Everything about Newcastle United F C totally explained
Newcastle United Football Club (also known as
The Magpies or
The Toon) is an
English football club based in
Newcastle upon Tyne, who currently play in the
Premier League. The club was founded in
1892 after the merger of two local clubs,
Newcastle East End and
Newcastle West End. Since their founding year, the club have played at their home ground of
St. James' Park.
They have won the First Division Championship four times and the
FA Cup six times, though their league success was achieved before the
Second World War. In European competition the most notable honour the club has won is the
Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, in 1969.
They have a long-standing and fierce rivalry with local team
Sunderland. The
Tyne-Wear derby between Newcastle United and Sunderland has been played since
1898. The club's traditional kit colours are black and white striped shirts, with black shorts and socks.
Supporters of Newcastle United refer to themselves as the
Toon Army.
History
The club was founded in
December 1892 by the merger of two local teams
Newcastle East End and
Newcastle West End who were previously rivals in the
Northern League, but after West End fell into financial difficulties they decided to merge. The deal included the lease on West End's stadium
St. James' Park and several names were suggested for the new club, including
Newcastle Rangers and
Newcastle City, however they chose the name
Newcastle United.
Newcastle United went on to win the
League Championship on three occasions during the 1900s;
1905,
1907 and
1909. The club's success continued in cup competitions, as they reached five
FA Cup Finals in seven years, appearing in the final of
1905,
1906,
1908,
1910 and
1911. However they went on to win just one of them, the
1910 Final against
Barnsley, in a replay at
Goodison Park. However, there was still one particular low point during this period, as the team suffered a 9–1 defeat by fierce rivals
Sunderland in the
1908–09 season. Sunderland still count the result as their record highest win.
After
World War I, they won the League a fourth time during
1927. The team returned to the
FA Cup final in 1924, in only their second ever final at
Wembley Stadium. They were successful in defeating
Aston Villa and therefore winning the club's second
FA Cup trophy in its history. Notable players during this period include the likes of prolific goal scorer and captain
Hughie Gallacher,
Neil Harris,
Stan Seymour and
Frank Hudspeth.
During the 1950s, United won the
FA Cup trophy on three occasions within a five year period. In
1951 they defeated
Blackpool 2–0, a year later Arsenal were beaten 1–0 and in 1955 United defeated
Manchester City 3–1. Newcastle had gained a high profile, and so had their players;
'Wor Jackie' Milburn and
Bobby 'Dazzler' Mitchell in particular.
The old war horse
Joe Harvey, who had captained the team to much of their post-war success, returned to revitalise Newcastle. He teamed up with
Stan Seymour to rebuild Newcastle United and they won the Second Division Champions in 1965. Newcastle then became very much an unpredictable and inconsistent team, always capable of defeating the best, but never quite realising their potential.
Joe Harvey's team qualified for Europe for the first time in 1968 and surprised many the following year by winning the
Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, (which was the forerunner of the
UEFA Cup), beating
Sporting Lisbon,
Feyenoord,
Real Zaragoza and
Rangers along the way, before triumphing over two legs against Hungary's
Újpest FC in the final. United possessed a reliable team and Newcastle's tradition of fielding a popular goalscorer at number 9 continued, as Welshman
Wyn Davies was prominent.
In the years that followed European success, manager Harvey brought in a string of talented entertainers who thrilled the Newcastle crowd. Players such as
Jimmy Smith,
Tony Green,
Terry Hibbitt and in particular striker
Malcolm Macdonald all became favorites among the supporters.
Nicknamed 'Supermac', Malcolm Macdonald was one of United's most popular figures and is still held in high regard by supporters to this day. He was an impressive goal scorer, which led United's attack to Wembley twice, in
1974 and
1976, against
Liverpool in the
FA Cup and
Manchester City in the
League Cup. But on each occasion Newcastle failed to bring the trophy back to
Tyneside. A small consolation was back to back triumphs in the
Texaco Cup in 1974 and
1975.
By the start of the 1980s, United had declined dramatically and were languishing in the Second Division.
Gordon Lee had replaced Harvey as boss, yet he in turn soon gave way to
Richard Dinnis and then
Bill McGarry. But it was
Arthur Cox who steered United back again to the First Division with ex-
England captain
Kevin Keegan the focus of the team, having joined the club in 1982. With managers such as
Jack Charlton,
Willie McFaul and
Jim Smith, Newcastle remained in the top-flight until the team was relegated once more in 1989.
Later, Kevin Keegan returned to Tyneside to replace
Osvaldo Ardiles as manager on a short term contract in
1992, taking what he claimed to be the only job that could tempt him back into football. United were struggling at the wrong end of
Division Two; Sir John Hall had all but taken control of the club and he needed a minor miracle to stop Newcastle from tumbling into the Third Division for the first time in their history. Survival was confirmed by winning both of their final two league games, at home to
Portsmouth and away to
Leicester City, the latter to a last minute
own goal, although as it transpired, Newcastle would have survived even if they'd lost at Leicester .
The
1992–93 season saw a dramatic turn around in the club's fortunes. They won their first eleven league games before a 1–0 home defeat against
Grimsby Town ended the run, two games short of the English league record of 13 consecutive wins. Playing an exciting brand of attacking football Newcastle became Division One champions with a 2–0 away win, coincidentally at Grimsby, and gained promotion to the
Premier League.
Under Keegan, Newcastle continued to succeed, impressing with their attacking flair and a third place finish during the
1993–94 season, this was their first season back in the top flight. The attacking philosophy of Keegan led to Newcastle becoming labelled by Sky television as "The Entertainers". The
following season Newcastle sold top scorer
Andy Cole to
Manchester United and finished 6th that season.
With the transfer money in
1995–96, Newcastle rebuilt with the signing of
David Ginola and
Les Ferdinand amongst others. The club came very close to winning the
Premier League that season, and were at one time 12 points ahead of nearest rivals Manchester United, but eventually lost out. One match in particular from that season stood out, the 4–3 defeat to
Liverpool, which has since been described as the greatest ever Premiership match. On
30 July 1996, the disappointment of missing out on the title was lessened to an extent, as the club signed
Alan Shearer for a then world record fee of £15 million. The
1996–97 season saw Newcastle once again finish in second.
After short and unsuccessful spells as manager from
Kenny Dalglish and
Ruud Gullit, former England manager
Sir Bobby Robson was appointed as manager. His first home game in charge was particularly impressive; it was an 8–0 victory over
Sheffield Wednesday, which remains the club's record home win. Good performances such as these helped the club ensure survival in the Premiership in Robson's first season. A title challenge emerged during the
2001–02 season, and Newcastle achieved qualification for the
Champions League after finishing in 4th place. However, Robson was fired in 2004 after failing to qualify for the Champions League. Robson is still held in high regard by Newcastle supporters.
Graeme Souness was his replacement, but he proved to be an unpopular choice being fired on
2 February 2006, despite signing
Michael Owen for a record £16 million.
Glenn Roeder replaced Souness; the game after his time as manager Alan Shearer overtook
Jackie Milburn as the club's highest ever goal-scorer. Shearer retired at the end of the
2005–06 season, with a total of 206 goals for the club. Despite finishing the
2005-06 season well, Roeder's fortunes quickly changed in the
2006-07 season, and he left the club by mutual consent on
6 May 2007.
Sam Allardyce was named as Roeder's successor on
15 May, with what proved to be
Freddy Shepherd's last act as Chairman, who sold his final shares in the club on
7 June to
Mike Ashley. Despite making a promising start to the season
Sam Allardyce left the club on
9 January 2008 by mutual consent after less than eight months in charge. It was confirmed on
16 January 2008 that
Kevin Keegan would return to Newcastle as manager, eleven years and eight days since leaving the club on
8 January 1997. A popular choice amongst many Newcastle Fans Further appointments in January 2008 have seen
Dennis Wise join the club as Executive Director (Football), as well as Tony Jimenez as Vice President (Player Recruitment) and Jeff Vetere as Technical Co-ordinator.
Badge
The first club badge which Newcastle United wore on their shirts was the
armorial bearings of the city of
Newcastle upon Tyne which was worn as standard from 1969—1976, though it had been worn on previous occasions far earlier especially in
FA Cup finals. A scroll at the bottom featured the city's motto in
Latin;
fortiter defendit triumphans which translates into English as, "triumphing by brave defence".
From 1976—1983 the club wore a specific badge which was developed to wear in place of the city's coat of arms. The design was of a circular shape which featured the club's name in full, it contained a
magpie standing in front of the
River Tyne with the historic
Norman castle of Newcastle in the background. A more simplistic design followed in 1983, featuring the initials of the club's name, NUFC with the small magpie used in the previous crest within the horizontally laid C, this logo was relatively short lived and was discontinued after 1988.
From 1988 onwards, the club has assumed a pseudo coat of arms representing a reversion to a more traditional design and takes elements from the city arms. The current design is black with two
white pallets, echoing the club's home strip. The supporters have been taken from the city arms. The crest is slightly modified from the city's with a red pennon with a red St George's cross on a blue chief.
Colours
For much of Newcastle United's history, their home colours have been black and white striped shirts, with black shorts and black socks, though white socks are sometimes worn under some managers who consider them "
lucky". For the first two years of the club's existence United continued to wear the home kit of
East End, which included red shirts, white shorts and black socks; this was changed to the more familiar black and white striped kit in
1894. The new colours were adopted because many clubs in the same division as Newcastle also wore red and frequently clashed, including
Liverpool and
Woolwich Arsenal.
Conversely, United's change or away colours have been very inconsistent, there's no set in stone standard and the club changes the away colours often, but most commonly it has been a shade of
blue (since the 1990s) or
yellow. The yellow kit was especially common throughout the 1970s and 1980s and featured a
green or blue trim, depending on the season; a yellow and green striped away kit even appeared in 1988—1990. Other common change colours have been
grey, all
black, all
white and green. The most unusual away kit was likely the
maroon and
navy blue horizontal hoop colours from the
1995–96 and
2006–07 seasons, it was a tribute to
West End.
Shirt sponsors and manufacturers
Stadium
Newcastle's home stadium is
St James' Park, which has been their home since the merger of East End and West End in 1891, though football was first played there in 1880. At the turn of the 20th century the ground could hold 30,000, but this was soon expanded to 60,000. However, the ground was altered little in the next 70 years, and by the 1980s was looking dated.
The
Bradford fire in 1985 prompted renovation, but progress was slow due to financial difficulties. The takeover of the club by
Sir John Hall in 1992 resolved these difficulties, and the stadium was redeveloped to comply with the
Taylor Report. In the mid-1990s, the club wished to build a new ground in the nearby Leazes Park, however these plans were quashed. In response to this, the club expanded St. James' Park further. Following the completion of the construction in 2000, St James' Park became the club ground with the second highest capacity in England with 52,387 seats, behind Manchester United's
Old Trafford. It later became the third highest capacity after the completion of Arsenal's
Emirates Stadium.
Two stands, the Sir John Hall stand and the Milburn stand, have two
tiers and are of cantilever construction, whereas the East Stand and the Gallowgate End are roughly half as high, and each have a single tier. This can make the stadium look quite lopsided. The Gallowgate End is traditionally home to Newcastle's most vociferous supporters, as it was once the stand with no roof covering. In recent years, a fan based group named Toon Ultras has began to assemble in Level 7 of the Sir John Hall Stand to attempt to "Bring Back The Noise" which supporters feel was lost when the club expanded the stadium and split fans to cater for executive boxes.
It was announced on
2 April 2007 that the club intend to submit plans for a new £300 million development that would increase the stadium's capacity to at least 60,000.
Supporters
Newcastle have a large fanbase and had the third highest average attendance (50,686) in the English Premier League for the
2006-07 season, although in terms of percentage of stadium capacity, Newcastle were tenth in the Premier League with 96.7%. In terms of all-time, Newcastle have the seventh highest average attendance of Football League clubs in England. Please note that some pre-war attendance figures used by this source were estimates and may not be entirely accurate. Newcastle's supporters have been described as a passionate set of fans and were found to be the most dedicated in the country in a 2007 survey.
They are often referred to as the
Toon Army, the
Magpies, or the
Geordies. The name
Toon originates from the Geordie pronunciation of town.
Magpies refers to the black and white colours of the club, similar to the
Magpie bird.
Geordie is a regional
nickname for people from
Newcastle, of debated origin, which is often applied in the media to supporters of NUFC in general.
The club is based in the centre of Newcastle upon Tyne and is the only major club in the city; within
England itself, the club's most prominent fanbase is from the
North East down to and including
Yorkshire. In recent times, where other clubs have attracted fanbases from all around the world, Newcastle's fanbase is still mostly within Britain, with a percentage from other parts of the world, particularly
Scandinavia,
North America and
Australia.
Like all major English football clubs, Newcastle has a number of domestic supporters' clubs. The club's supporters publish
fanzines such as
True Faith and
The Mag. In addition to the usual English
football chants, Newcastle's supporters sing the traditional Tyneside song
Blaydon Races.
Former Labour Prime Minister
Tony Blair is known to be a keen supporter of Newcastle, as well as
Sir Frank Williams, founder and manager of the
WilliamsF1 Formula One Team, Also
Auf Wiedersehen Pet Star
Jimmy Nail is a big Newcastle supporter.
Newcastle's longest-running and deepest rivalry is with their nearest major neighbour,
Sunderland, colloquially known as the
Mackems. Matches between the two are referred to as the
Tyne-Wear derby. Newcastle also have a smaller, lesser rivalry with
Middlesbrough, with whom they contest the
Tyne-Tees derby.
Statistics and records
Jimmy Lawrence holds the record for the most Newcastle appearances, having played 496 first-team matches between 1904 and 1921 as a
goalkeeper. Former
captain and
left back Frank Hudspeth comes second, having appeared 472 times and scoring on 37 occasions.
Alan Shearer is the club's top goalscorer with 206 goals in all competitions between 1996 and 2006 having surpassed
Jackie Milburn's tally of 200 in February 2006. Milburn had held the record since 1957, his striking partner
Len White is the third highest scorer at Newcastle with 153 goals.
Albert Stubbins could be Newcastle's all time leading goal scorer but his goals are not counted as the majority were scored during
World War II.
Newcastle's record home attendance is 68,386, against
Chelsea on
3 September,
1930.
The capacity of St James' Park is currently 52,387,
Reserves
Notable players
Management
While
Mike Ashley is sole owner of the club, he hasn't given himself an official role on the board of directors of the club. St James Holdings Ltd was the company used by Ashley in the purchase of Newcastle United plc, whose shares were de-listed from the
London Stock Exchange at 8 a.m. on 18 July 2007.
Executive Staff
Coaching staff
Manager history
As of 5 May, 2008. Only competitive matches are counted.
Honours
Domestic
Football League Second Division: 2
- Champions: 1964-65, 1992-93
- Runners-up: 1897-98, 1947-48
Domestic Cups
FA Cups: 6
- 1910, 1924, 1932, 1951, 1952, 1955
Charity Shields and Community Shields: 1
European
Anglo-Italian Cup: 1
Inter-Cities Fairs Cup: 1
Intertoto Cup: 1
- Winners: 2006
- Runners-up: 2001
Other Cups
Kirin Cup: 1
Texaco Cups: 2
Further Information
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