Hear all Sides

I HAVE recently seen the reports of the Local Heroes Awards evening and would like to add to the remarkable list of achievements by Kip Watson, a friend for over 20 years.

About ten years ago, one of the Royal Navy mine counter measures vessels, HMS Quorn, paid a courtesy visit to Sunderland. Our son-in-law was captain and we managed to get Kip and his wife an invitation to visit the ship.

Not content with that, Kip suggested a football match which took place with quite a lot of press coverage and, I believe, even local sponsorship.

By all accounts, it was a highly successful and enjoyable event, although the result was an understandable disappointment for the Navy team. They only had a crew of 35 from whom to select; Kip, I seem to recall, managed to squeeze four ex-internationals into the over-40s side.

But, really, the purpose of this letter is to record that, from that chance beginning, over 30 subsequent matches against military teams have been organised through the Naval Regional Officer at HMS Caliope, including the Royal Yacht Britannia and a Dutch warship.

We are proud to count Kip and Mary among our friends, and are delighted to know that he is held in such high regard in Sunderland. - Robert Aiken, Coleford, Glos.

Darlington FC

HAVING endured 25 years of mostly utter garbage following Sunderland, recent remarks by George Reynolds were refreshing, to say the least.

Even in the Premiership, the players are vastly overpaid for their meagre talent. The workhorse has replaced real skill. An athlete who can run all day is the requirement.

The tricky winger and creative midfielder are a risky inclusion in the "don't get beat" formations of modern football. Boring to watch, oh yes. Entertaining, certainly not.

George Reynolds and his wife can be accused of the dreadfully criminal act that is "telling the truth". It's no good ringing radio shows, filling the letters pages of football papers stating how poor football is, then, when a chairman echoes our views, saying he's out of touch.

Mr Reynolds' only mistake was to choose the wrong town and business to invest his money in. There are not that many decent players around and even if he went out and spent millions on players, Darlington will repay George by putting 5,000 bums on seats in a new stadium holding 25,000. - J Tague, Bishop Auckland.

A NEW stadium will not take Darlington FC out of the Third Division, neither will a new manager or chairman.

Only the players themselves can make this happen by giving their all to the club. The loyal three of four thousand supporters, if they each took a friend to watch a game, would double the gate. If they cheered on their team instead of pointing and shouting abuse at the directors' box and trainers' bench, then Darlington FC might, just might, climb up out of the lower league.

George, keep your money in your pocket. Turn the new ground into an athletics stadium, then you might be appreciated. - Frank Greenwell, Darlington.

DREAMS of a fantastic stadium and Premiership football had fans tangled in a fantasia-like scenario that gave supporters aspirations far beyond the capabilities of Darlington to maintain.

The saviour of our team - and whatever has happened since he took over, he will always be known as that - could also be the death of our club.

We don't need this public attack on players who, for all their worth, are trying their best for us. But you get what you pay for. Bennett and Taylor have had to work under a Spartan pay structure and it has crippled Darlington. When we needed to get better players in the summer, we got injury-prone players. The dream has evaporated, the fans disillusioned and sad that we are, once again, falling down the table.

I don't want to see Darlington Football Club die. Please George, don't do it to us. Give us a team to support.

Support the players, support the fans' loyalty, give us something we can grasp and hold on to and, not like your dream, slip through our fingers. - Ian Crammond, Darlington.

PENSIONS

WHAT a mess this present Government is making of running the country.

The latest catastrophe is workers' retirement plans. A lot of companies are closing their pension schemes which pay a retirement income linked to a final salary.

The companies are switching to a money purchase plan, which does not have to be shown on the balance sheet. This will leave a lot of workers well below their expected pensions. The other big fear will be to existing company pensioners if the company pension scheme is folded up.

Tony Blair is planning for an extensive time in office, God forbid, and all we can look forward to is more tax by stealth. What is the point of planning for retirement with a regime like this in power? - AL Carter, Marske, Redcar.

EUROPE

CONTRARY to the opinions of Councillor Stephenson, of Doncaster, (HAS, Feb 23), I suggest that Britain should become a state in a Federal United States of Europe, in the same way as, for example, New Jersey and California are states of the Federal United States of America.

How did the United States of America become the richest and most powerful country on Earth? Because it is, for the most part, peopled by descendants of Europeans who wanted to get away from the poverty and wars of Europe.

But the combined population of the countries of Europe is greater than that of the United States, and the economic potential is there for Europe to at least match the US, but we must get rid of this smallminded "we can do it ourselves" attitude. We can't!

Let us become a state of the Federal States of Europe and then we can all stop hating the Germans, French, Italians, Spaniards, Dutch, Swedes, Norwegians, Poles, Czechs, etc, etc. - W Collinson, Durham City.