a free bike for their Council Tax. It’s got to be better than giving all that public money to the Metro or Northumbria Police.

Ouston; You Have A Problem....

Pitch invasions and cyber capitulations; a typical month in the life of Newcastle United....

March 9^th would have been my old fella’s 85^th birthday. He’ll have been gone 10 years this summer, on the day after Bobby Robson in point of fact, but I still consciously mark the passage of time by recalling him on every appropriate landmark date. To be honest, he wasn’t a great one for any kind of fuss; in fact, I can only recall him celebrating 2 of his birthdays properly. We held a surprise 70^th do for him in 2004 and he loved it. Happy, hammered and honoured. The other momentous date was his 40^th; Saturday March 9^th, 1974.

When you’re a kid, time moves fast and even though my first trip to SJP had only been 15 months previous, for a 2-2 with Leicester City on New Year’s Day 1973, I was feeling like a regular, as the old man took me to all Saturday league games, though cup games, other than almost meaningless Texaco games at the start and end of the season were, for some reason, off the agenda. Hence, it was unsurprising when no offer to take me to the FA Cup quarter final game at home to Nottingham Forest was forthcoming. What did knock me back on my heels somewhat was his announcement that he was going to the game without me, in the company of my Uncles Brian and John, his brother and brother in law respectively. Drink would be taken.

Strangely, I wasn’t one to sulk at this snub, so I took the disappointment in my stride and followed my usual Saturday regime for away games and cup ties; once Football Focus and On The Ball had finished, I took myself off to my room with the transistor radio I’d been given the previous August on the occasion of my 9^th birthday for company and tuned into Home and Away with George Bailey on Radio Newcastle.  It was the only option for those wishing to keep abreast with regional sport, as Metro didn’t launch until July of 74. The rules governing what could be broadcast were strict and Spartan; three 30 second bulletins in each half, as well as goal flashes were the limit of what commentators at the ground could say on air. Messages were relayed to the anchor back in the station, who read them to an agog audience. Otherwise, for the dedicated football fan, it was a case of tuning into Radio 2, which did have the second half commentary from one major game or other, but it never seemed to involve Newcastle United, except for this momentous afternoon. Even then, I swerved the clipped vowels of Bryon Butler, choosing to remain loyal to the local Beeb lads from Archbold House in Jesmond.

My memory may be playing tricks, but the first half seemed to be relatively uncontentious, certainly in comparison to what came later. The fact Forest, a somnolent second division outfit in the days before the stellar impact of Brian Clough on the City Ground, were ahead 2-1 at the break was seen as typical of Newcastle United; a gutless capitulation when the stakes were even slightly raised. The one FA Cup game I had been to had been the year before, when the East Stand was opened for the first time at the Luton Town fourth round tie. It was on Match of the Day, so typically we lost 2-0, without a shot in anger or a whimper of dissent. It got far worse than even that one, against Forest soon after the break; the referee, a pompous and portly insurance agent from Amersham by the name of Gordon Kew, awarded Forest a penalty and sent Pat Howard off for arguing. Quite bizarrely, on doing some research before writing this I’ve found that not only is Kew still alive, aged 88, but was actually born in South Shields. Typical Mackem behaviour on his part, obviously.

As soon as the ball hit the net, the Leazes End decided to voice its objection. First there was a trickle, then a stream and then a torrent of invaders, hell-bent on causing mayhem. Kew took the players off and the game was suspended for 20 minutes until order was restored. The old man used to recall how, as the invasion started, many of the older heads in the West Stand Paddock, which was his location of choice, were disappointed by such stupidity and made their disappointment known. Him and John were bemoaning the existence of mob rule and attempted to canvass Brian’s opinions on the subject, only to see a person I always recall as Bob Ferris’s body double, complete with leather car coat, bubble perm and Mungo Jerry sidies, behaving like any responsible auditor for Gateshead Council with a Vauxhall Viva and a Bellway semi in Whickham should, by hightailing it across the cloying pitch, waving his black and white favours above his head like a dervish. Once order was restored and Brian’s adrenaline levels had fallen to normal levels again and he retook his position in the West Stand Paddock, knee deep in clarts, the game restarted.

On the radio, the local commentator had abandoned any pretence of neutrality, blaming the entire situation on Mr Kew and generally going ape as Newcastle got back into the game; a Terry Mac penalty halved the deficit, before a glorious John Tudor diving header brought us level and then, in injury time, which was about 5.15 or thereabouts, Bobby Moncur scored the winner from about 18 inches. An astonishing turnaround, but the result was never going to stand. Almost immediately, the FA insisted on the game being replayed, at Goodison of all places and, after a stalemate, Malcolm MacDonald got the crucial goal in what was referred to as the second replay, that put Newcastle through to the Burnley semi-final and the subsequent crushing at Wembley.

Neither me nor the old fella made any other FA Cup games that year, but I do recall the sheer elation of being in SJP to see us win the Texaco Cup, in front of over 36,000 at home to Burnley. My programme collection also tells me I attended a less-than-memorable 0-0 with Norwich City on Easter Monday, but I’ve wiped all knowledge of that clash of the titans from my memory. We were still there in the ground though, cheering the team on; the Forest invasion, which I’d seen as a surreal stampede on Shoot the day after, was something brushed off as youthful stupidity by the mature and revelled in as proper Geordie agro by the trainee boot boy element. The truth is certainly somewhere between the two, but the negative aspects of the day were used by the more scurrilous sections of the press as evidence enough to hang the club.

Fast forward 45 years and nothing has really changed; 7 fans accidentally spilling onto the track at the edge of the pitch at Bournemouth is being called an invasion by The Sun, that renowned champion of the Beautiful Game. It wasn’t; it was simply unbridled, supporter elation at a last gasp equaliser at any away ground nigh-on 400 miles from home. Ask any football fan; they would have reacted in a similar way, regardless of whether it was the Northern League or the Champions’ League. Pitch invasions are the current folk devils of the sporting press and the game’s administrators on both sides of the Border. A year on from West Ham’s home trouncing by Burnley that saw not the ICF, but an apparent gathering of librarians and Sociologists re-enacting Clive “Bex” Bissell; The Craft Ale Years on the turf of the Olympic Stadium, it’s happening all over. The clown in the Stone Island coat taunting Jonathan Smalling as Arsenal cuffed Man United the other week, a drooling simpleton in a scarlet Canada Goose snide getting his grid all over social media after a pointless incursion during the Swansea v Man City game, as well as more serious events such as the Brummie pillock now doing 4 months for ploating the admittedly highly punchable Jack Grealish. With my Hibs hat on, I’m acutely aware of the incidents involving flying Buckie bottles versus Celtic and the bodying of James Tavernier when the Huns were in town. One positive aspect shows that in confronting both sides of the Old Firm, Hibs display no latent prejudice; we hate Weegies of all persuasions. Let’s have a sense of perspective though; it isn’t Luton v Millwall redux. Frankly, it’s only really a passing fad.

Back in the 70s and 80s, the panacea for all footballing ills was seen as a combination of steel fences and ID cards. Well, look how that turned out; there’s 96 fans, crushed to death against metal barriers at Hillsborough in 89, testament to the ultimate efficacy of caging fans in like cattle off to market. At SJP, fences were erected in the close season of 1983 and came down again in 1989, post Hillsborough. The only time we came close to an invasion in those days was after a 3-0 loss to Charlton in May 1987, when a bizarre combination of results had meant we were safe from relegation despite that thumping. It was a daft, happy potential invasion, unlike the events of May 16^th 1990. The Mackem play-off loss, when we’d completely bottled the home leg, ended in ridiculous scenes whereby Gabbiadini’s goal prompted the Gallowgate to pour onto the pitch in pitiful spite. As soon as George Courtney hauled the players off the pitch, I turned on my heel and marched out of the Milburn Stand. I was back home in Spital Tongues before the players emerged to play out the remaining 90 seconds in front of silent, empty stands. My reasoning has always been; if you can’t handle defeat, then don’t watch football. It’s really as simple as that.

As regards Newcastle United, it seems that watching them is going to be quite easy over the next few weeks, once this latest interminable International Break is over. Despite the predictable crocodile tears all over social media from the usual ultra uber conspicuous superfans, the fact that the Arsenal, Leicester and Brighton away games, as well as the Southampton one at home, are all going to be on the box, is an absolute boon for those of us who either can’t afford or still refuse to line the pockets of the current ownership by becoming active members of Ashley’s Army. To show my hypocritical streak, there is the small matter of the Palace home game on April 6^th taking place on a day when Benfield are without a fixture, which almost seems tempting, though I am firm and resolute in my standpoint that I will not return to SJP while Benitez remains in charge.

Of course, such a philosophical position is becoming ever more untenable as the team appears to have turned a corner. At the point of writing, after 31 games, the team has remarkably achieved exactly the same results as at this point last season, even down to number of goals scored and conceded. Spooky huh? Well, it’s about the only frightening thing about the club of late. Since I last wrote about NUFC, the subsequent 6 league fixtures have seen 3 home wins, 2 away draws and an away defeat. Both the Huddersfield and Burnley victories were achieved with absolute minimum of fuss; the second half of the former and first half of the latter could have seen considerably more goals than they did. However, Schar’s Goal of the Month against Burnley and Sean’s debut home league strike were enough to calm the ire of the most embittered of fans. The West Ham loss was pretty straightforward as well; we did OK, but they’re better than us and have more creativity in their side. They deserved the points and good luck to them. The really sad thing was seeing Sean have his season ended in such a seemingly innocuous way. However, he will come back stronger, though I’m steeled to the fact we probably won’t see him turning out for Tynemouth this year.

As far as the other 3 games go, the rank incompetence of the officials at Molineux in failing to spot two fouls in the build-up to their overtime equaliser left a nasty taste, only equalled by the idiocy of certain NUFC walking planks demanding Dubravka be dropped. This game makes you despair at times. However, at other times it makes you literally jump for joy. We’ve already discussed Ritchie’s equaliser at Bournemouth, but the turnaround against Everton was even better. Jordan Littlearms has morphed into Steven Taylor in gloves (thank you Gary for that one) and it seems his career will only go in one direction very soon. Then again, that victory wasn’t just about Pickford’s implosion, it was all about the endeavour, work ethic and spirit of the team. Same as last season, Benitez has publicly castigated and berated them, calling them out for not being good enough, which may be true, but they’ve really dug in and turned it around.

Let’s be frank; Newcastle United are not yet safe from relegation. There is much work still to be done, but the quality of the centre backs available, not to mention the impact of Almiron to bring the very best out of Perez and the transformed Rondon, gives plenty of causes for optimism. Benitez will never play football the Keegan way and can be infuriatingly stubborn and inflexible, but I’ll admit he is tactically astute in a dour, defensive manner and he’ll always keep this club up, having learned from the preventable demotion in 2016, even on a shoestring, though the club should be aiming to achieve so much more than that. Unfortunately that doesn’t tie in with Ashley’s philosophy, such as it is. If Benitez leaves, then Newcastle United will probably be poorer for his departure in the short term, as his squad are now performing exactly how he has wanted them to do from day 1.

If the departure of Benitez would be viewed as a catastrophe by most of Newcastle United’s support, then the imminent withdrawal from public life of True Faith founder and former editor, one time NUST board member and previously a regional FSF representative Michael Martin after 20 years in his unasked for role as the inflexible paterfamilias of the most visible strata of NUFC’s supporter hierarchy, may not resonate so deeply. It comes at an ironic time as NUST are making yet another attempt to reanimate the dormant corpse of organised support aspirations. Having resigned from the Trust in 2015, I doubt I’ll be parting with a fiver of my hard earned, though the disappearance of the likes of Peter Fanning and Wallace Wilson from the executive board must be seen as a positive move, bearing in mind their unique influence on the chequered slalom of Magpie activism. Perhaps they’ll all withdraw from football entirely and become taxi drivers or something.

The straw that broke the camel’s back for Michael Martin was the savaging he took on Twitter for a seemingly innocuous tweet about how morally indefensible it is to support a team you have no geographical or familial ties with. Reasonable point if you’re talking about the Big 5 in England, if akin to shooting fish in a barrel. Sadly, some took hold of the wrong end of the stick and savagely berated MM for having a go at Newcastle fans born more than a mile from the banks of the Tyne. I have to say, despite having been on the end of an internet campaign of trash talking by MM and several of his one-time allies back in 2015, I felt sorry for him. He was being blamed for something he hadn’t said by people who hadn’t read his words in the first place. That’s something I find so frustrating about social media; attempting to put the record straight and have the last word when confronted by drooling cretins is impossible. Like a many-headed hydra, the cyber chattering classes can never be effectively cut down. Certainly the vicious, wholly-inaccurate and repeated attacks on him by Sunderland’s supporters must have worn down even the most stubborn and hard-faced on-line pugilist.

However, the crucial fact to bear in mind is that levels of resentment against MM have been rising ever since True Faith intervened to suggest the Wolves boycott be abandoned, as the club was apparently on the verge of being sold and such a tactic may scare off potential buyers at the eleventh hour. This grave miscalculation has been shown to be a terrible tactical error, as no bid, much less deal, was forthcoming.  Whatever their motivation, the primary result of TF’s actions was to fatally undermine the fragile truce that existed amongst almost the entire congregation of organised NUFC support. The more cynical of observers pointed out such an intervention coincided with the relaunch of the print version of True Faith.

Now I’ve read all 5 issues of the relaunched print version of True Faith and I have to say, it is utterly unlike the final editions of the previous print incarnation.  It’s not like Militant or Socialist Worker any longer, as there is no inflexible party line that is reinforced in ever article. Indeed, as well as a wide range of opinions, there seems to be less confrontational zeal running through the pages, probably because of the wider range of contributors involved. Whisper it though, it’s largely dull and worthy in the style of The Mag. Additionally, I don’t see many, indeed any, ordinary folks reading on the bus or in the pub these days.

Perhaps the written word really is dying, which is probably reflected in the obsession of True Faith and others with podcasts.  For the first time in months, a Through Black and White Eyes editorial appeared on the website the other week, which I took to be a retirement speech. To be honest, MM attempt to rewrite Prospero’s farewell to the stage was a strangely self-pitying document, in which he portrayed himself as a naïve ingénue in the world of social media. Throughout the document, he demonstrated utter incomprehension as to why his words were so badly and deliberately misconstrued. Partly I suppose it’s because people are stupid and partly because those with a score to settle don’t value the truth that much. However, I had expected a little more insight and self-awareness as to why he’d become such a pariah. Perhaps that’s something he can reflect on during his retirement. I wish him well.

Cold Trafford

A long time ago, I used to go to Old Trafford each year and watch Newcastle United get thumped; now I go to see Tynemouth Cricket Club suffer an annual hammering -:

As Storm Gareth batters the country with 60 mph winds and squally showers of torrential rain, it seems strange to be talking about cricket, but the simple fact is that the 2019 season is a mere 5 weeks away. The NEPL campaign begins on Easter Saturday, April 20^th and frankly, I can’t wait. Same as last year, when Seaham Harbour’s resignation left the first division a team short, there are 23 teams operating across the two divisions. In the top division, as well as the disappearance of Durham Academy, the league management committee were required to deal with the aftermath of Stockton transferring to the NYSD League post season. Consequently, there was no relegation and two promoted clubs, Burnopfield and Bournmoor, have been elevated to the storied ranks of the top flight. While both clubs provide a challenging adventure for those keen on public transport expeditions, they will also demonstrate both ends of the evolutionary scale in terms of facilities. The reader is invited to assess whether a carpeting of daisies in the outfield constitutes rustic charm or pitiful pit village.

Division 1 sees 3 newcomers; Ashington, who Tynemouth have been drawn away to in the Banks Salver on May Day Monday, Crook and Shotley Bridge. Followers of the paranoid pit yakkas from NE63 have already flexed their capacious sense of injustice six pack by suggesting the fact Ashington are the odd ones out without a game on the opening day is some kind of slight on their honour and indicative of the sort of treatment they have to look forward to. Quite… As well as the trio of neophytes, my personal omnibus odyssey has yet to take me to Willington or seemingly inaccessible Castle Eden. However, I will do my utmost to tick the 5 unvisited grounds off the list. It should prove a more exciting contest that watching South North, augmented by new signing Oli McGee and Jacques Du Toit, ambling to the Premier Division title in third gear, yet still amassing a record points total.

Incredibly fortuitously, Benfield’s League programme is scheduled to wrap up the week before the cricket season gets underway, with a final day contest at Seaham Red Star, so I hope to be able to dedicate myself to my other main sporting love, Tynemouth CC from the very start. Indeed, I’ve already seen Tynemouth in action at 3 different venues over the past couple of months in the various rounds of the National Indoor 6 a side Championships, battling through successive Northumberland qualifiers at South North against the likes of Blagdon, Backworth and Tynedale,  before reaching the North East final at Durham against South Shields in early January. Facing a stiffish target, the lads batted beautifully to win with ease and thus move forward to the Northern final at Old Trafford. This was the same stage as we reached last year, on the same weekend, with almost exactly the same team; Polly as captain, Smudger, the two Sams and Fez, with the final spot taken by Owen Gourley, apparently because he was already in Manchester that weekend on the gargle.

Drink had been taken by yours truly on Saturday 9^th, during and after Benfield’s thoroughly enjoyable 4-1 away success against Penrith, when we’d recovered from the blow of going a goal down in 7 whole seconds, to win with ease. Despite finding my way back indoors for the start of Match of the Day,  the carousing continued in honour of Newcastle’s superb recovery against Everton that was the first game on, almost incredibly. As a consequence, the alarm clanging me awake before 8 on a wintery morning was a sick joke and indicative of a tough, tough start. However, I got it together in time to be picked up by Messrs Smith and Pollard. The journey was initially a breeze; cold outside, but dazzlingly sunny. Yes it was a bit blowy when we breakfasted at Wetherby, but there was nothing to hint at the weather awaiting us. Once on the M62, conditions began to deteriorate: cloudy by Elland, pouring by Huddersfield and eventually a blizzard as we sashayed past Saddleworth Moor. It was a temporary, if terrifying, state of affairs; dry by Rochdale and blindingly sunny as we departed the M60 for Salford Quays and the home of Lancashire Cricket.

Within 15 minutes, the whole team was there, as well as the support, which consisted of me and Fanta, meaning what we lacked in numbers, we made up for in girth. Our opponents were the Shropshire winners; Grasshoppers CC. It would have been interesting if the county had been represented by Shrewsbury CC, as Joe Hart may well have turned out as he seems to have already been put out to pasture at Burnley. Grasshoppers won the toss and put us in. Despite 19 from the first over and an encouraging 46/1 from 3, we never got going; after 5 we’d become becalmed at 56/3. In the end, a less than stellar 90 all out from 10.1 meant we’d have to bowl like demons and field like angels to stand a chance. Nobody hid and nobody chucked it. Smudger bowled with accuracy and hostility and Sam Robson held a couple of good catches, while they also contributed a comedy run-out, but it was a fond hope. They cruised home after 10.1 as well, winning by 3 wickets, leaving us to ruefully pick at the post-game buffet and contemplate what might have been, following our second successive exit at this stage. Grasshoppers are off to Lords on March 31^st, as they overcame Hallam from Sheffield in the final. Fair play and good luck to them; they bowled very well in a large arena, twice the size of anywhere Tynemouth had played before today. To be frank, it’s probably best we got knocked as the Mackems are in London that weekend for the Checkatrade Trophy final and we’d only have outnumbered, outsang, outdrank and outfought them.

Initially, the journey back was a glum one, but before we’d even got out of Lancashire, a sense of proportion returned and we gassed on, all the way back, about hopes and fears for the season to come. It’s one of the things I love about Benfield, Tynemouth and any grass roots sport; you can talk to players in a sensible, rational way as most of them have interesting angles to express and amusing anecdotes to express them. However, I guess we can all agree that sharing bestiality videos in the WhatsApp group is a bad idea, though try telling that to Tynemouth Bad Boys.

The midweek league starts week commencing April 22^nd (Easter Monday in point of fact) and we’re actively looking forward to life in division 2, even if 5 of the teams (Bates Cottages, High Stables, Sparta, Whitley Bay and ourselves) have been promoted en bloc to compete with  Cramlington, Genetics (Swalwell) and Merz & McLellan (Ulgham). As a shift worker, I anxiously await the arrival of my next rota, as that will dictate what holidays I need to take, if I’m to continue appearing, as opposed to playing, for the Galatasaray of the Midweek League. Regular updates to be found here, with references to proper cricket as well, on the odd occasion.

Milllenialist Tendencies

The Labour Party, March 2019; a few observations....

I’m not a cinephile, to say the very least. It’s not that I hate films per se, because I don’t. What I find hard to deal with is the interminable sitting still and keeping quiet for two hours or so. In the 13 years Laura and I have been together, we’ve made 2 trips to the flicks; Control and The Damned United since you’re asking. I also went by myself to see Filth. It isn’t altogether surprising we don’t have another outing to the silver screen planned.

One consequence of my self-imposed disengagement from blockbuster films, similar to my avoidance of television and popular music, is that I haven’t a clue who are all these famous actors and directors that the gossip columns go on about. However, I was pleased to see Olivia Colman win an Oscar, mainly because I loved her performances in Peep Show and Rev, not to mention the Bev and Kev car insurance adverts. Reading up about reactions to the list of winners, Spike Lee appeared justifiably disgusted that Green Book won the award for Best Picture, as it perpetuates the “white saviour” trope and tells an improbable story of a racist’s redemption, fuelling the institutional racism of Hollywood by whitening any story involving African Americans, to appeal to middle class WASP audiences.

Now, I totally agree with Spike Lee as it goes, but what amazes me is the mealy-mouthed soft-pedalling Bohemian Rhapsody got from the critics, who focussed not on the significance of Queen’s abhorrent actions as a group, but on the sanitised biopic of Barry Bulsara’s cousin, Fred.  From the outset I’ll state I fucking despise Queen’s music. Like any right-minded human being, I find their bland, pompous, middle of the road, radio friendly soft rock to be an affront to all of those truly creative geniuses who have slaved away, writing and recording provocative, memorable, life-affirming music in any genre, bar the sickening AOR cesspool that Mercury and his pals inhabit. However, the main reason I thought there would have been a critical backlash against the hagiographic pile of horseshit Bohemian Rhapsody undoubtedly is, were the activities of Queen in October 1984, when they kicked off their The Works tour by scheduling a dozen sold-out dates in front of whites-only audiences during the apartheid era in South Africa at the Sun City Super Bowl. In the end, Mercury’s voice allegedly gave out and they only played 9 dates, but that’s 9 too many.

It may be 35 years ago now, but I remember vividly the hatred and scorn visited upon Queen’s heads for their unapologetic bathing in fistfuls of blood-soaked Krugerrands. That year, Thatcher’s Government, who had publicly denounced the ANC and Nelson Mandela as terrorists, took a few moments out of running the country as a fascist Police State during the Miners’ Strike, and hurried through Zola Budd’s application for British citizenship. Oh, how we laughed, in the lee of the Orgreave Atrocity, when the white trash poster girl of Soldiers of Fortune and the Whitehall elite finished last in the Olympic final, as a prelude to disqualification, after impeding US favourite Mary Decker Slaney. In the context of the times, it made Queen’s decision to prop up the murderous apartheid regime whose massacres from Sharpeville in 1960 to Soweto in 1977 were enough to make all civilised nations break off all contact with South Africa, even more repulsively amoral. Questions of conscience didn’t stop Queen, as there was money to be made. Unsurprisingly, Bohemian Rhapsody, a film described as a "terrible and self-indulgent piece of revisionist history, where the legend is always prioritized over the truth,” that does not even begin to address the fact Mercury was gay, despite his death from AIDS, has nothing to say about the moral stain on the band’s collective conscience, but I’ll never forgive, nor forget their treacherous, avaricious support for apartheid.

Then again, in the febrile atmosphere of the Orwellian Year Zero that was 1984, an awful lot of people were harbouring a whole load of crazy opinions. I’ve just read Michael Crick’s authoritative history of Militant, half in a state of amused detachment, reminiscing just how batshit crazy “The Organisation” were and half in a boiling rage of undiluted anger at the tactics and beliefs of the Leninist equivalent of Branch Davidian. Despite their slavish adherence to the dated and dangerous doctrine of democratic centralism, Militant were so obsessed with distancing themselves from ultra-left “sectarians” and non-Trotskyist “trendy” lefties, they were completely unconcerned that their tendency’s uniform attitudes to what they dismissively regarded as “single-issue” campaigns were as reactionary as any Daily Telegraph editorial. In their incessant veneration of workerist ethics, racism and chauvinistic misogyny were at least tolerated, if not actually embraced.  Their disastrous inability to grasp the concept of social privilege meant that Militant granted carte blanche to young, white, heterosexual, working class men; economic disenfranchisement trumped any other indicator of oppression. Being gay, black or female and middle class meant you were lumped in with the enemy; fair game for workerist abuse.

Remember, The Organisation were the group who made anti-Thatcher t-shirts demanding we “Ditch the Bitch” and whose publications were filled with ultra-masculine cartoons, with strong blokes and weak ladies, drawn by the tellingly named Alan Hardman. Additionally, the What We Stand For alphabet of transitional demands made reference to “housewives” being regarded as workers in future. Having scarcely believably called for a “socialist federation” with Argentina during the Malvinas War, their fetishisation of the Unionist working class in the Six Counties was par for the course. Worst of all, the belief that any non-heterosexual orientation was a “bourgeois lifestyle choice,” legitimised a particularly unpleasant streak of homophobia that still exists in the ossified beliefs of SPEW, Militant’s failed rebrand following the abolition of entrism, following Kim il Taaffe’s “Open Turn” in the early 90s.

How difficult it must be for Militant to understand that child sex abuse wasn’t the preserve of the upper classes, but the modus operandi of men who exuded a desire to express their power. It is the working man’s ballet football that appears to have been a particularly fertile field of dreams for working class nonces.

Back in the day, the nonsensical falsehood that the RSL and Militant were only a loose amalgam of newspaper readers and sellers, was as credible as the existence of the tooth fairy or claims that the moon was made of cream cheese. However, prior to the “Open Turn,” this lie was parroted endlessly, despite neither speaker nor listener ever believing the words uttered. Still, as Crick forecast when writing in 1986, in the squalid aftermath of the idiotic farce that was the disastrous destruction of Liverpool as a viable city by Militant, the minute they quit the Labour Party and stood on their own two feet, they’d fail spectacularly.

So, it has come to pass. Fair’s fair though; at least they kept it together while being a parasitic tapeworm in the lower bowels of the Labour Party, unlike Maomentum who have been as much use a glass eye in the bottom drawer. It’s not only slightly ironic, but also very amusing, that 75 Militant members have applied to rejoin the Labour Party. Sensibly, they’ve all been rejected, apart from the slippery, career bullshitter, Degsy the Horsebox Hatton, though by all accounts, 2 days after getting his party card, he’s been suspended following allegations of an anti-Semitic tweet from a few years back. Now, anti-Semitism is the single most divisive issue in the Labour Party these days; even more so than the failure to adequately articulate the need for a People’s Vote, as Rees Mogg and his acolytes open yet another window in their Brexit Advent Calendar, so we’ll discuss both issues.

Back in 1981, allegedly because of their unease at Labour’s leftward drift under Michael Foot, specifically the Wembley Conference in January of that year at which the party adopted policies such as unilateral nuclear disarmament and  withdrawal from the Common Market (I’m not making this up you know) the infamous Gang of Four, comprising Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Bill Rodgers and Shirley Williams, made their Limehouse Declaration that ushered in the foundation of the Social Democratic Party. While only Owen and Rodgers were MPs at that time, 28 elected Labour members as well as 1 Tory performed their own “Open Turn,” though only 1, Bruce Douglas-Mann in Mitcham and Morden, resigned his seat, then subsequently lost the by-election. Despite going into the 1983 election with 31 sitting MPs, the SDP was reduced to 8 and then 5 after the 1987 election, at which point they fell into a marriage of convenience with the Liberal Party. One intriguing fact is that the last of the SDP founders to be elected to Parliament was Gateshead West defector John Horam, who represented the Tories in Orpington from 1992 to 2010.

Tom Watson, who some members on the left actually voted for as Deputy Leader, though not me as I’ve supported Stella Creasey as she’s a big fan of the Wedding Present, really ought to take note of history, when not playing the role of Witchfinder General. Indeed, perhaps Chuka Umunna and the other idiots who ditched Labour to form the Independent Group of allegedly principled pro Europeans and committed campaigners against anti-Semitism, should bear this in mind. I’m sure the trio of Tory turncoats have already factored that in to their career development plans.

With Britain in the kind of constitutional crisis I’ve not known in my lifetime, which puts Suez, Profumo and the Falklands in the shade, and may be as crucial as the events of 1909 that led to the 1911 Parliament Act, it is almost impossible to predict the eventual situation in Britain from 11pm on March 28^th onwards with any degree of reliable accuracy. I do still feel an extension of Article 50, followed by a fudged Norway Plus deal will be the eventual outcome, but there will be plenty of hot air, split milk and spilt blood before we get there.

Of course, Farage and his gang of gamine gammon Fucktards are planning their equivalent of Mao’s long march. Sustained only by fags, Bombardier and Melton Mowbray pork pies, the Campaign for an English Reich are pointing their brogues southerly and intend to march from Sunderland to London, demanding Brexit is delivered as the 52% demanded. Regardless of the motivation of those who voted to Leave, let’s just hope this gang of bastards in Barbours take their travelling circus right past the main entrance of Nissan on day one, so they can explain to an entire workforce who are about to be thrown on the scrapheap, quite how economic suicide is an effective way of taking back control.

Even if nasty Nigel was eviscerated on the A183, it still wouldn’t make the news. After all, the main story every day is how the Labour Party has transformed into Corbyn’s personal Hezbollah and how anti-Semitism runs rampant through the party, infecting everyone it touches. Unless, as the narrative goes, each and every person in the party makes a solemn oath never to support Palestinian rights and performs a public act of auto da fe to apologise for conscious or unconscious personal or institutional anti-Semitism, the Labour Party is finished. Even then, only the removal of Jeremy Corbyn, precisely the kind of principled person who attacked Militant’s reactionary politics and Queen’s support for South African National Party, will satisfy the dog whistle demagogues.

Now I am prepared to admit that Jeremy Corbyn, despite his calm, understated, charismatic conscience-based politics in the wider world, has been an absolutely hopeless leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party. I’ve long said Corbyn would be better as party president, in a ceremonial rather than executive role. However, that’s because his gentle style and sense of humanity has stopped him from wiping the floor with the Tories. His instinctive Euroscepticism has been a complete disaster as well, but I don’t believe he, or any significant number of Labour Party members, display any anti-Semitic attitudes.

In all my years of political and union activism, I have only twice heard unequivocal anti-Semitic attitudes from those on the left; once by an ancient Stalinist in the Communist Party bookshop at the top of Westgate Road in the early 80s and once by some raving RCP lunatic, frothing at the mouth at the Haymarket at the end of that decade. Considering The Next Step was partly funded by Mossad, we can safety discount that aberrant nonsense. I’ll admit I know little about the machinations of the parliamentary Labour Party, but those MPs I do know (Mearnsy, Chi, Mary G, Bridget and Laura for instance) don’t have an anti-Semitic fibre in their being. Similarly, the conduct of local Labour Party branches in recent years is beyond my experience, other than Newcastle East Dene Ward, but I would seriously doubt any such attitudes would be tolerated.

The mendacious lies of racists who claim that anti-racists like Corbyn are somehow racist, echo the deceit of Militant’s workerist persecution of the LGBT sector of the Labour movement or the mendacious hagiography of the spandex attired Sun City Boys who claimed to be Champions.