The club only got one thing wrong with the Newcastle United victory parade | OneFootball

A lot has been said about the Newcastle United victory parade and the Town Moor event.

A lot of talk before, during and after Saturday’s celebrations.

A few things were very different compared to any Newcastle United victory parade of the past.

For starters, the photos and footage of this 2025 one are in colour!

Back in 1969 for the Fairs Cup, the FA Cup victories of the 1950s and whatever else before that, it was very much a black and white world.

What was also very different about this modern day Newcastle United victory parade was the timing.

Back in 1969, United completed the 6-2 aggregate win over Ujpest Dozsa on 11 June 1969 in Budapest.

The Newcastle United squad flew back home and in less than 24 hours they were on an open top boss heading around the city centre, with the route ending at St James’ Park, with the stadium opened up for who knows how many fans to see the players and cup presented to those packed inside.

I don’t think it was exactly this simple, but not far off…when  I say that the preparations in advance back then would have been along the lines of;

What time tomorrow will we have the Fairs Cup victory parade if they win it?

What route will be best in the city centre for as many people to see it as possible?

Then once the final whistle went over in Hungary on the night of 11 June 1969, just a case of saying right, we will shut all these roads for these hours and open up St James’ Park and let as many people crowd in there as want to.

To be fair, the losing Newcastle United parades of the 1970s and 1990s weren’t a whole lot different to the above. Nor the Kevin Keegan (victory) promotion one of 1993.

For better and worse, health and safety trumps everything these days. So we all know that these things take organisation and endless meetings.

However, at the same time, all of these meetings could have been held in the many weeks leading up to the Carabao Cup Final and indeed most of them clearly were. On the basis of, if Newcastle United win at Wembley, this is what we can and should do when it comes to a Newcastle United victory parade.

As I say, usually with these parades they are within a day, at worst two or there days, of the victory on the pitch. Before you know it the open top bus is on its way around the city, whichever city, is celebrating whatever.

With this 2025 Newcastle United victory parade it was quite unique, with the football calendar shifting to accommodate an expanded Champions League, it meant an international fortnight immediately followed Wembley and so the celebrations delayed by a couple of weeks.

Far too much time for media and Newcastle United fans to talk about what could and should happen when it came to a Newcastle United victory parade (and anything else that might be arranged…).

Rumours spread that there would be a Newcastle United victory parade two weekends after the win, once the internationals were reunited with the rest of the NUFC squad.

Nothing official though and fans worried that nothing at all might be arranged, or even something at the end of the season instead.

Then on Friday 14 March 2025, the club announced that there would be an event on the Town Moor and gave a list of dates and times when the various groupings of fans could register their interest in going to the Town Moor event.

This is where I think the only real blunder happened.

All that the football club, the council, the police, whoever else, had to announce, was that a Newcastle United victory parade was ALSO going to be part of Saturday 29 March 2025 celebrations BUT final details were being sorted and they would be announced shortly.

It was a huge communications blunder and anybody who works in that industry would 100% tell you so.

They just needed to say that parade was also planned but still working on the details, but because they didn’t do that, it created a void where countless people unsurprisingly thought that the Town Moor event would be it and no Newcastle United victory parade. On top of that, for many fans, the fact that this thing at the Town Moor was a ticketed affair, simply said to them that this was a divide, where the fans who usually got to the matches, got to go to Wembley, would be able to go to the celebrations, whilst the wider community who also love Newcastle United would be excluded.

We all now know of course that this wasn’t the case. However, the failure to communicate this message led to a number of days of anger, frustration and disappointment for many Newcastle fans.

In the end though we had a brilliant day delivered, well done to all who were responsible for it.

The Newcastle United victory parade and the final stages of the Town Moor event were superb and made such a magnificent spectacle around the world, as 300,000+ Newcastle United fans, players, management and so on, did Tyneside proud. The Town Moor event ended up open to everybody as far as I know, I certainly didn’t have my digital ticket checked nor know anybody else who did.

In an ideal world…

Not complaining of course and as I said it all went off really well, but if you are talking in my ideal world…

Can you imagine how spectacularly good it would have looked, if the Newcastle United victory parade had set off from St James’ Park, headed down Gallowgate, but then instead of turning left along Percy Street, instead carried straight down past Old Eldon Square, past the Monument, then made its way around to get onto Grey Street, down Dean Street and ending up heading along the Quayside. Before heading up to the Town Moor.

It looked class the Newcastle United victory parade but fair to say that when anybody does any video footage to show off Newcastle Upon Tyne at its best, then Percy Street and heading along to towards the central motorway isn’t what springs to mind!

They can start working on my dream route for what unfolds in 2026 for Newcastle United…

After all, why can’t you be greedy after finally getting fed with NUFC success after all these years of silverware starvation???