Category: Article

Always Look on The Bright Side of Life; Five Things That Made Me Smile in October.

October was a bit of a funny month. While there was plenty to keep me optimistic and to make me crack the odd smile, it also signalled the closing weeks of that tough first half term of the academic year. So even smiling felt like an effort! Anyway, here’s what made me make that effort last month!

A groundsman’s pitches go viral. As someone who used to coach football teams, this one caught the eye. I never had to cut the pitches, but was responsible for marking the lines out every once in a while. However, this was a story about Joe Mecke-Davis, the groundsman at Westfields Football Club in Herefordshire. Because his club isn’t professional there are no rules as to how he cuts his pitch and so Matt has let his imagination run wild over the years. Now, his designs are in the running for an international award after images of his pitches went viral. Have a look for yourself…

The joy of a free book and a writing workshop! Every year at the school that I teach at each student in Year 7 gets to choose a free book. It’s a sponsored thing designed to promote reading. And if you didn’t know, reading figures are dropping fast. Obviously, as an English teacher and a fairly prolific reader, I find this trend really worrying. Naturally then, I think the scheme where kids get a book for free is just a fantastic idea. But the thing that made me smile more than anything this year was the enthusiasm of the my students who were desperate to get a look at the choices and haven’t stopped asking when they’re going to get their book ever since! Alongside this, recently I had to nominate 5 students to take part in a workshop with a visiting author. I decided to nominate a couple of really shy, quiet boys because I thought they might benefit from working with a writer for the day. We had to give out little tickets to the event as well and so I kept my group of five back at the end of the lesson to give them their tickets. Both of my shy students looked like they thought they had done something wrong, but the smiles on their faces and the expressions that said ‘Me, really?’ almost made the whole slog of an 8 week half term worth it!

Dinosaur Discovery! I read a brilliant story concerning a discovery of dinosaur footprints last month. They’re part of the longest trackway site ever discovered in the UK. They were originally found by a farm worker driving a digger and since their discovery archaeologists have been excavating the land bit by bit. Now, they’ve unearthed five different trackways of massive footprints that go on for 150 metres and are thought to have been made by both sauropods and a Megalosaurus, the largest predatory dinosaur known in the UK during the Jurassic period. I find things like this fascinating!

Divers discover $1 million worth of treasure. Another article that I read last month told of the discovery of treasure found on a centuries old Spanish shipwreck off Florida. It’s thought to be part of up to $400 million worth of treasure that was lost in the same hurricane, which divers are now frantically hoping to find more of! I used to collect old coins as a school boy and loved finding rare ones, so this story couldn’t have failed to make me smile!

Finally…half term! I’m writing this after work on the final day of the first half term of the academic year. It’s been a long, gruelling 8 week stint, marked particularly over the last two weeks by massive bouts of illness across the school. On at least two days this week we’ve had over 100 students off ill. So partly, I’m happy that I seem to have avoided it and also I’m just thrilled to bits that I now have a week off! The next one leads us right up to Christmas; something else to smile about!

I hope you enjoyed my reasons to smile this time around. There’ll be more at the start of December. Hopefully November is full of positives!

Victory over Benfica with a little help from Wor Flags, Joe Harvey and Nick Pope.

Once again Wor Flags managed to get it just right last night. On another big European night at St. James’ Park they remembered the biggest with an inspirational display dedicated to the Fairs Cup heroes of 1969.

I was born a few years after that Fairs Cup win and spent my formative years thinking that another success was probably just around the corner. It wasn’t. And so Joe Harvey’s boys became the stuff of legend to me. A group of players that any Newcastle side would need to live up to.

At half time last night, the words of Joe Harvey in Budapest drifted through my mind. Two nil down at half time in the second leg of the final all those years ago, Harvey told his players not to worry. “Get a goal and they’ll fold like a pack of cards.”

It was apt last night too, I thought. We were 1-0 up, but in need of a goal. With the game ticking over the hour mark, Benfica were having a lot of possession and it felt like we needed to weather the storm. If we could get a goal though, they’d fold.

Ten minutes later, Nick Pope collected a corner and went looking for options. Still in his own box, Harvey Barnes was one of a few players who started running as Pope carried the ball forward. And then it happened – Pope channelled his inner Tom Brady and launched a Hail Mary up field and into the path of Barnes who had sprinted into Benfica’s half. The covering defender couldn’t quite get there and Barnes was in, although a little wide. The rest is history.

Pope gets some stick for his distribution and rightly so at times. However, he was a hero last night with that throw as well as the customary crucial saves that we’ve come to expect!

In the shadow of the great Joe Harvey, Eddie Howe’s Mags made it another fantastic European night with a resounding 3-0 win. Here’s to another European adventure. Howay the lads!

Gallowgate Cult Heroes; Number 18 Paul Goddard

Every once in a while, we make a signing that almost goes under the radar and then creates a pleasant surprise when it comes to how good the player actually turns out to be. One of the best examples of this that I can think of in recent memory would be someone like Yohan Cabaye, who was quite a low profile arrival but went on to have a big impact on the team.

Paul Goddard was also a good example of this particular phenomenon. With almost 250 appearances and 77 goals for QPR and West Ham, he’d seemed settled where he was and was actually quite reluctant to move north. This was the 80s and a time when moving north from London might have felt like moving to the Arctic Circle! And in fact it was this feeling of being unsettled that would plague him during his time on Tyneside and eventually lead to him moving on. But in the two years that he spent here he managed to become a very popular member of what started off as very much a failing side and grew into something far better.

It was October 1986 when Goddard joined the Toon. We were struggling and Goddard came in and gave the side a real boost. He took a little bit of time to find his feet in the team and didn’t score until his fifth game; a 1-1 draw away at Charlton. Bur Sarge, as he was known, had undeniable quality. Despite being relatively small, he was strong and his hold up play was excellent, allowing others to come into play. He was a good finisher too and someone who seemed to play more on instinct than anything else, reading the game well and knowing when to risk a flick or play the tricky pass. His movement was excellent too. Despite his presence though, as 1987 approached Newcastle remained near the bottom of the league and indeed hit rock bottom after a 4-1 away defeat at Old Trafford on New Year’s Day 1987. Goddard had still only scored one goal.

More defeats followed and it wasn’t until February that Paul grabbed his second goal. Newcastle were stuck at the bottom of the league.

And then, as April approached things took a turn for the better. Goddard would go on a scoring streak, notching in the next 7 games as we won 5. Newcastle were up to 17th where we would finish the campaign. Sarge was a huge reason for us staying up.

For season ’87/’88 Goddard was joined by Mirandinha playing up front. The Brazilian would prove to be a constant source of frustration to Sarge though who time after time would take up a position in space awaiting a pass only to see Mira invariably shoot, regardless of the angle. I seem to remember a few stand up rows taking place in the middle of the pitch as Goddard pleaded for a pass! Even then, Paul managed to score ten times in all as we finished 8th in the old Division 1. The team featured Goddard, a Brazilian international in Mira, Peter Jackson and Glenn Roeder at the back and a host of exciting young players like Darren Jackson, Brian Tinnion, Michael O’Neill and of course the one and only Paul Gascoigne. As a Newcastle fan this was a time when you could help but feel a bit of optimism. Also as a Newcastle fan though, our hopes were about to be shattered.

Goddard had been unsettled in Newcastle from more or less the moment he’d arrived. And now he decided that he wanted to leave in order to head back to London. Add to this the devastating departure of Gazza to Spurs and suddenly everything wasn’t so rosy in the Gallowgate garden.

Bizarrely, Goddard would then move on to Derby – not exactly famous for being near London – where he would score 15 goals, staying for just over a year. Later moves would take him to Millwall and then Ipswich where he finished his career.

Had he stayed at Newcastle I think Godard would have really made a name for himself and perhaps been able to help develop players like Michael O’Neill who never really fulfilled his potential. However, for the time he was at the club Goddard did more than enough to be thought of by many who remember him as a bit of a cult hero.

Where are they now? An update on some of our released academy players.

At the end of every season our list of released players is published and without fail there are a lot of academy players on it. For some, it’s the end of a promising career with Newcastle while for others, it must have seemed inevitable for a long while.

What has always struck me about our released players is the likelihood that they will disappear from the professional game altogether. It’s always felt like a rarity to see any of them picked up by a league club and then go on to have a successful career. James Tavernier, once of this parish, has gone on to become a Rangers legend, Jamie Sterry is still playing at Doncaster Rovers and Dan Burn, released when he was 11 seems to be having a decent career nowadays too!

Recently, I got to thinking about our released players from last season. A little bit of digging revealed…not much. Players have mainly been picked up by local non league sides. Only a couple stood out as paying at a slightly higher level.

Jay Turner Cooke was brought into the NUFC academy from Sunderland in 2021 after a family issue saw him leave the club. He was highly thought of at the Academy of Light and it looked like a bit of a coup. However, despite much promise and even a couple of first team appearances in friendlies, he never quite bridged the gap to the first team and was released in summer.

Turner-Cooke subsequently signed for FC Halifax Town of the National League in August. Since then he’s made 12 appearances, scoring 2 goals from midfield and with Town currently sitting 6th in the league and on a 5 game winning streak, he might just find himself back in league football next year. It seems he’s settled well into first team life and hopefully can have a successful season and start to fulfil the promise he showed in our academy.

A while up the road Jamie Miley continues to do well at Hartlepool, also of the National League. In fact, having only been at ‘Pools since January of this year, he’s already signed a contract extension to keep him there until 2027.

Miley, the elder brother of Lewis, spent almost a decade in our academy and appeared in a few pre-season friendlies for Newcastle, but his time was blighted by injuries. Now, he finds himself in the National League playing alongside other former Toon academy graduates like Adam Campbell, Jack Hunter and Luke Charman. So far, Jamie has made 30 appearances for Hartlepool, with 14 of them coming this season where he has managed to grab two assists from a defensive midfield position where he’s been described as “pivotal”. Sounds like he’s doing well in a side that hasn’t really lived up to early season promise and recently sacked manager Simon Grayson. Best of luck for the rest of the season, Jamie!

Of other recently released academy players, forward Josh Donaldson is also at Hartlepool, but currently on loan at Dunston UTS. Slightly further south, midfielder Ellis Stanton is in the National League North with Darlington and has made 9 appearances this season, grabbing 2 assists in a struggling side. Finally, brothers Rory and Harry Powell are both at Ashington AFC.

Great to see some of the young lads fixed up with clubs and carrying on with their careers!

A little bit of appreciation for Nick Pope.

It’s easy to miss things these days as a Newcastle fan. Where for many seasons in the past we’ve had one or two stand out players capable of running a game or producing a moment that might change one, nowadays the squad is chock full of matchwinners and favourites. Tonali, Bruno, Big Joe, Anthony Gordon, defenders like Burn, Thiaw or Botman and of course Big Nick Woltemade. But it’s another Big Nick I’d like to pay a little bit of a tribute to.

Nick Pope has been excellent so far this season. In a defence that’s been miserly, conceding only 8 goals in 10 games, Pope has bailed us out on more than a few occasions making big, big saves when it’s mattered. He’s also displayed a renewed confidence when commanding his box too.

In terms of statistics, Pope has saved 19 of the 24 shots he’s faced in the league – a 79% save percentage. He’s also only conceded a goal for every 210 minutes played, which is an admirable record so far.

There have still been errors such as the Arsenal winner when you could argue that he should have just stayed on his line, but let’s face it, if he had and the header had still found the net we’d have all been asking why he didn’t come for the cross. And his kicking and distribution will always be under the microscope simply because it is a genuine weakness in his game. Sometimes keepers can’t win.

In the league, Pope has made 19 saves so far this season. A fair few have been pretty vital such as the one down low to his left from Eze against Arsenal, a game in which he made a few crucial saves. There were important saves in our most recent win against Forest, too. With 5 clean sheets in 7 league games it’s clear that Pope is reacting well to the challenge of Arron Ramsdale’s arrival. A player who has not always been universally popular on Tyneside, Pope is now proving to be a superb member of the team, as he has on many occasions in the past, to be fair.

Now in his fourth season on Tyneside it’s clearer than ever that Nick Pope is a top keeper and an asset to the team.

Always Look on The Bright Side; Five Things That Made Me Smile in September.

It’s that time again! Time to remind that despite the gruff exterior, there are occasions that make me crack a smile! I write this piece every month in order to remind myself and anyone else who needs it, that there’s always a reason to smile. September was a decent month too, so there are more than just the usual five too. You might call it a bumper edition!

Period 6 Frees! As a teacher, I sometimes find myself living for my free periods. The job is never not demanding and having my room to myself just to sit and work is always a blessing. This year, I’ve been rather fortunate, depending on your point of view. We have 6 lesson days at my school and on three of those days I’ve been lucky enough to be given the last lesson of the day free! I love it! Firstly, it gives me a goal to get to. I’m in my 50s and this job tires me out, so if I’m finished teaching before the end of the day that is just wonderful. I can relax and just get stuff done and this also means that I spend a little less time after work planning and marking. I also get to avoid some of the worst behaviour of the day too! And the best part? I have last lesson on a Friday free…all to myself…just me, the radio, an empty classroom and as much work as I can get through to start with planning for the next week.

Fantastic Forests. I’m a sucker for a lovely view. And I love a walk in the forest, having sampled a fair few across the world over the years. So an article on the BBC website about the most fantastic forests across the globe was right up my street last month. There were some that I’ll never actually see; the Jiuzhaigou National Park in China and the Amazon are either too far away, too dangerous or both for someone who might only explore them in retirement. However, the Hallerbos Forest in Belgium with its bluebell woods is close and very appealing.

The end of the Transfer Window! As a massive Newcastle United fan it felt like the whole focus of this year’s summer transfer window was on us and the sale of Alexander Isak, who memorably sulked and went on strike in order to force a move to Liverpool. A great role model for today’s youth, right there! Every day of summer was dominated by the story and it became quite exhausting really. In the end, he was sold for a British record transfer fee and, to be honest, it was just a relief in the end. Good riddance!

Couch to Team GB! This was the story of mum of two, Emma Broadhurst who recently captained the Team GB Triathlon team at the European Triathlon Championships in Turkey. Now that might not seem like that big a deal until you find out that Emma only started exercising again a few years ago after putting on weight having had two children. However, after not being able to stick to her exercise schedule she then entered a triathlon and joined a local triathlon club. With the camaraderie and support that she received Emma found that she was doing really well and then, two years later, found herself being called up to Team GB having finished second at an event in Cardiff last year. Emma is only 35, yet still a bit of a veteran in athletics terms and so this was a story that was bound to make an oldie like me smile!

Wor Flags. For the uninitiated, Wor Flags is a fan funded group that organises flag displays (tifos) at Newcastle United home matches. They’ve been going for a few years now and have held some incredible displays that help with the atmosphere in the ground on matchdays. Basically flags of all shapes and sizes are dotted around the stadium with frequent appearances by themed surfer flags that can sometimes cover entire stands or levels of stands. In my humble opinion, Wor Flags create the best displays in the UK. The one that made me smile last month – and once again feel incredibly proud to support my club – was displayed before the home game against Barcelona in the Champions League. Rather than banging on about it, I’ll just post the photos below. A thing of beauty.

Colourful towns and cities. I read an article about towns and cities that don’t shy away from a bit of colour and it made me smile. To get to our favourite beach when we’re on holiday we have to walk through the harbour of said town and most of the houses are painted different, vibrant colours. It’s just a lovely, lovely place. Then, about a week after reading the article I read that they were bringing back the children’s TV classic, Balamory. If you don’t know of it, Balamory was a fictional Scottish town full of happy-go-lucky characters who lived in a place where the houses were painted different colours. There was a lot of singing of catchy songs too. Again, just the mention of Balamory and the thought of all of that colour and remembering singing the songs with my kids when they were much younger made me smile!

And there we have it; a bumper (2 smiles more than usual!) edition of ‘Always look on the bright side…) and hopefully at least one thing to make you smile. Until next time; keep smiling!

Newcastle v Barcelona; can we talk about last night?

So, after the hype and the weeks long build up, some will say that Newcastle United came crashing back down to Earth following the latest Champions League tie. Going into it with memories of the 4-1 mauling of PSG, Mbappe et al, you could have been forgiven for getting carried away. We had a formula, right? Not quite.

Despite the result, for me there’s a number of positives to be taken from the Barcelona game. I mean, we don’t have to play them away for starters! And while we’re being just a little bit daft, there’s no shame in losing to a side who we all witnessed are just so, so good.

Personally, I didn’t think that there was a great deal wrong with our performance. We started well and with a little bit of luck and admittedly better finishing we would have at least taken the lead. And then it becomes a whole different game. If Barnes or Gordon put away one of those chances maybe the team and the crowd become just a bit too much for Barca and we end up with another PSG style performance. But maybes don’t win football matches.

So…positives. It would be remiss of me to mention positives and not start with Wor Flags and in turn, the atmosphere. What I love about Wor Flags is their ability to come up with something different and creative on a regular basis. The tributes to players, the poignant quotes and the cultural references all give St. James’ Park that little bit something different. Last night’s AC/DC themed effort was stunning and can’t have failed to inspire players and fans alike. Keep them coming lads and lasses!

As expected, the atmosphere was raucous and intimidating; a wall of noise that inspired the quick start made by the team. An early breakthrough might well have ramped that up a notch and then who knows what we’d all be talking about this morning.

I thought there were a number of players that did well. Tino Livramento put in his usual shift against the excellent Raphina as well as covering across the backline when we’d over committed. Sandro Tonali more than held his own in midfield with some clever touches and the usual ridiculous amount of ground covered. Anthony Elanga looked sharp and at times provided Barcelona with a real worry. His searing pace cut Barca open on a couple of occasions and he provided crosses that deserved far better than the end products. A player that, if we can get right, will prove to be a genuine threat this season. Not many will think that he should have been subbed. And I though Malick Thiaw looked superb when he came on. Pace, power and enough class to take time on the ball when others might have panicked. With an ageing back line it’s good to see that the future looks good.

The fact that we created genuine chances last night is of course another positive. There are winnable games to come, our defence is doing well and so if we continue to create chances we should start to put them away. Nick Woltemade will gain fitness and appear more, Yoane Wissa will be available…someone, hopefully can start finishing those chances!

With 6 more games to go it’s reasonably certain that we won’t see a challenge as big as Barcelona until that last game at PSG. Everything in between now and then becomes hugely important. Yes, we need wins, points and better performances, but there’s plenty more time to make that happen. Howay the lads!

Teaching: Back once again for the renegade (school) master…

So here we are again. Summer now feels like a distant memory as I’ve been back at work and into a new academic year for the last couple of weeks.

It’s my 26th year of teaching and I’ve reached the grand age of 53, so as I’m sure you’ll understand, regardless of holidays I’m permanently knackered. For me there’s no longer that fresh feel to every September. Not only will I still be tired, but I’ll have seen and heard more or less everything that’s going to be thrown at me between now and late July many times before. It’ll just have been given a new trendy name. And be delivered by someone with way more enthusiasm than me…

I wanted to write about a couple of new things though, as well as something that feels like it’s as old and predictable as time.

Neither of the new things are entirely new. One is in the setting that I now work in and the other is an old idea that has now resurfaced with a new name. Both are challenging me in different ways.

As part of our role as teachers, we all get a couple of duties to do per week; supervising on the yard at break, that kind of thing. This year I had to rub my eyes when I saw what my new duties would entail. Even when I looked again, they were still there and a couple of months later when a new rota was sent out, they remained. Let me tell you, I’m not impressed. This year I have toilet duty…twice a week.

Now, I have to say that I’m lucky as our student toilets are in fact very modern. Glass fronted, lots of cubicles, one big hand wash station in the middle and some fancy hand driers off to the side. These boys have never had it so good! But, they’re still toilets. So two of my breaks are now spent managing the queue outside of the toilets, while trying to keep the flow of ‘customers’ going inside and watching out for any suspicious vape activity too.

On my first duty last week I had been there all of 6 seconds when one of the smaller boys was sick near the front of the queue, which really does just typify my luck! While he stood there unable to work out what to do next, the other boys were either pointing it out to me or screaming and squirming about it. Meanwhile, I had to find someone with a radio who could get in touch with a caretaker, while simultaneously getting the boys to not walk straight through the sick as I kept the flow of the queue going! Talk about juggling plates!

It wasn’t long before a caretaker arrived on scene, coned the area off and cleaned everything up, but not before some of the queue had managed to ignore my warnings and walk straight through it all! You could say it was a baptism of puke…

Since then things have been a bit less eventful. Queues are pretty orderly and nothing dramatic has happened. The smell however, well that’s another matter…

Many years ago Year 11 students who we didn’t think had the ability to follow the GCSE English course would do a course called Entry Level Certificate, which concentrated on the basics of written communication and meant that those students would at least leave school with some kind of English qualification. These were kids with complex special educational needs, learning delays and sometimes even those that could barely read or write. It worked really well, doing much for the self esteem of kids who’d never before felt too comfortable with the study of English.

In their wisdom, the education gods took Entry Level away though and so every year we were left with a cohort of students who would really struggle to access the content that they were being given, however it was pitched.

As is the way with education though, it was eventually brought back, revamped and given a new name and now I have a group of Year 10 students who are doing that course, bringing back many happy memories of teaching it before. It’s taking a bit of getting used to and because there’s no existing work for it at our school I’m having to do lots of planning, but I have to say that it’s actually really enjoyable.

One thing that certainly isn’t new is how fussy Year 7 students can be. I’m blessed – sort of – with two Year 7 classes this year, although one is only for one library lesson per week. Regardless, I think I’m already developing a nervous tick.

At time of writing I’m two weeks into the new academic year and so have taught these groups only a handful of times. Still, they are proving to be quite painful! Maybe it’s the grumpy middle aged man in me, but they just seem to be a constant stream of often irrelevant questions, fuss, a lack of listening and a way too much stationary!

Today we did a reading test in a computer room. The instructions were clear as day and repeated by not just me, but our librarian who was running the tests, at least 4 times. And yet still, I found myself drowning under a deluge of the same type of questions – “Sir, what do I do now?”, “Sir, how do I log on?”, “Sir, what do I click on?”. In situations like this I find any kind of professionalism that I may possess being tested to its very limits!

However, the best was saved for later in the lesson, when bored of having to answer questions on the test, one of them asked our librarian “Miss, how many questions are there?” Rather than tell the individual student, she stopped the group and addressed them all, telling them that the programme was measuring their reading age and thus there were no set number of questions; it would end when the program had got a reading age.

Two minutes later came the same question. And again seconds after. And again a few minutes after that.

As we were packing up it was all I could do not to ask the question myself. However, looking at my colleague I decided that I valued my life more than a valued a cheap laugh!

Anyway, only 36 weeks more to go!

Magpie Moments Episode 3.

Whatever your era or age as a Newcastle United supporter, you’ll have rarely experienced a dull moment. Unless of course you still remember almost every deadline day under the stewardship of Mike Ashley. However, in the third episode of the Magpie Moments series I think I can bring you a few moments that might just raise a smile.

Who the f*** is Micky Quinn? Micky Quinn can be safely referred to as a legendary number nine at Newcastle. But when he signed it was a bit of a different matter for some fans. At the time there was a bitter battle between fans and board and some fans were boycotting the first game of the 1989/’90 season. I remember it well. My cousin Shaun was standing on the ‘picket line’ and almost persuaded me to join him as I walked up towards the Gallowgate, but thankfully I went in. Quinny himself remembers it well too and wrote about seeing a banner that read ‘Who the f*** is Micky Quinn?’ as he walked up to the stadium in his excellent autobiography ‘Who Ate All The Pies?’! Thankfully, most Geordies knew exactly who he was by the end of that 90 minutes, Quinny scoring four as we beat promotion favourites Leeds United 5-2! The first was a penalty at the Gallowgate end and what I remember most about it was Quinn’s technique of standing outside the box with his back to to the keeper before his run up. The hat-trick goal was a hooked right foot volley from close in at the Leazes end and then the fourth was a one on one with Quinny looking exhausted as he ran through and just finishing with a shot from outside of the box before he got caught by the chasing defenders! Some amazing moments at the start of a season that would promise much but fail to deliver in the most spectacular style.

The away kit at home, under the lights and Alex Mathie! Monday 13th September 1993 saw a Newcastle game almost called off because of the opposition’s kit! Sheffield Wednesday rocked up at St. James’ Park in our first season in the newly formed English Premiership (now the Premier League) with a specially commissioned one off kit for the televised match. The only problem was that the kit was white and featured a black stripe. Until Newcastle offered to wear their all blue away kit, the fixture was in danger of being called off! As for the game, well first of all I remember that it was just too weird to watch us play in blue at home. And it seemed so for the players as well as Sheff Wed gradually took control and went 1-2 up as we looked like a side who’d never played together before. In the meantime Wednesday had chance after chance after chance. Toon substitute Alex Mathie – recently signed from Morton – changed the game. Firstly he provided the cross that eventually fell to Andy Cole to equalise and then he scored a beauty. Mathie was around the edge of Wednesday’s box when a ball was played forward from the right. He allowed it to come over his shoulder before volleying it over the keeper and into the net without breaking stride. Ultimately, Mathie didn’t make it at Newcastle, but he gave us a hell of a moment with that goal.

Shola’s new identity. Not particularly a ‘moment’ this one, but just a quick story that always makes me smile. It was well known that Sir Bobby Robson wasn’t always the best with names and could be quite forgetful when it came to his players identities. One of the best examples of this came up when Shola Ameobi was asked about nicknames in an interview. At first he said he didn’t have one, so the reporter asked, ‘what does Bobby Robson call you then?’ to which Shola replied, ‘Carl Cort’! Always makes me laugh!

Always Look on the Bright Side; Things that made me smile in August.

August is a month where I fall out of routine. As a teacher, I’m enjoying the summer break; six weeks of work free bliss. And because of that, I rarely remember to keep up with the routines that I establish during term times, including looking for the little smile worthy positive moments in the news. So, this month, my bright sides are a bit more generalised.

Summer and a bit of a heat wave. Now, I feel it’s best to quantify the term ‘heatwave’. I live in England which is never particularly warm in comparison to a lot of other countries. However, this year, for a week or so we had a bona fide heatwave and temperatures that at times became unbearable. Why smile then, you might ask. Simple. Being without work for 6 weeks meant that I was free to sit out in the garden on such hot days and chat to family or read a book or even, if I was feeling a little more ambitious, do a bit of gardening. And it’s wonderful just to feel the warmth of the sun on your skin. In the north of England it’s easy to get used to the wind and the rain and so it’s always a reason to smile when the sun gets out in summer.

We’ve got a clean patio! Having had a lovely family holiday in Wales we returned to normal life that included the added bonus of a patio now full of weeds. We’d done some work getting them off before we’d left but when we got back home after a week it was like a mini jungle. Now, after much trowel work, boiling water pouring and sweeping our patio looks lovely and it’s been fantastic being able to sit there in the sun without wishing it wasn’t a mess. Sometimes, it’s the strangest of things that can raise a smile!

My son’s GCSE results. Despite the fact that it feels like mere minutes ago that I was regularly picking my kids up from their primary school’s after school club, they’re in fact both finished in regular education. The youngest, my son, finished Year 11 in July of this year and so picked up his GCSE results near the end of August. He passed everything, which was great, achieving excellent results in Maths, English Language and i Media. It’s obviously really stressful for everyone, especially him while waiting for the results, so knowing that he got through it all so well was more than enough reason for a bit of a smile. It’s nice to know that he’s got that particular hurdle out of the way. Now he’s just got to do it all again with 2 year’s worth of A-Levels!

Newcastle. My home city, the place I was born and raised and unfortunately, somewhere I left when I was in my early twenties. Every August gives me plenty of time to visit home and catch up with family and friends. And this August I was lucky enough to be able to visit twice. Firstly, I took my son up to watch a Newcastle United match. Just a friendly game, but it was the first time I’d been in a while and it felt wonderful to be back in the stadium, being part of a fabulous atmosphere and just being able to watch my team. A week later we visited again for a couple of days in order to see family and friends, catching up with everyone that we wanted to see and having a great time. My dad hasn’t been in the best of health for the last year and so it’s good to check in with him and see that he’s gradually getting stronger again. He’s not quite the same, but it’s comforting and more than enough to bring a smile to my face to see that he’s getting better.

Running. I’ve had a strange year with fitness and have never quite got myself to the levels that I want. It’s been very ‘stop, start’ with illness and injury dominating, meaning I’ll get out for maybe two or three runs in a row and then suffer some kind of setback. However, towards the end of August I felt like I’d made a breakthrough. Having injured my back and worrying that I wouldn’t be able to run for at least a couple of weeks, I recovered within less than a week and was running again. Fingers crossed, everything’s been fine since and although I’m not running with a smile on my face – more a grimace – I’m finding a little bit of consistency. There’s always a positive to be found!

So there we have it; another month, another five things to smile about. Hopefully I’ll have lots to smile about in September, despite having to go back to work!