Tears of joy, giant Howe banner, kids on phone boxes: Newcastle's League Cup celebration

New York Times

30-03-2025

Eddie Howe's eyes are glistening. Usually the epitome of calm and restraint, he is clearly fighting tears.
Stood on the deck of one of two open-top buses, which are snaking between thousands upon thousands of black-and-white-striped shirts — most lining the streets, many others hanging from lampposts, out of windows and off buildings — Howe has just glimpsed the enormous Wor Flags banner of himself, draped down a St James' Park-facing hotel.
'I did not know what to expect,' he tells Ant and Dec, the Geordie TV personalities. 'I hoped that some people would come, but this is something else.'
Howe's words are genuine and are echoed by every member of the Newcastle United squad.
Yet they are far from the only people inside the club who had been uncertain about the volume of supporters who would turn out to celebrate Newcastle's Carabao Cup triumph.
Officials had deliberated what the scale should be, reaching out to those with long-held connections, who almost universally responded with a variation of the phrase, 'Like nothing you have ever witnessed before'.
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'It's only the League Cup,' some onlookers had scoffed, following Newcastle's frenzied celebrations in London a fortnight earlier. But they failed to comprehend the immensity of that victory. Bruno Guimaraes, the captain, summed it up perfectly when he described the clash with Liverpool as Newcastle's 'World Cup final'.
During these celebrations, decision-makers were told, those 56 years of hurt without silverware, that 70-year yearning for a domestic trophy, would pour out in such extraordinary fashion that nobody could quite comprehend its magnitude in advance.
Those reassurances convinced Newcastle that their decision to 'go massive', as a senior insider puts it, was prescient.
During discussions with local authorities and stakeholders, Newcastle stressed they were essentially 'trying to put on Glastonbury-on-Tyne within two weeks' and were attempting to shrink a 12-month planning period for such a large-scale event into 12 days. 'We're trying to build the plane while we're in the air,' was the oft-repeated phrase internally.
The conservative official estimate for those who amassed was in excess of 300,000, but the figure is likely to have been far greater. This was how Newcastle uniquely celebrated their historic cup victory with what has been described as 'the largest gathering the city has ever seen'.
By 9am, it is apparent that festivities are not confined to the city centre.
Across Tyneside, black-and-white flags are draped from windows, flown outside shops and on poles outside office blocks. Even red post boxes have been dressed in Newcastle colours. At a Greggs in Gosforth, a sign reads, 'NUFC 2025 — Baked into history'. Two miles from St James', at a school, Wor Flags has unfurled the 'Write your name in the history books' banner, alongside a huge surfer flag featuring the iconic 'Blue Star'.
Today is why we love being a one club city.
An entire region celebrating an achievement of its football team.
Have a great day everyone 🏴🏳️🎉 pic.twitter.com/qfZKy0uh2G
— Wor Flags 🏴🏳 (@worflags) March 29, 2025
On the Town Moor, a 1,000-acre green space just outside Newcastle city centre, a large stage has been erected, flanked by multiple giant screens and enormous speakers. A 12-foot green metal barrier has been placed around the perimeter.
This is where the buses will head and the celebrations will culminate. Entrance is permitted from 1.30pm, but players are not scheduled to appear on stage for almost five hours — yet thousands of supporters, many as family groups with small children, are already streaming in, desperate for prime placing.
From 2pm, the entire cup final is replayed, with fans transfixed. 'I know the ending, so the nerves aren't shredded like two weeks ago, but I can still feel my heart beating rapidly,' Jeremy, who has front-row viewing, says.
When Dan Burn heads in the opener at 2.45pm, a huge cheer erupts. Once Alexander Isak dispatches the second, the crowd has grown and the noise levels have risen. By the full-time whistle, just before 4pm, tens of thousands have congregated and the wooping is accompanied by hugging, before a child is hoisted into the air and crowd-surfs.
Intermittent sets from local DJs are followed by north-east artists — including Sonny Tennet, who Newcastle flew out to Germany to play a private gig during pre-season — but Sam Fender, despite rumours and the eager hope of many, does not appear.
A succession of songs aimed at building the atmosphere are played. Those which provoke the keenest crowd participation are 'He's from Blyth' (a bastardised version of Ultrabeat's 'Pretty Green Eyes' about Dan Burn), 'Hey Shearer' (an adaptation of DJ Otzi's 'Hey Baby' about Alan Shearer), and the most recent addition to the repertoire, 'Don't you know pump it up, Newcastle's won the cup' (a variation of Danzel's 'Pump It Up').
'Alreet, wor kid' 🥶 pic.twitter.com/QBq5VonkQO
— Newcastle United (@NUFC) March 30, 2025
Admittedly, it is slow burn. The suggestion had been that fans would be able to watch the whole parade, but only sections of it are beamed, and the audio from on-bus interviews is patchy. However, when Howe speaks to Ant and Dec, the whole field goes quiet, listening intently to his every word.
There is a sense that the real attraction is elsewhere, but at least it is nearby and almost en route. Anticipation is quickly ramping up.
Outside St James', the scene is pure Geordie Hogarth; Beer Street, Gin Lane and Mortal Avenue rolled into one. Swaying men clutch plastic bags containing bottles, small huddles of bouncing lads, some without tops, bop to their own rhythm, cans of beer shaken and spritzing amongst them and then tossed into the air without a thought about landings, happy or otherwise. The honk of vuvuzelas scars the ears.
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Everywhere you look, there are black-and-white vignettes. A small boy perches on top of a telephone box clutching a checkered flag. Traffic lights and signposts and walls have been scaled, vertiginous vantage points for a club looking upwards. Nothing is too sacred; one man sits astride the bronzed head of Sir Bobby Robson's statue, another balances on Shearer's shoulders, holding on to his raised right arm as he conducts the choir beneath.
In Philadelphia, police 'grease the poles' as a safety precaution when the Eagles, their American-football team, win big. In Newcastle, you needed to grease an entire city. In any case, the council has adorned lampposts with banners which read, 'Carabao Cup winners 24/25,' and, 'Don't you know, pump it up.'
At Wembley, the team played like their fans sounded.
There are thousands of people here, a recreation of the (largely) genial mayhem which greeted Newcastle's controversial takeover in October 2021 and a realisation of what it promised, a party decades in the yearning. Every viewing space is taken outside the raised sections of the Gallowgate End, on walls and staircases. Crowds crane their necks in the throng of Strawberry Place, kids clambering up parents' backs to see.
CHAMPIONSSSS 🏆#wedontdoquiet pic.twitter.com/zX49fXeBjP
— Newcastle United (@NUFC) March 30, 2025
An hour before the buses are due to appear, the place is packed. Footballs are punted into the air. The full repertoire of songs are sung, from 'Ei ei ei oh, up the Premier League we go', to 'Sunderland get battered', to 'Who's that team we call United', and flares are lit and held up, the tang of smoke catching in throats. Helicopters buzz. For some, the wait is too much; a drunken, staggering lad takes a thump to the face and goes down hard, sprawling.
When the banner of Howe clenching his fists is lowered, a huge roar goes up and now people are straining and looking up Barrack Road for the coaches. Their approach is like a guttural rumble and then bang, at 4.30pm, they are present; more smoke, more cheers, Ant and Dec gurning, players twirling scarves and recording on their phones, snaking through a cordon of police and stewards.
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You wait 70 years and it is over in a crash, blare, honk and a flash. As the buses press on, down Percy Street, beneath the crammed, coiled carpark, past the Haymarket and up the Great North Road, people turn and march or jog away from St James', a reversal of matchday, when a magnet pulls a city towards its stadium. Now, it is repelled outwards, to Newcastle's green lungs.
This day needed the parade.
Ideally, it would have been longer. Casual local supporters could have turned out, waving the buses through the diverse neighbourhoods which combine to give this city its distinct character.
Logistically, that proved unfeasible in the short timescale between Wembley and celebration day. The belated announcement of the short bus journey led to criticism, with supporters initially frustrated by the lack of a parade.
That was always an essential part of the festivities, but confirmation did not come until three days after the festival-style gathering was made public, as authorities worked to ensure public safety. Suspicion around alleged culpability grew, with claims and counter-claims emerging on social media, though none of the organising parties blamed one another.
Communication could have been clearer, even if the celebration's success was impressive, given the extremely short lead-in time. The emergency services even invoked major-incident planning, proposing a top-level estimate of up to half-a-million people descending upon the route and Town Moor.
Half-an-hour always felt like an ambitious bus-route schedule and it takes almost 60 minutes to complete the circuit, with the Newcastle contingent desperate to pay ample appreciation to the hordes.
On stage, the final warm-up act is an ecstatic Shearer. Receiving the crowd, who chant his name in unison, he shifts the praise towards Howe and the players.
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'It's the best feeling I've ever had, on or off a football pitch,' Shearer says, of the final. 'I've been waiting for this day all of my life — to see our city being done so proud.'
A man made of granite, even Shearer begins to tear up, as he is asked about his father, who died last year. 'I just wish he could have hung on for one more year just to sample this,' he adds, echoing the sentiments of countless supporters who have spent a fortnight remembering those no longer with us.
Scenes 🖤🤍 pic.twitter.com/pTujjoDjoS
— Alan Shearer (@alanshearer) March 29, 2025
Eventually, after almost five hours of waiting for the earliest arrivals on the Moor, Newcastle players and staff — and the League Cup — arrive on stage to a hero's welcome. The trio of Guimaraes, Kieran Trippier and Jamaal Lascelles repeat their collective Wembley trophy lift, to rapturous applause.
Almost every player takes turns to hoist the cup aloft, before Howe walks over to rarely heralded members of staff — Tony Toward, the team administrator, and Ray Thompson, the kit manager, among them — and insists they have their own moment in the spotlight.
Guimaraes, Howe, Burn and Isak are interviewed by Ant and Dec, declaring their amazement at the unprecedented scenes they have witnessed. Isak mimics a Geordie accent — saying 'Alreet wor kid' (all right, our kid) — and then makes the serious point that winning the cup, 'means the world to us, but it means even more to see how much it means to you'.
It is Guimaraes who really revels in front of the crowd.
Repeatedly starting songs, he ignores the warnings of no expletives, given it is all going out via live stream, leading a chorus of Sandro Tonali's song, which contains the line, 'He hates f***ing Sunderland'.
'Geordie boys, taking the p***', is the joyous response from the faithful.
Howe is content to let his players — who, like the crowd, are under a strict alcohol ban — drink up the reverence. This is the celebration they have waited 13 days for (especially the internationals who were not on the trip to Dubai).
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But then comes the serious message. Watching these Newcastle players jumping up and down, playfully orchestrating the fans in front of them, it is difficult to comprehend that they have a massive home match against Brentford in four days' time.
'We are hungry for more but we can't get ahead of ourselves,' Howe says as his sign-off message. 'We have 10 huge Premier League games and we have to go again. The one thing we have to do is match your passion on the pitch.'
If Newcastle get anywhere close to doing so, then Champions League qualification is assured. Newcastle the team will be an unrivalled force of nature, just as Newcastle the city was on Saturday.