Newcastle pre-season Sunderland head coach setback Boro England coup.
Newcastle, Sunderland and Middlesbrough all feature in this week’s North East Notes:
Newcastle United are set for a couple of overseas trips this summer. Eddie Howe and his players will jet off to Australia later this month for exhibition games against Tottenham and an A-League All Stars team, and are set to head to Japan as part of their pre-season preparations in July.
However, there are also plans in place for some pre-season action closer to home, with St James’ Park set to stage the return of the Sela Cup.
Last summer, Newcastle won the inaugural edition of the tournament as they beat Fiorentina and Villarreal ahead of the start of the Premier League season.
The Sela Cup is set to return this August, forming the showpiece domestic event of the Magpies’ pre-season programme.
The opposition line-up is yet to be confirmed, but this time around, the competition will feature both men’s and women’s matches. Newcastle Women won promotion to the FA Women’s Championship this season, and the games in the Sela Cup will form a key part of Becky Langley’s side’s preparations for life in the second tier.
MIDDLESBROUGH’S ENGLAND COUP
Newcastle is hosting an England double-header at the end of the season, with England Women taking on France in a Euros qualifier at St James’ Park on May 31 before Gareth Southgate’s men’s team play their penultimate game ahead of this summer’s Euros in the same stadium, taking on Bosnia on June 3.
However, while all eyes will be on Tyneside for the two matches, Middlesbrough have pulled off quite a coup as they will be playing host to the men’s team at Rockliffe Park in the week leading up to their game.
Rather than basing themselves in Newcastle, the FA have decided to head to Rockliffe, where the players will be closeted away in Rockliffe Hall while training at Middlesbrough’s neighbouring training ground.
Southgate, of course, has strong Boro links, having skippered the Teessiders to victory in the 2004 Carling Cup final, and his England side used Rockliffe as a base ahead of their warm-up matches against Austria and Romania which were played at the Riverside as part of the build-up to the delayed Euro 2020 tournament in 2021
