Just 24 hours before Newcastle resume battle at Wolves on Sunday I will be standing deep in an old Ashington pit site which is now a museum giving a talk on Geordie legend Jack Milburn to mark the 100th anniversary of his birth.
Such remains Wor Jackie’s popularity 36 years after his death that the tickets for the Woodhorn Museum Heritage event have been snapped up way before I am due to pay humble homage with a waiting list composed in case of any late withdrawals. A three-time FA Cup winner and master goalscorer, who has a stand named in his honour at St James Park, deserves such adulation.
This is what waits for those who combine serving United long and well with actually winning silverware. Are you listening Bruno and Big Joe, Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon, and Sandro Tonali? Does anyone want to join Milburn in Geordie folklore?
in case of any late withdrawals. A three-time FA Cup winner and master goalscorer, who has a stand named in his honour at St James Park, deserves such adulation.
This is what waits for those who combine serving United long and well with actually winning silverware. Are you listening Bruno and Big Joe, Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon, and Sandro Tonali? Does anyone want to join Milburn in Geordie folklore?
If so let them go out at Wolves this Sabbath and get the business done. Let them repeat the feat three games hence at Wimbledon and take another step along the road that leads to Wembley, Jackie’s second favourite home, and the League Cup final. This is supposed to be a club and a team of aspiration so please show it.
Wor Jackie did alongside such sterling comrades as Bobby Mitchell, Joe Harvey, Frank Brennan, Bobby Cowell, Jimmy Scoular and Len White. At a time when every single player was inevitably British United broke the fifties mould by featuring a star from South America _ Chilean George Robledo who scored the Wembley winner in 1952. Now the black and whites are chock full of players from across the globe. The world have moved on, but let Newcastle revert back to the grand old days of the early 1950s when the rest of the country were sick of us winning what was then the showpiece match of the season, the FA Cup final.
Yes, we’ll take Europe as well as domestic success which was an innovation not open to Milburn’s Magpies but very much on today’s agenda. Three points at Wolves can help towards that, victory at Wimbledon bring a silver pot another step closer.