The build-up to Wear-tyne and tyne-Wear derbies – says Monsieur Salut, pettily using lower case to diminish Jimmy Nail’s Big River (half-decent song, actually) – should start at least as early as the approach to any other game. This one is horribly important to us. Steven Fletcher boosted his confidence no end with his hat-trick for Scotland, but can he do to the Mags what he did to Gibraltar? While covering the inquest into the deaths of the IRA’s would-be bombers killed by the SAS on The Rock, M Salut befriended a court official who happened to have played badminton for Gibraltar at the Commonwealth Games. A match was arranged and ended in a draw, each winning one game. M Salut is, and was not even then, an especially fit man. Is that the measure of Fletch’s otherwise commendable achievement?
While we ponder such weighty questions, it seems a good idea to run a few blasts from the past. Here, as a start, is my cousin David Athey, whose outstanding piece, first published here a few seasons ago, sums up what I think should be the true nature of a rivalry that divides families, friends, schoolfriends and workmates …
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