A Star is Reborn
ing the activities carried out at Scotswood all the more vital, a point not lost on businessman Stephen Best, the chairman of the new Newcastle Blue Star club, who grew up in the area. Indeed, the ethos of the Grainger Park Boys Club, whose boxing club is located next to the football ground, has very much flowed through to Newcastle Blue Star, who with multiple age group teams and a flourishing social section, are acutely aware of their role in serving the people of the West End of Newcastle and raising the profile of the area. In fact, the arrival on the scene of the new Newcastle Blue Star club couldn’ t have been better timed, for it has coincided with efforts to regenerate Scotswood and the surrounding area with new housing.
Largely self-financed, with Stephen Best’ s steel company heavily involved in the construction of the stands and ancillary buildings, the ground at Scotswood started to take shape in 2019, with the erection of exterior fencing. In 2020, attention was turned to laying hard standing, erecting a seated stand and installing floodlights. It is nothing unusual nowadays to see clubs wheeling in ready-made stands to fulfil ground grading requirements, often with little regard as to their practical use, with viewing issues caused by a lack of elevation and poor siting. This has not proved to be the case at Scotswood, where starting with the Alan Smith Stand on the far side of the ground, the stands have been of the club’ s own devising, with broad metal tiering being the order of the day. Another commendable feature is the liberal use of signage, with the main seated stand at Scotswood bearing the club’ s name in large, unignorable capitals. The floodlights, meanwhile, came in the shape of four corner poles bearing LED lamps, with Friday night fixtures capturing the imagination of the local populace, with large crowds, sometimes in excess of 1,000, watching Northern Alliance football.
Left & Below: The bold livery of the Alan Smith Stand Photos: Vince Taylor
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