This website iz dedecated to the Newcastle United groundhoppers who follow the fortunes of the team aroond the world (and beyond!) The ground totals include competitive and friendly forst team, resorve team, junior team and Newcastle United X1 games that 'the mad-sad groundhopper' has attended, aall for Newcastle United games only, in the last SEVEN decades*** cheers!***'Fink' (the mad-sad groundhopper!)***last count 379 (380 inc Motspur Park outside)
Posted ‘high noon 🕛 bells’ Wedinzday 15th April 2026
With a blank midweek again The Geordie Times haz ‘dug up’ a match report from the opening of Dunston’s groond 38 years ago!
They were caalled Dunston Federation Brewery in those day and the groond woz named Federation Park after the Federation Breweries in Dunston! (Their sponsors at the time) Now long gone I’m afraid!
Ground number 087 ⬇️
Ground number 87
Date of First Visit: 15th August 1988
Federation Park, Dunston
Dunston Federation Brewery 1 (Davison)
Newcastle United XI 3 (Coxall, Craig, Bogey (pen)
Friendly fixture for ground opening
Attendance: 1,000 (estimated)
"COME ALONG AND SEE THE STARS OF NEWCASTLE UNITED!"
Az the drunken magpie flies Federation Park (Now UTS Stadium) and St. James’ Park are 1.6 miles apart across the Tyne! (Googled it!)
Yet in terms of size and support its aboot a million miles and 10 league divisions apart!
This woz the official openin' of 'The Fed’s new groond and news of ‘The Toon's visit had been the talk of Dunston for days!
A poster woz pinned to the waall of the now sadly demolished ‘Cross Keys’ boozer near Dunston Staiths advertisin the match and it read: OFFICIAL OPENING OF GROUND BY WILLIE McFAUL—COME ALONG AND SEE THE STARS OF NEWCASTLE UNITED (McFaul woz the manager!)
The 'stars', az it torned oot, wornt even playin'!
Instead NUFC had sent a bunch of mainly resorve and junior player, while some of the stars (Andy Thorn, Dave Beasant etc) were just spectators like the rest of us!
I'm writin this in April 2026, nearly 38 years after this game woz played and sadly just a few months after Willie (Iam) McFaul had passed away!
The Dunston groond back then, woz simply a fenced off field with hard standin aroond it with nee cover or seats of any description! (See top photo)
There were nee floodlights eethaa and a smaall cabin behind the goal doubled up az the clubhoose at the time!
Dunston were in The Northern Combination and NUFC were in the old Forst Division (now the Premyaa Leegue)
A large crowd had turned up to see the ‘stars in stripes’ but like aa say it woz anything but!
It didn’t take the Toon XI lang to take them lead when Coxall scored in the 2nd minute! It stayed that way til bang on half time when Craig doubled the lead, with the home side strugglin to contain their ‘big brother’ from across the river!
HT 2-0
The second period woz the same and the NUFC XI increased the goal gap in the 54th minute when a Dunston defender gave away a penalty!
Up stepped Ian Bogey to shoot into the back of the net for a 3-0 lead!
(The Bogeyman did have a handful of 1st team appearances, but played mostly in the resorves)
‘The Fed’ then got a consolation goal through Davison, to add a bit of respectability to the scoreline!
There were nee more goals, so it ended 3-1 to the ‘No Stars in Stripes’ at the final whistle!
Posted from 8:16 pm 🛎️ bells’ onwards on the train back from King’s Cross, Sunday 12th April 2026
“NOT! A GOOD TIME TO BE A TOON FAN!”
After a 3 week break, after playin 2 games a week for 4 months, you would have thought NUFC would be rejuvenated, after a much needed rest, but we couldn’t be more wrang!
Yet again we played in wor aaful green away strip, when there woz nee colour clash.?
Az well az wor aaful strip, it woz an aaful game az well, az both teams put in a lack lustre performance! 🎭
We were marginally the better team in the forst half and we took the lead in the 43rd minute when Wil Osula fired from close range from an excellent Lewis Miley cross!
HT 1-0 to us!
The second period woz az dull az dish waataa, but the turnin point came in the 65th minute when Palace brought on Mateta, who proved to be the game changer!
Just when it looked az though we would hang on for the 3points, Mateta had other ideas and he equalised in the 80th minute with a heeder from a Mitchell centre, that Toon goalie Aaron Ramsdale couldn’t get near! 1-1
But the killer blow came deep into stoppage time, when Sven Botman needlessly grabbed Lerma’s arm in the penalty area and the ref pointed straight to the white spot!
Mateta took it, but Ramsdale woz unable to stop hiz shot az the baall entered the net! 2-1 to them after 90+4 minutes!
Bizarrely, Wissa and Elanga were then sent on for the last 2 minutes, but not surprisingly, it woz too little tooo late az the full time whistle blew!⬇️
Havin’ been on the pitch for just 2 minutes, Wissa then swopped shirts with Mateta at the end of the match!— unbelievable!
The dejected Toon fans gave light applause and a few booos to the team, az we made wor way to the exits! FT 2-1 to them!
Amazingleee NUFC have dropped 25 points from winnin positions this season and would be 2nd top , just 3 points below leaders Arsenal IF we could have held on to those leads!
Instead we find worsels in 14th position, with a European place now lookin a lang shot! 🔫
Just how a ‘not so’ ‘Steady Eddie Howe’ can survive this ‘wobble’ iz anybodys guess?🤔
This iz NOT a good time to be a Toon fan, for certain!😵💫
Attendance: 25,141 (2,687 p*ssed off Toon fans!)
*Pub crawl pix!⬇️ (6 new ones for this season, plus one we’ve been tee many times (The Barrel Vaults) Runnin total for this season iz 160 different drinkin dens!
“WE MUST BE BARKING 🐕 MAD!”⬇️
We stopped in a hotel in the Barking district of London the neet before the game and did a mini pub crawl! (Just 4 drinkin dens, includin the Ibis hotel bar)
It took a while to find them!
Little did we naa when we booked wor hotel, but Barking haz the lowest number of drinkin dens oot of the 32 London boroughs---Trust us to pick a hotel there!
Next day we heeded for Norwood Junction station, which iz the nearest to Selhurst Park! We did 2 boozers and the second one, which we have been tee loads of times on previous visits, charged me £19.80 for 2 pints of IPA!⬇️
Thats £9.90 a pint! (In thin plastic glasses!) The most av ever paid for a pint in the UK—How lang before its ower a tenner in London?
After the match—and to drown wor sorrows, we heeded for a regular haunt at St Pancras next door to King’s Cross!⬇️
Posted ‘high noon 🕛 bells 🔔’ Saturday 11th April 2026
It’s 56 years since The Geordie Times forst visited Selhurst Park in sooth London, to watch The Toon in August 1970, when NUFC lost 1-0!
If I remember rightly, there woz a grass bank at the back part of the Holmesdale Road end, where the double decker stand iz now! Toon fans were in the opposite open end, where the supermarket iz now!
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It was primitive then and it’s still primitive now, with the shallow rake of the away section, makin it impossible to see the near side corner flag at the Holmesdale Road end, even though I am 6 foot taall!⬇️
*Sven Botman iz still oot, alang with Bruno and Fab Schar, but Lewis Miley iz in contention for a place in the squad!
*(Although we hear 👂 that The Toon are are toyin with the idea of puttin Botman in a mask to protect hiz broken nose! 👃?
Palace have won just 3 of their 15 home Premyaa Leegue games this season, drawing 7 and losin 5, so this iz a great opportunity to collect the 3 points, to climb the table! With the possibility of the top 7 qualifying for Europe next season, this iz a great chance to gain some groond! (11 places in Europe are possible IF certain teams win the 4 cups on offer!---highly unlikely!)
Palace beat Fiorentina 3-0 in the first leg of their Conference tie on Thorzday, but the Italians wirnt very good! (Watched it on a ☠️ channel at an unknown address!)
NUFC sit in 12th place in the table, with 42 points, just 4 points behind Brentfaad in 7th
It’s still "aall to play for", with 7 games left!
And more importantly, just ONE game per week, so that the players (and fans!) can recover from travel sickness! (unlike the previous 4 months, with 2 games per week, every week!)
That’s 6 very winnable games (v Palace, Bournemoooth, Forest, 🌳 West Ham, 🥩, Brighton and Fulham) and one ‘toughie’ at The Arseholes!
"Bring them on!" 🤪👍🏁
* Will dee the match report on the train back from King’s Cross tooneet!
Az per usual
“Watch this space fort misstaykz!”
*
Posted 'high noon bells'🔔 Thorzday 9th April 2026
The Geordie Times iz gannin from strength to strength, az we have now past the 3 million pageviews landmark!
The month of March woz unprecedented, az we recorded nearly two thirds of a million hits! (663,742) and in one day alone on Friday March 20th we got 84,912 pageviews!
We recorded 2 Millions pageviews on Xmas Eve and 3 million 2 days ago--- 103 days for a million 'hits' The Geordie Times started in 2010 and it took ower 14 years to get to the forst million mark (5,110 days by wor calculations!) So to dee the latest million in just ower 100 days iz mind bogglin!
We have aalways said that The Geordie Times iz advort free, but beecoz of the cost of gannin to the away games it haz nearly emptied mee NUFC piggy 🐷🔨 bank!
For example, wor trip to Azerbaijan cost an eye 👁 opening £1,500 coz we had to book up very late, az the direct charter flight from Toon airport to Baku airport woz cancelled at the last minute--- and so we had to make other very costly arrangements to travel to Edinburgh by train, catch a 4 hour flight to Istanbul in Turkey— and then another 3 hour flight to Baku! (and the same way back!) A 6,000 miles roond trip!
And then the visa and hotel price on top, and then add the drinkin den and scran money on top of that! (Had to pay for the visa twice, coz the forst application woz rejected!?😱)
(6 away European games, plus 18 away games in the UK and 4 away U21games)—-And with 4 away games still to gan (3 in London!) it izzint cheap!
Beecoz of wor depleted funds and the fact that European games cost on average £500 per trip (not including the Baku trip) we are gannin to try Google’s ‘Ad Sense’, where adverts are placed into The Geordie Times, to try and rake in in some much needed capital!💰
The Toon divvint have much chance of qualifying for The Champions Leegue this time, but The Europa League and Conference Leegue (God forbid!) are within reach!
The Conference Leegue haz teams from the Welsh Leegue, Andora, Gibralter and places we have never hord of before, from ‘the back of beyond’—Like Qarabag from Azerbaijan for example! ie: Very expensive indeed! 💰
Unusually:
“Watch this space——for adverts!”
Posted ‘6:00pm bells 🔔 Tuezday 7th April 2026
“EASTER 🐣 EGG 🥚 STACY!”
Ower the Easter 🐣 weekend we needed wor ‘fix’ az The Toon had a blank weekend, due to wor exit from the FA Cup!
And so we did a Dunston Double Heeder, with their home game in the Northern Premyaa Leegue East Division, on 🐣 Saturday —-and their away game on 🐣 Munday!
Forst up woz their home game v ex Futbaall Leegue side Bradfaad Park Avenue, where a bumper crowd of 421 torned up at the groond! (Bumper, az it woz nearly 200 more than wot they normally get!) (30 or so Park Avenue-ites!) The game woz really a play off 6 pointer with Bradfaad just one point behind Dunston, in the last play off place!
If it wasn’t for the Dunston’s ‘larger than life’ goalie, Dan Lowson, who made some brilliant saves in the forst half, it could easily have been 4-0 to ‘The Park Avenue-ites’ at HT, az they were well on top!
The Bad Blue Boys of Dunston played much better in the 2nd period and just when we we thought that the game would end goal-less, up stepped Dunston’s Sado to fire 🔥⚽️ home from inside the penalty area in the 88th minute, to send the vast majority of the 400 plus crowd into Easter egg🥚stacy ! (sic!)
That’s the way it ended and the result meeenz that Dunston moved 4 points clear of Bradfaad in the race for a last play off place, to reach The Northern Premyaa Leegue Premyaa Division next season!
"SCOTLAND!--SCOTLAND!--HERE WE COME!"
2 days after this and we were on wor travels to Newton Aycliffe in Coonty Durham, 30 miles south of Dunston on 'The Tyne', on the supporters bus, for Dunston’s Easter Munday fixture at The Ashcourt Stadium! (3rd visit to this groond!)
33 had travelled doon on the bus, (16 ‘Dunston Ultras’ (teenagers!) at the back and ‘The Oldies’ (like me!), at the front, includin the driver!), plus others on the team bus and in jam jars (aboot 75 Bad Blue Boys (and girls) in total, includin the Dunston committee!)
We arrived at the clubhoose at 11:20am bells’ 🔔 to find oot that it wasn’t open til ‘high noon 🕛 bells’ (An absolute disgrace!) SO we had nee choice but to heed for the nearest boozer, which woz a 10 minute walk away across a duel carriageway!
“I’m in Gretna Green!” I told her!
"Wot are you doin' in Scotland?"---I'm confused?" she replied (The forst town across the England/Scotland border)
"So your in Scotland, don't understand?" she went on!
"It's a PUB caalled Gretna Green in Newton Aycliffe!" I told her, and sent a picture of the boozer!
"Aarrr right-- I havvint got mee glasses on!" she replied!
Anyway, enough of that!---we heeded back to the clubhoose (In ENGLAND!) which woz now open and then onwards to the match, after somemore 'liquid lubrications'! (hic!)
We entered the tornstiles at the groond and within 2 minutes of the ‘1:00 bells 🔔 kick off, Dunston took the lead, when David Robinson rolled the baall across the six yard box and it trickled ower the line and into the net! 1-0 to Dunston!
The visitors were well on top and it woz soon 2-0 when a penalty woz awarded in the 32nd minute for a bad foul in the box!
David Robinson took it to double their lead! (See video at the start of this report!)
Bang on half time another penalty woz awarded at the opposite end, this time to Aycliffe after Harvey Neary fouled an Aycliffe attacker, who woz clean through on goal! Not anly woz a penalty awarded, but the Dunston man got a red card az well!
Divvint naa who took it?, but Dunston goalie Dan Lowson guessed the reet way and saved the shot!
The Dunston hero from Saturday (see Bradfaad report above) woz the hero once again! HT 2-0 to The Bad Blue Boys in RED!⬇️
Against 10 men, Newton Aycliffe were again 2nd best in the 2nd half and the away side forthaa increased their lead, when David Robinson completed hiz hat-trick, to put the game to bed🛏 in the 82nd minute! 3-0 to Dunston final score!
Attendance: 345 (75 or so from Dunston, az mentioned!👏)
News woz awaited from Bradfaad PA, who, if they’d lost, would have been 7 points adrift!
However! they had won by 8 lucky goals to nil against Brighoose, to boost their goal difference and keep the pressure on, with 3 games to play!
Unfortunately I will miss them aall, az their fixtures clash with NUFC games, which must take priority, I'm afraid!
Hopefully IF they make the playoffs, wor games won’t clash!?
Fink (NUFC mad-sad groundhopper!--and part time Dunston fan!)
Posted ‘high noon 🕛 bells’ 🔔 Easter 🐣 Munday 6th April 2026
News reaches The Geordie Times (2 days late, by wor ‘fly by night’ reporter, Secret Pigeon) that wor number 2 Kieran Trippier iz to leave NUFC at the end of the season!
He woz the forst quality player to join the ‘project’ when the PIF took ower wor great club fower and a half years ago!
Kieran iz nearly 36 and hiz playin carrier iz comin to an end and he wore the captain’s armband with pride!
He haz helped us avoid certain relegation, qualify for 2 Champions League tournaments and of course played in wor historic Leegue Cup win at Wembley, just ower a year ago!—Wor first domestic trophy in 70 lang bleak years!
He says he’s had “the best time of hiz life!” at The Toon and leaves with hiz heed held high!
He will never be forgotten, by everyone associated with the club—and we at The Geordie Times wish him and hiz family “aall the best!” for the future!
Posted 'high noon bells' Saturday 4th April 2026 Updated 10:35pm 🛎️ bells’
Updated again 9:30pm bells 🔔’ Sunday
The fixtures for SIX of wor last seven games have been cast in stone!
Beecoz NUFC have been knocked oot of the FA Cup we have a blank Easter weekend!----And so to get wor 'fix', we will be takin in 'The Bad Blue Boys' of Dunston's 'Northern Premyaa Leegue East' games v ex Futbaall Leegue side Bradfaad Park Avenue this afternoon, in a crucial six pointer, for a play off place ('3:00 bells') and then on Easter Munday its a trip to Newton Aycliffe in Coonty Durham for a '1:00 bells kick off!
Next weekend 'The Geordie Times' iz steamin off to King's Cross once more, when The Toon take on 'The Crystal Cryers' at Selhurst Park in sooth London (2:00 bells') on the Sunday! (12th April) (live on Sky)
Then the followin Saturday (18th April) its a home game v 'The Cherry Pickers' of Bournemoooth' in a non televised game at '3:00 bells'
The game at 'The Arse', iz scheduled for Saturday 25th April at '5:30 bells'--- BUT!--- IF? ---they win away v 'The Simon Templar Mob' of Soothampton in the FA Cup qwaataa finals tooneet, then the game will be moved forward to eethaa Tuezday 21st, Wedinzday 22nd OR Thorzday 23rd April—-Updated ‘10:35pm bells 🔔’ Sooothampton DID win so the game stays at ‘5:30 bells 🔔 Saturday 25th April
Wor home game v 'Nee Where Near Brighton' will be at '3:00 bells' on Saturday 2nd May az it hazzint been picked for live telly like the Bournemoooth game!
Wor game at 'The Friar Tuck Mob' of Nottingham haz been moved to '2:00 bells' on Sunday 10th May for live telly (Sky)
Anothaa game that could be moved iz wor home game v 'The Jellied Eels Mob' of West Ham'! IF? they beat Leeedz in the FA Cup qwaataa finals tomorrow AND! then win a semi final on the weekend of 25th April, wor game will be moved from Sunday 17th May to a new midweek date (we presume?)
Updated 9:30pm bells 🔔 Sunday
We WILL play West Ham at home 🏠 on eethaa Friday, 16th, Sunday 18th or Munday 19th May, az they lost to Leedz on penalties this afternooon! (Saturday 17th May iz FA Cup final day and NEE games can be played on that Saturday)
And finallEEE!-- Wor last game of the season away to 'The Cottage Pie Brigade' of Fulham WILL take place on Sunday 24th May at '4:00 bells'! (Aall games kick off at the same time on the final day!)
Posted ‘high noon 🕛 bells’ Thorzday 2nd April 2026
AT LAST NUFC have got a naming rights sponsor for wor Darsley Park training groond in Benton!
From next season Sooth African sports drink company KNOX will have its name plastered aall ower the place!
KNOX will aalso be on wor training groond gear az well!
The deal iz said to be worth 18 million quid ower 3 seasons!
Az we are caalled NewCASTLE United, mebeez the trainin groond should be caalled FORT Knox from now on? (sic!)
Just a thought!
