Toon meet the Green Army for New Year bash.
Posted on January 1st, 2010 | 156 Comments |
As a previous six times winner of the competition, albeit the last time over half a century ago, the FA cup still brings out a sentimental streak among many Toon supporters. Who could forget that 1974 cup campaign when Tyneside well and truly had cup fever? Despite being a child at the time I remember the highs (Supermac’s goals, amongst others) and lows (team performance in the final) and the excitement of the build up to Wembley.
Sadly the competition no longer has the same kudos, and of course successes and failures in other areas can have such a dramatic financial impact on football clubs today. With so many teams willing to sacrifice progress in the FA cup to a greater monetary god such as promotion / avoiding relegation / Champion’s League success etc. Who can blame them with the cash implications of any of those having such a major impact on their football clubs?
For me though, as a football fan and romantic, I love the third round. Watching the inevitable slip up by several big guns to giant killing acts from the veritable minnows. The non league teams playing on their familiar but terrible surfaces, spurred on by their biggest crowds, in front of the TV cameras, dreaming about Wembley, and pulling off seeming impossible victories because they wanted it more than their pampered Premier League competitors. The non league clubs appearance in the next round cup draw desperately hoping for a fixture with a premier league team so that the huge cash injection helps secure their survival for another few years.
Yes, I still love the FA cup, but I’m not sure Chris Hughton see’s it as a priority for the Toon to progress in the competition, that’s why he’s making noises about giving some of the young guns a run out. Not as many thankfully as he did against Peterborough, when it all went pear shaped, but possibly 2 or 3 reserve team players to give some of the other first team regulars a rest.Tim Krul and Tamas Kadar appear to be on standby for a call up for first team action.
“I’ll make changes,” said Hughton
“We’re not in a position to make massive changes, and what we’re also mindful of is that it’s a great cup competition.”
Chris will also speak to Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson to see whether loan defender Danny Simpson will be allowed to play against Plymouth as he would then be cup tied if he returned to Man U.
Meanwhile, United’s Plymouth-born defender Ben Tozer, who made his first-team debut in the Carling Cup earlier this season – will also hope to be involved against his hometown team.
“It’s a game we’d like to win,” continued Chris “and we’ve got to make sure we’ve got the right balance to do that.
We’re mindful the fans will be travelling a long way, as we are with every game.”
So what’s in store for us as we face The Pilgrims? Argyle are forecasting a season’s best attendance of 15,000-plus at Home Park for the three o’clock kick off. These numbers are bolstered by The Toon, who have sold their 2400 ticket allocation to the Barn Park End.
The well respected John Carver, former assistant manager at Newcastle United, now number 2 to Paul Mariner at Home Park, has vowed not to celebrate if Plymouth knock Newcastle out of the cup – good lad, but let’s hope it doesn’t come to that anyway. Plymouth go into the game on the back of two big wins: beating Cardiff away and Reading 4-1 at home so it’s not going to be easy especially with the form we’ve shown in our last two games.
LUKE SUMMERFIELD is hoping to complete a memorable seven days after his return from a three-month loan spell at Leyton Orient has coincided with two handsome back-to-back wins for Plymouth in the Championship. On Boxing Day, he helped Argyle beat Cardiff City and two days later, Summerfield and the Pilgrims were continuing the good work with a 4-1 victory over Reading at Home Park. In both matches, he had stamped his authority in midfield and visibly grew in confidence. And he now has his eyes firmly set on another starting slot against the Toon. On the upcoming game he said:
“Newcastle at home is a good game to look forward to. Hopefully, we can carry on our good form as the win would be brilliant for us.
“I’ve been very lucky to come straight back into the team, while the two wins have been brilliant for me. They have been games I’ve really enjoyed playing in and I’ve put everything into them.”
Summerfield may not have been back at Plymouth for long but he has sensed a new-found confidence within the Pilgrims’ squad. He believes the Cardiff and Reading results were a sign of things to come from the Argyle squad.
“Keeping a clean sheet (at Cardiff) was massive for us and coming away with a win was a big turning point for us,
“And we have gone on from there and scored four goals and we’ll want to create more goals in every game.”
Let’s hope this new found momentum and confidence doesn’t continue into our match on Saturday and we get into the game early on rather than during the last 5 minutes where we seemed to wake up against Derby.
Defender Reda Johnson will be unavailable for Plymouth due to his call up to the Benin squad for the African Cup of Nations.
Not sure what team Chris Hughton will put out on Saturday, but I believe he has a full squad to choose from apart from Joey Barton; unless Christmas has completely messed up my memory.
Hoping for a 1-0 win.
Howay the lads and well done the 2400+ Toon fans making their way down there the day after New Year.
Happy new year to all.
NUFCBlog Author: geordie deb
geordie deb has written 38 articles on this blog.
Good article as always Geordie Deb :)
I have to be honest, but i’m taking the same view of the FA cup as i did about the League cup. Its just extra games that we don’t need. Our ultimate goal is to get promotion and look at the last time in a cup against Huddersfield when Shola was out for months.
Its not like we have any real chance of winning it. The biggger teams take this much more seriously so we would end up out at some stage.