Reader’s Corner: “The north-east used to be a hotbed for football - now our clubs are dying”

Many outside of our region really don’t understand how important football is to this area. The ONE thing, that the North East has and always will have above ANYWHERE else in this country, is our love for Football.

Up here, even if you don’t ‘like’ football, you ‘know’ football. To us, football is true, its proper, its historic, its fierce, its pure and it's absolutely amazing. The term ‘football is life’ is thrown around on billboards or sweatshirts as a means of promoting a ‘cool’ culture within society.

To us here in the North East, football really is our LIFE.

Our area was once a place for great footballers and managers alike. With players coming from all over the continent to play in the famous Red and White of Sunderland and the Black and White of Newcastle United - where standards and expectations were sky-high, matching our clubs’ incredible level of support that they receive.

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Nowadays, when you think of North East football, you think of boring, dull and poor football teams. Teams to whom the modern day has completely left behind, much like the region they belong to. Failed ventures by clueless chancers, who exploit and take advantage of our famous and historic clubs who we love more than life itself, in attempt to line their own pockets and build their enterprise with no care or consideration to the utterly loyal and supportive fanbases to whom ‘their’ clubs would be NOTHING without.

This does not only apply to our two clubs, Newcastle and Sunderland.

Our lower league, smaller teams are also victim to this vicious cycle - once-established football league or non-league clubs who have succumbed to this horrific chokehold of neglect. Teams like Hartlepool, Gateshead, Blyth, Berwick and Darlington are now almost forgotten, and rotting in the back end of non-league Football, barely scrapping by year after year.

Modern football and all of its surroundings has ripped our beloved region apart to the brink of no return. Our football clubs are dying - if not already dead.

And it’s killing us too.