Going where the Eagles dare

The football was a 1970s preseason friendly, against Middlesbrough. "They played a strong team, " he recalls. "My claim to fame is that I got kicked in the air by Graeme Souness."

Ian's an Eagles' season ticket holder. Loves the game, the crack, the intensity, the atmosphere. The Backtrack column, conversely, had never watched the sport since the days when the Harlem Globetrotters were on television at much the same time as Bill and Ben the Flowerpot Men.

Ian said we shouldn't worry too much over what it was all about, just to enjoy the ride. Today's column could be headed Winging it With the Eagles.

They play at the Metro Radio Arena in Newcastle, a large and functional hangar which originally was the dream of Sir John Hall and which now hosts all manner of big name entertainment.

Happily they have resisted the temptation to call it the Eyrie, or to bill match nights as a talon contest.

We were first there, almost at once bumping into Swoop, the Eagles' flamboyant mascot. On all other occasions, Swoop is David Robinson, a rather diffident 19-year-old student from School Aycliffe, near Darlington.

"I opened my mouth at the wrong time, " he says, asked how he came to land at the Arena.

He's studying bio-medical sciences. What, we enquire, does he want to do thereafter. "Be a biomedical scientist, I suppose," says David, declining to be photographed lest - like Batman and Robin - it give away the secret of his identity.

Inside the multi-coloured Swoop suit, he's a different bird altogether. "You make yourself look stupid really, but it's great fun. You can do anything you like, no one knows you."

Eleven teams contest the British Basketball League, each run as a franchise. Five years ago the average Eagles attendance was 870, now - chiefly because of huge schools and community involvement - it tops 3,000.

"Not bad for an imported American sport in a football mad area, " says Ian. The Eagles also have five men in England's Commonwealth Games squad.

"It's a terrific sport, a family sport and the kids just love it because all they have to do is put up a hoop and they're away" says Peter Ratcliffe - officially marketing manager, unofficially (he says) the bums on seats man.

Also among early arrivals is former Olympic swimmer Samantha Foggo, 33 the following day, who for six years has been general manager. "Our guys are in the region's schools all the time, our profile has just exploded in the last 12 months," says Sam.

She won't be photographed, either, though she may never once have struggled into a Swoop suit.

"Too shy," she insists, freestyle.

Eagles, second, are playing league leaders Scottish Rocks, whom they'd beaten in the Trophy semi-final the week previously and had also played two weeks before that. "Should be fun, " says Ian Wilkinson, who lives in Darlington.

We're in corporate hospitality, spring rolls by Big Luke's, a secondary sponsor to Springfield Honda. There's a little pep talk from Fabulous Flournoy, the 6ft 7in head coach.

Mr Flournoy, whose first name really is Fabulous - "His Mom clearly had high hopes," says the programme - admits that he's worried about the night's encounter. As things turn out, he has every right to be.

"It's awfully hard to beat the same team three times in a row, " says Fab. "We've done the job, we have to do it all over again. They know us now" Fab may also be concerned about the prospect of a suspension for thumping another coach before Christmas. "He's from the Bronx so could only let so much intimidation go unpunished, " pleads Ian by way of mitigation.

It still wasn't very festive, though.

The basketball court is laid on top of the ice rink which permanently covers the Arena. We're at ground level, the toes so cold it's just like watching Tow Law.

Swoop leads out the black and white clad home side, swallow dives (if an Eagle may) along the floor, ruffles a few feathers.

They're without star man Jeremy Hyett, a late injury victim. "It's like Newcastle United without Alan Shearer, " says former Tyne Tees Television head of sport Roger Tames, another basketball fan.

The tallest are 6ft 9in, the shortest just six feet; the Rocks have two at barely 5ft 11in, in danger of tripping over their shorts. Former Eagle Ian Whyte was 7ft 2ins, got to appear in Alien v Predator - one or t'other - and to play the giant in one of the Harry Potter films.

Unfortunately the giant was supposed to be 8ft 6in. They taught him to walk on stilts.

It's said to be a non-contact sport, a hit and run convention more honoured in the breach than in the observance. "Our hardest job is keeping them all fit, " Peter Ratciffe had said.

Home side, Eagles get the choice of music, which plays continually. Their tunes appear to be We Will Rock You and the theme from the Addams Family, with no shortage of contenders to play Lurch.

Soon, however, it becomes apparent that Bad Day (a recent number one for Mr Daniel Powter) would have been more appropriate - the Rocks' number 14 as deadly as Thierry Henry, whose number he shares.

The Eagles are stranded, forever trailing. The cheer leaders are cheerless, Swoop cooped, crowd bowed. Whatever else it is they're going through, it's not too many hoops.

"It's a very tactical game, they've worked us out, " says Ian, the Rocks several baskets in the black, though he recalls that once the Eagles won a game by scoring 19 points in the last minute and a half.

It ends 55-81, the Eagles' fourth defeat in five games, the following morning's papers full of words like "humbling" and "dismal" and "utterly out of kilter."

The website is more outspoken yet.

Back in corporate hospitality, Swoop - returned to mufti - is drinking lager from the bottle. He looks thoroughly plucked: Rocks and a hard place, if ever.

Starter for ten

BEFORE this leg of the column strides any further, a little quiz: in his first eight months as manager of Tottenham Hotspur, Terry Venables signed two Geordies for record fees. One was Paul Gascogine, who was the other? The answer a little later.

WHILE Manchester United played Burton on Wednesday evening, Thornaby played Tow Law. Clearly it affected the attendance: there were only 52,000 at Old Trafford.

Thornaby secretary Peter Morris was philosophical, in the "What if" fashion that football people favour.

The Teessiders' FA Cup run had ended in the second qualifying round against Leek Town - "the worst we've played all season", said Peter - who in the next round lost to Burton.

The rest is FA Cup history.

"Instead of paying Tow Law tonight we should have been playing Manchester United, " said Peter. His side lost 4-0, anyway.

TUESDAY'S column carried a picture of Darlington players training on a snowbound Feethams in the winter of 1963. Among them, it transpires, was our old friend Malcolm Dawes - better remembered at Hartlepool (and at New Yo rk Co smo s . ) Just a bit bairn in those days, Malcolm never made a first team appearance before a free transfer to Aldershot. He's fourth right, two to his right is the late Lance Robson, the footballing dentist.

The others from the left are Ralph Phillips, last heard of in Pittington, Jim Reed, Doug Robson - who followed Ron Greener as centre half - Trimdon lad Billy Curley and Malcolm Scott, who also played football for Newcastle United and York City but may better be remembered as a Northamptonshire cricketer.

Scottish goalkeeper Jim Ferguson is next, then fellow Scot Jim Brown, Malcolm, Tony France, Lance Robson and Jimmy Lawton.

They needed to run around just to keep warm - Quakers didn't play a home game between December 22 and March 11. "It was just endless, " says Malcolm.

"There's never been a winter like that one."

HOPING to develop a clubhouse on the suitably named Brewery Field, Spennymoor Town have come across an unexpected problem. "The council is reluctant to give planning permission because it's supposed to be a habitat for the great crested newt, " reports director of football Ken Houlahan.

The great crested in a protected species, and clearly the policy's working. Newt for their comfort, the blinking things are everywhere.

HEATINGTON Stannington v Steels of Sunderland - for whom 44-year-old former Darlington manager Gary Bennett still turns out - in the Over 40s League Cup last Saturday.

It's down to penalties, Heaton Stannington trailing 3-2 with seven kicks taken and desperate to score with the eighth. Goalkeeper Peter Guthrie steps up, scores, goes back between the posts and saves the next. Stannington go through.

Peter Guthrie - Born in Newcastle, also 44, he played for Weymouth in the Southern League when Spurs signed him for £100,000 in 1987. It was a record fee paid to a non-league club. The next Pat Jennings, said Venables.

He never played a first team match, made a handful of loan appearances for Swansea and transferred for £60,000 to Barnet, head to head with the Quakers in 1989-90 for promotion from the Conference. Darlington won.

TUESDAY'S column also sought the "definitive" answer to the odds against all 20 Premiership clubs being drawn apart, as they were this month, in the third round of the FA Cup.

"Mine is the definitive answer, " insists Richmond School maths master Andy Mollitt, who's reckoned 12 in 1,000.

Bob Foster, meanwhile, sends his reasoning (as good scholars should) for concluding that the true figure is 19,619.7 billion to one.

Sum mistake somewhere.

AND FINALLY . . .

THE player considered by Sir Bobby Robson to be the second best ever to come from the British Isles - Tuesday's question - is Kevin Beattie, who won nine England caps but made just three appearances for Middlesbrough.

The other question which Jamie Corrigan posed from Sir Bobby's autbiography was where the England caps "stolen" from Sir Bobby's house were found. The answer was in the loft.

Bob Foster today seeks the identity of the only team to have played in the Premiership, the old divisions one, two, three and four and the Third Division North and South.

We're all over, again, on Tuesday.

Published: 20/01/2006