NEWS
Note : sometimes the site's Message Board has "breaking news" so please have a look at those pages ( if you haven't already done so).
New Scrum Half Signs
Following Gary Armstong's unfortunate "accident" against Wasps, when he broke his collar bone, the Falcons faced a scrum half crisis with both Allen Chiltern and Hall Charlton also sidelined. With Steve Bates warming up ready to lace up his boots again - watched hopefully by the Saint John's crew who needed the practice- Rob Andrew stepped in and engineered the late signing of Kiwi Harley Crane (he should lift the team!), who had been providing World Cup cover down at Bath. At 5ft 10ins and 14 and a half stone he has a reputation of playing like a back row forward (speed and mobility of Peter Walton?) and has represented New Zealand "B" at both 7's and 15 a side. 23 years old, he holds a British passport so is unaffected by the "overseas player" restrictions. Further details about Harley can be found on the Message Board. He makes his debut against Leicester - playing against Austin Healey.......now if only Harley's second name was Davidson.......(Thanks to "TD" on the Board for those appalling puns)
European Shield Draw
Newcastle Falcons have been drawn in Pool 6 for the European Shield competition along with Dunvant, Narbonne and Staid Aurillocois. Pool games are to be played over the mid-November to mid-January period with the quarter finals and onwards being played later in the season. The Shield Final is scheduled for 27 May 2000. See the "Fixtures" page on this site for full details of these and all Allied Dunbar League games.
Full draw is :-
Pool 1 : Begles, Bristol, Calvisano and Dax.
Pool 2 : Bedford, Castres, Italy 3 and Newport.
Pool 3 : Caerphilly, Pau, Perpignan and Sale.
Pool 4 : Connacht, Ebbw Vale, Romania XV and Toulon.
Pool 5 : Biarritz, Bridgend, Gloucester and Spain.
Pool 7 : Agen, Brive, London Irish and Roma.
Season Ticket Applications.
As part of the clubs commitment to improving facilities and as a recognition of your support, the Club has announced that 1999/2000 Season Ticket prices have been slashed, Family Tickets introduced, cheap guaranteed priority car parking provided for all season ticket holders, stands weather proofed and that a new TV gantry has been built which doesn't block any pitch views. Full details of the new Season Ticket prices can be found on the Season Ticket application form. Tickets are available on a "Sliding Scale" basis to give value for money even after the start of the season. Remember, you can print off and use a copy of the form by either selecting your browser's printer icon or selecting "print" under the File drop down menu.
Supporters Club AGM
The Supporters Club Annual General Meeting was held at Kingston Park on Thursday 24 June 1999. All the existing Management Committee were re-elected. Futher details of the Supporters Club and their activities, including plans for a "Pre-Season Bash" with the players are shown on the Supporters Club (On the Wing) pages.
Welcome Stuart Grimes
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Scotland's Stuart Grimes is set to join Newcastle after the World Cup on a three year contract. The signing came after talks between Garath Archer and Bristol lead to his eventual contract for next seasons new Premiership side. The 6'5", 17st, 25 year old lock is joining from the Glasgow Caledonians. Originally playing full-back and centre, Grimes moved to lock, the position which has lead to his earning 9 caps for Scotland sharing the second row with Newcastle's very own Doddie Weir. |
Talk In Report
We are not sure of the exact numbers but would guess that on the evening of Tuesday 4 May well over 200 supporters attended the "Talk-In" at the Kingston Park Club House, hosted by the Supporters Club, to hear new owner Dave Thompson and Chief Executive Paul Mackings explain their vision for the future of the Falcons.
We have tried to summarise much of what was said but as anyone who was there would be able to verify, once Paul got going even Dick Godfrey couldn’t get a word in! So if we have missed out anything major we are sorry.
Dave and Paul made it clear that they saw their priority as being the development of the business side of the club, leaving the playing side firmly in the hands of Steve Bates and Rob Andrew. They did, however, believe that many of the more senior players would see out their playing days with the Falcons, including Inga, Tony U, Doddie and Gary Armstrong. Dave, in particular, made it clear that he was a great admirer of the "Manchester United" style of growing your own players through an active youth development policy and was delighted with the emergence of the younger players who were now challenging for first team places. He also believed there was a need to forge ever stronger links with local clubs, schools and Universities. At the same time the Club also recognised that they had to hold on to the very best players, at the peak of their careers, but feared that this may not always be possible unless the Club was able to create the necessary environment in terms of the quality of the stadium they played in on a week to week basis, the size of crowds and the status and prestige of the club itself.
There was a general acceptance by Dave, Paul and the supporters that the present Kingston Park was simply not up to the required standard. Dave explained that developing the correct stadium was not optional but a necessity. The League had placed a requirement on first division clubs that they had to provide grounds with a minimum capacity of 10,000 - all under cover - with at least 4000 seated. KP had a lot going for it in terms of Metro links and excellent road access from all points of the compass but its location on the edge of a residential area also caused potential problems as far as car parking, congestion and possible noise pollution were concerned.
The Club believed that the Gateshead Stadium experiment had been a disaster (no arguments there- Noo and Tiff) and that the future lay with a KP development plan, centring round the creation of a new main West stand to replace the present temporary structure. This would include 16 Corporate boxes, thereby transferring hospitality away from the current clubhouse, freeing more space for the "ordinary supporters" but also incorporating space beneath the stand for "the longest bar in Europe, bigger even than the Stoop...we are going for the Guinness Book of Records". Other matching developments would also be undertaken elsewhere at the ground.
Dave an Paul stressed that planning permission would be needed and asked the fans to offer support to that process when the time came. It did mean, however, that the planning timescale meant that the earliest that these plans could be implemented would be the 2000/2001 season and more realistically the season after that. Certain things could be done to improve facilities for next season but it would not make sense to spend vast amounts on new features which would then have to be changed again when the main developments took place.
There were quite a few suggestions on improvements which could be made for next season, including better toilet facilities, faster service in the bars (we were not sure if those two were connected -Noo and Tiff), improved floodlighting and PA systems. It was noted that the current PA speakers actually faced the pitch, so the players knew what was going on even if the crowd didn’t - which meant that if the teams unexpectedly left the pitch during the match it was because that there had just been an announcement to evacuate the ground! Unfortunately if that happened during a night match the floodlights meant that you couldn’t see that they had gone.[Don’t worry, we are exercising some editorial licence here -Noo and Tiff] Again, it was stressed that there may be some limitations to what could be achieved in these areas in the short term because of the capacity of the existing sewerage and electrical supplies to the ground.
It was also suggested [and not discounted] that there may be a case to be made for a future ground share scheme with Gateshead Thunder as they were probably also experiencing the same problems as the Falcons had found with the lack of atmosphere at the International Stadium.
It was said that there would definitely be changes to the ticket pricing policies for next season. The new management team agreed with fans that there was a need for discounts to be applied on season tickets and greater flexibility in the range of ticket offered, for example family tickets. They were also examining a debenture scheme to assist with the financing of the ground developments.
Both Dave and Paul believed that the key to the future was to get the facilities right. The Club had to encourage supporters to come to the ground earlier and leave later, as well as use it more on non match days. That required a major marketing effort, not just within Newcastle but throughout the Scottish Borders, Durham and Northumberland. (Don’t forget us "smoggies" from Teesside, North Yorks either. Now that West have been relegated to Div. 2 - assuming they survive - there is a potential audience there - more editorial comment from Noo and Tiff).
On the matter of European qualification Dave and Paul explained that in purely financial terms it would not be an absolute disaster if the Falcons failed to qualify for next season’s European Cup. There was a difference of £200,000 between the money they would receive if they qualified and the money they would still receive if they didn’t - and much of that £200,000 would be taken up though the additional cost of team travel and accommodation to France and Italy. What would be lost though would be prestige and status of both the Club and its players and that could not be valued in purely monetary terms. Hence the fact that they were still treating qualification as the main priority for the club at the moment. It was a shame that there was no automatic entry to Europe this year for the Tetley Cup Winners [there would be next season].
There was strong criticism from supporters about the fairness, or otherwise, of the proposed AD league structure during the World Cup in October when two points are to be awarded for a win, rising to three points once the Cup was over. It seemed blindingly obvious to every fan present that this would benefit the clubs with few internationals and penalise those clubs, like the Falcons, who would have high numbers of players away on International duty. The panel made it clear they were not able to comment on this issue, so they didn’t. [We can and we will - it is absolutely daft. What will this possibly achieve other than make sure that the best teams are consigned to play "catch up" in the second half of the season? - yet more editorial comment from Noo and Tiff - we are getting into this!]
Throughout the evening Dave and Paul stressed their willingness to listen to the views, comments and suggestions of supporters and we were delighted to find that the following day Dave left his email address on the site’s Message Board so anyone who wishes to contact him can do so. If you are unable to find it on the Board his address is d.Thompson@which.net
As we said at the start of this we have tried to summarise what was said but we are bound to have missed some things out. If we have, and you think it is important, please either email us at TonyKirlew@onyxnet.co.uk and we will amend this article or, alternatively, post a message on the Board.
Youth Academy
The matches for the Under 21 squad are shown on the "Fixtures" page of the site and includes a game against the touring New Zealand All Blacks Under 21's as well as the Scottish Under 20's. Last year no less than 11 members went on to play for the Falcons's First team - Hugh Vyvyan, Jimmy Cartmell, Simon Best, Hall Charlton, Tom May, Jimmy Rule, Allen Chilten, Ed Thrope, Jamie Noon, Howard Quigley and David Walder and many of these players also covered for international team members at the start of the 1999 season, during the World Cup.
Nortfamptom Kant Spel
On last season's visit to Northampton we noticed the main Saints scoreboard before the match. The W is obviously an M upside down and the A and the C are the wrong way round. Unfortunately for us, they spent more time training than learning how to spell. At any rate it is better than our Home and Visitors score board where they only have three of each number. This proved a bit of a problem at the Bath Cup tie earlier this season when the score was level at 22 all! Luckily the Falcons soon sorted that little problem out!
FALCONS SUPPORTERS CLUB
Further information on matters relating to the Falcons Supporters Club can be obtained on the "On the Wing" pages of the site or by emailing "fsc@onyxnet.co.uk" .
You can watch them again, and again, and again........
The Falcons have released a video of their amazing first season in the Allied Dunbar Premiership, from their spell binding opening match at the Rec to championship victory at the Stoop. The video can be bought now at the Rugby Shop, Kingston Park for £14.99 (see above)
