NUFC Blog on metro.co.ukAs some of you may already know, I am currently the Newcastle United blogger for metro.co.uk, the website for the free newspaper distributed in London and several other major cities throughout the UK.
Anyway, I want to prepare a piece over the next few days for my Metro blog which features the thoughts of my fellow Newcastle United fans about what the coming season might bring for the club, whether it’s about Alan Pardew, how well you think we will do in what remains of the transfer window, where you think we will finish or whatever.
As it won’t be an epic piece overall as it is word limited, so it would be great if you could keep your entries to around 50 words. To give you an idea, the paragraph preceding this one is 58 words, so something slighly shorter would be fine, or about the same about the length if you absolutely must, but definitely nothing over 60 words please. If you don’t have Microsoft Word or something similar with a word counter and can’t be bothered to count the words one by one, you can find an online word counter here. (more…)
Mick Harford – Warned off by Toon fans before he even started?Whilst searching for inspiration yesterday, this piece by Jackie Smithfield in Newcastle United blog The Mag caught my eye. Entitled ‘Newcastle fans help Mick Harford to decide Millwall is better bet’, it bragged of fan power scaring away Harford from his former club before he’d even started, claiming:
‘With an overwhelmingly negative reaction, no doubt Mick Harford has also got on the ‘blower’ to friends and family in the North East to gauge which way the wind is blowing:
‘On this basis, it would be no surprise to see Harford saying thanks but no thanks. Shame his mentor JFK is slightly thicker skinned when it comes to the reaction he produced on his appointment.’
And to put it mildly, I just couldn’t see the wisdom of that. Joe Kinnear might well be thick skinned, but the writer of the above is just thick if he or she thinks a policy of fans attempting to force out anyone Joe Kinnear tries to appoint to enhance the Newcastle United’s scouting before they’ve even started won’t be damaging to the club. (more…)
Fans accused of anti-Semitism towards Mike Ashley.Newcastle United have threatened legal action over a piece by Jim Armitage in the Independent newspaper.
The piece is a sickly hagiography of Mike Ashley entitled “Is Newcastle United owner Mike Ashley the best boss in the world?” In it’s original version, it alleged that Newcastle United fans had abused the club’s owner on the basis of his Jewish background, despite the fact that he isn’t even Jewish..
On the club’s official Twitter page they tweeted:
“The club is aware of the article in today’s Independent and has referred the matter to its lawyers. Thanks to fans who have raised concerns.”
There is also an image of the original tweet below. To get to the meat in the sandwich though, the anti-Semitic parts of Armitage’s piece were rapidly edited out, but it was too late for the Independent and the original part of the piece which made the slur is preserved below.
EPL Clash’s presenter, KSI, in action.I have been contacted by Peloton TV’s James Whittaker, who is currently working in partnership with Youtube to make football content. James would like to know if any of you Newcastle United fans out there would like to represent NUFC Blog.org on the show “EPL Clash” and be filmed in a “bloggers battle” at 10am outside St James’ Park?
To use his words:
“The segment itself is pretty much a quirky vlog styled piece, mainly about the stadium, surrounding areas, current rumours, how your season is going and so forth. This piece will be presented by KSI.”
“It will only take 15 minutes to film, and will give the users a chance to plug the website and their own Twitter. It will be a quirky back and forth and give you a chance to pretty much have a go at a Sunderland fan on camera.”
KSI and Peloton TV have a combined following of 1,876,541 YouTube users when I checked, so it would certainly be a great opportunity to put yourself out there! (more…)
