"Doing a Newcastle"

Sadly, the phrase "doing a Newcastle" doesn't yet mean "balancing the books and acting in a financially prudent and responsible fashion". No, it apparently means "throwing away a healthy lead at the top of the Premier League to hand the title to Man Utd" - according to the link that led to this article, anyway.

Under the impression that Man City might be choking as we did back in 1996, the BBC's Jimmy Smallwood has been speaking to Robert Lee. Our former midfielder pinpoints the home defeat by our closest foes that season as crucial - all the more demoralising given how severely we'd battered their defence and Peter Schmeichel in particular - and identifies failing to lift the trophy as "the biggest regret of my career", claiming "We would have been in Geordie folklore for many, many years". I wouldn't worry, Rob - you've gone down in Geordie folklore all the same.

Meanwhile, another definition of "doing a Newcastle" might be "to fail to control your players". Yep, we've been found guilty of that offence for the second time this season. Our fine, at £40,000, is double that of the Mackems for that reason - though that doesn't make it any easier to swallow when the whole situation was initially inflamed by our visitors and Lee Cattermole's first-minute assault on Mr T in particular.