Remember when part 2
Hitchhiking to Glasgow
The summer of 1993 and there was a monumental buzz
around the Toon after May’s promotion party and our
forthcoming season in the new fangled sparkling Premier
League. Keegan magic was at its peak even after a collection
of fairly tame and low key pre-season friendly games against
Hartlepool United, Workington and Berwick Rangers. These
unglamorous fixtures didn’t really spark the imagination
even though we got our first sighting of new signings Nicky
Papavasiliou, the exotic looking curly haired Cypriot, Alex
Mathie, some unheard of Scottish bloke signed from Morton
and of course, there was the returning football genius of
Peter Beardsley after his 7 years spell on Merseyside with
Liverpool and Everton.
!
Our penultimate warm up game of the summer had us invited
north of the border to Glasgow to face Rangers in Ally
McCoist’s testimonial game in early August.
This to me was the first game in the new era of football with
all seater stadiums and the end of standing terraces.
Redevelopment work since we last played at St James Park
had finished with my new location for watching football
being taken up in a grey plastic seat in the Leazes End. The
ground from now on would be full of season ticket holders
for some silly reason football grounds were suddenly to be
referred to as football stadiums. Interest in Newcastle United
even warranted all ticket pre-season friendly matches!
!
Rangers at the time were the champions of Scotland as well
as qualifying for the Champion’s League. They had just
travelled down to Joker Park for Gary Bennett’s testimonial
match in vast nu X