To kick off with, if you sneer at the title ‘Newcastle United tickets: It’s double shan’ then I want you to leave this article now (go and read Henry Winter). Even left a link to that meff for you.
Using a colloquialism (if you prefer this word to ‘shan’ see above) isn’t a sign of stupidity, it is communicating with the people you know , love and I’m trying to talk to.
Background
I feel writing about football teams (especially Newcastle) you need to prove yourself to some degree, so here goes.
Dad born in Longbenton, Mum in Cornwall, brought up in Heaton, went to Heaton Manor School.
I would class myself as a very low ranking NE6 soldier (a joke that has been flying about for years).
I’ve lived in Manchester, London, and now in Brighton.
I somehow find myself at 42 on the South coast, with my wife and young daughter. (Quick one, I didn’t go to Brighton as my Spurs supporting cousin booked his fucking wedding on the same day!). I was told there were loads of empty seats, and this is where the problem lies.
I’ve had season tickets in my family, since the last two years of paddocks standing, and family still have two.
My Cousin and uncle just shifted from the Corner, as my uncle can’t stand in the new section, as he is getting on a bit (he won’t like that!)
Aways
I get to about 7-8 aways a season, and have been on the march with the Toon army since I was 17.
My very best mates in the world go to the aways, there are mates I see just at the aways, lads you give a nod to as you have seen them since forever all over England, radge kids you have a quick banter with, and hoolies who you give their own space to – it’s for the best.
I drink too much, and whatever else, I chant as much as I can, and I’m usually late up after half time, as I’ve ordered 2-3 pints.
Not a real fan you thinking? You don’t know what you are talking about.
Before we get going ‘lads’ refers to all toon fans in all their colours and types.
Black market
So, what is this black market for tickets people have been moaning about?
Well, here is the secret (come closer), you ask your pals, you post on Facebook to fellow toon fans, and ask in what’s app groups with friends and contacts you have built over years.
Eventually you get a ticket, ALWAYS at cost price, maybe postage, but people will say I never pay them, so they are actually out of pocket.
I have had many tickets where I turn up and the person I’m standing with is someone I know, the ticket changing hands a few times, before I’ve got it in my mitts.
One of these ‘touts’ is an elderly lady, she won’t like me saying that, who all the lads love and sit and chat with hours before the match.
If you kna, you kna.
I’m nee grass, so names won’t be used.
Was it a closed shop?
Well, not anymore it isn’t.
Now people are terrified to share their tickets, as they don’t want to lose points if some jobsworth checks a ticket on the way into a different ground.
On that note, who are these people supposedly checking the tickets, have a good look at yourself and sort your life out.
I can’t wait to see how that works at the Palace away end, where everyone knows it is virtually lawless.
Why it doesn’t work?
The Newcastle diaspora stretches across the country, and world.
Geordies have always had to graft away for work, Auf Wiedersehen, Pet being a prime example.
I’ve loads of mates, who are toon fans not born on the fucking quayside with Jimmy Nail delivering them.
But you see the passion in their eyes, they are no plastics.
They will be coming soon, but that’s another story (I’ll write it for The Mag, but they have probably done it 100 times already)
Examples
Here are a two out of about a thousand examples of how the ticketing worked:
1.Last season at Southampton, we ended up with two spares, outside the ground a father and son were standing near the turnstiles asking for ticket.
I think we gave it to them for nowt, and they got to see the match.
The sheer joy on their faces was amazing. Made you proud to help out a fellow believer.
2. One December when we were playing West Ham just before Xmas, a lad had got so mortal that when the train got to Kings Cross, my pal who had just jumped on the train the other way, woke him to say he was in London.
The mortal drunk kid slurred ‘leave us man’, and he went straight back to sleep, and home to Newcastle.
His pals had his ticket, and again I assume they shifted it in a boozer or near the ground.
Milan anti-banta
So, we got in the Champions League, just in case you missed it.
Before this ticket farce, I reckon 10-20,000 fans would have headed over.
Many without a ticket, but maybe the chance to pick one up. However, they will know that they will see the same lads they bump into at the aways, for the last however many years.
Their own close mates will be going too, you CAN’T miss this trip!
I haven’t told my wife this, but if it was like it always has been, I would have got a new credit card and just went, as I guess a lot more would.
I am skint, after not working for a company I set-up and ran for over a decade (violins out, read that story in Take a Break), but I know that so many of the lads would be there. I would have to go, and to be fair would likely have got a ticket.
New fans
Now I am aware this sounds like I’ve proved it was a closed shop.
I know that lots of young kids were not alive to stand and watch our first team get battered by Wigan’s second on a freezing cold night in Carling cup.
It was just a week or so after they had beaten us there in the league. 4,000 odd fans at each, freezing cold, and I was at both.
Shit times, great day out though. That’s how it was.
Saudi
Just a quick one, I am not getting into the ownership and the morality of that (I’ll write something for the Morning Star about that).
To finish
Aye, I have been banging on a bit, but if you are still here then good on you.
The ticketing is so complicated (let’s be honest the Newcastle ticket office has been awful since 1892) that fear is stopping the fun, just as we might get good…finally.
The frustration is palpable with many of my friends in similar positions to me.
What to do
The club must return to the old policy, but cut off maybe 20 per cent to ‘new fans.’
They can slowly get in and build up the network like we all did. Not just so you can get a ticket for a final at some point, you have to join the Geordie family that’s what it is all about.
Yes, I know I’ve had a season ticket for years and could have built my points up, so missed a trick there.
I’m a disorganised bell-hat and have pals with monster points, so never seemed an issue.
The harsh fact is that the hardcore have been there long before me, and let’s be honest the last 15 years or so have been awful, they deserve to see the good times.
I see the same faces, the same passion, the same Geordies who didn’t care if it was Sandro Tonaili or Christian Bassedas bossing the midfield…
It never mattered, we can’t buy players, you get what you’re given as fan.
But they knew that if we win, draw or lose we will be on the booze.
Spending a day away from the stress of life, just let all go, daft banta that leaves you literally crying with laugher.
Newcastle United will never be defeated and the new owners need to learn that doesn’t mean what the result of the game is.
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