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BBC News
01-05-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
Northumberland walk named after Dan Burn 'a boost for business'
Businesses say trade is booming on a walking trail renamed in honour of Newcastle United star Dan Elsdon Burn Walk in Northumberland was renamed the Big Dan Burn Walk as a nod to celebrate his Carabao Cup opening goal, which helped end the team's 70-year wait for a domestic Sewell, landlady of Bird in Bush, says "the difference that it's made has been tremendous", with the pub experiencing an upturn of more than 110% since 2 to the success, Northumberland National Park Authority (NNPA) has extended the name change until to the end of September as a tribute to the 6ft 7in (2m) Blyth-born defender. Burn, 32, will also be made an honorary freeman of Northumberland, after county councillors unanimously voted to back the plans. Black and white stripes The national park authority has invited people on to the two-hour walk, which follows Elsdon Burn, to "reminisce about that header" and celebrate a "local hero's triumph"."Just about every single person that comes into the pub or the coffee shop is either starting the Big Dan Burn Walk, or they're ending the Big Dan Burn Walk," Ms Sewell told BBC Radio Newcastle. Ms Sewell said the increased popularity had been "absolutely amazing"."We've never seen this many people for so long in Elsdon," she Village Hall, which provides toilet and shower facilities on a donation basis, has also seen an increase in day visitor and overnight campers' numbersAn "increase in takings is being appreciated", the national park authority said it had seen plenty of people doing the walk in their black and white Dan Burn Walk stickers have also been put up alongside the current markers. Follow BBC North East on X, Facebook, Nextdoor and Instagram.
BBC News
22-03-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
Dan Burn: Newcastle hero's story shines a light on second chances
Football loves a fairytale ending, and it got one this week from Dan Newcastle defender made his England debut last night, days after scoring the goal that set his side on the way to their first domestic trophy in 70 it wasn't always this way for the was dropped from the club's academy aged 11, drawing comparisons with Jamie Vardy, another player released by a professional team's youth programme. Both kept playing non-league football - in Burn's case, while he was pushing trollies at his local supermarket as a teenager - before battling back to top-flight football. Once upon a time stories like theirs would have seemed like impossible dreams - but is that changing? Former Premier League striker Charlie Austin has seen both sides of the forged a successful pro career after being dropped from an academy, going on to play for Southampton, QPR and West 35 years old, he plays with AFC Totton in the Southern League Premier tells BBC Newsbeat the standard of non-league football has dramatically improved in the 15 years since he was last a part of it."There's a lot of players now that have come up through academies and then not been given the opportunities at full-time level for one reason or another, and dropped down into the non-league," he says."And then, all of a sudden, people are taking a chance on them and they're taking it with both hands."I enjoy it. It's a tough test every time I play." The Premier League launched the Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP) in the 2012-2013 season in response to concerns there weren't enough homegrown players in the to a report published 10 years later, there were 14,226 players, ranging from under-8s to under-22s, in the academy system during the 2021-22 Premier League says it's an "unavoidable reality" that the majority of those young people will leave academy systems without a professional playing it says 11% of its top-level academy graduates go on to play at least 20 professional league EFL, which represents clubs in the Championship, League One and League Two, say more homegrown academy players are now playing in their say 295 academy-developed players - who played at that club from 16 to 18 - made their first team debut last season. That number went up from 227 the season released from the academy track can be a devastating blow for those that don't make it seems that more players are finding their way back into football in the lower leagues of the game. Journalists Andrew Cooke and Lee Davies, hosts of the Non-League Treatment Room podcast, have been following the scene for the last 10 years. "There's a lot of players being released from academies and they have to find somewhere to play," says Andrew."Non-league is usually where they go."Lee says the pair have had a lot of players on the podcast who started out at academies before being into the non-league world is "one heck of a shock to the system", he agree the standard of games has increased, and there are opportunities to move up."I would say that non-league now is better than ever for a stepping stone back into the full-time game," says Lee. The National League is the fifth tier of English professional football behind the Premier League and three divisions of the EFL.A spokesperson told Newsbeat they don't keep official stats but there have "definitely been more" players moving up from lower leagues in recent player who's followed that path is 28-year-old Josh March, who plays for EFL League Two team Harrogate had a few short spells with academies as a youngster, but ultimately made his way into the professional game, aged 22, via non-league."It's quite a long journey and quite late on really," he says. "You don't really expect to turn pro at that age, and alongside working a full-time job."Josh's team-mate Tom Cursons has an even more remarkable tale. The 23-year-old has never been part of a professional academy, but played part-time while studying sport and exercise science at Nottingham Trent signed for Harrogate after impressing for Ilkeston Town in the seventh tier of English admits that players like himself, Dan Burn and Jamie Vardy are "extreme examples" and it's still not easy to come up through the lower says he was was "one of the only ones, if not the only one" who hadn't been part of a professional academy system at any been a disadvantage on the pitch at times, he says, but is something that's given him other opportunities."I probably wouldn't have had the life experience that I've had of going to uni if I'd done a scholarship, or if I'd had one year pro at 18," he says."So I don't look back with any regret that I never got signed anywhere, because I've made some incredible memories over the last three-and-a-half years."So it's a different path, but I think I've shown that you can still get here." Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays - or listen back here.
