Newcastle Falcons - History

History

The original Gosforth Football Club was founded in 1877 by a group of Old Boys of Durham School, in whose colours of green and white hoops the club played until the mid-1990s. The name Gosforth came from one of the suburbs of Newcastle upon Tyne. In 1955, the club moved to a new ground at North Road which was to be its home until 1990. During that time and particularly in the late 1970s Gosforth enjoyed tremendous success both on and off the field winning the John Player Cup in seasons 1975/76 and 76/77.

Gosforth supplied innumerable players to all counties over the years, to the North of England sides and to the full international and British Lions teams. These include Arthur Smith, Ray McLoughlin, Malcolm Young, Roger Uttley, Peter Dixon, Duncan Madsen, Dave Robinson, Richard Breakey, Jim Pollock and Colin White.

In 1990 the club name was changed to Newcastle Gosforth and they moved to Kingston Park. Gosforth Rugby Football Club continued as an amateur side working in partnership with Northumbria University, and currently play at the training ground of the Newcastle Falcons, Druid Park.

For the 1996/7 season the new name of Newcastle Falcons and new black-and-white colours were adopted, after local businessman Sir John Hall had taken control and attempted to create a sporting club in Newcastle that would emulate the success of the Barcelona model. The four teams that made up the sporting club were the football team, nicknamed the Magpies, the Newcastle Eagles basketball team, the Newcastle Wasps (later Riverkings, Jokers, Vipers) ice hockey team and the Newcastle Falcons rugby union team.

Newcastle was the first fully "professional" club in the world. In 1995, Sir John Hall installed former Wasps’ captain, Rob Andrew, as his salaried Director of Rugby and saw the club earn promotion from the national Second Division to the Premiership. The following season, Newcastle became English champions at their first attempt. The following season Newcastle didn't play in Europe as English teams did not take part but they did go onto the Tetley's Bitter Cup final against Wasps which they lost 29-19.

Hall sold the Falcons for a 'nominal' sum in 1999 to current owner Dave Thompson and since then Newcastle have won two Powergen Cups: in 2001 the Falcons beat Harlequins F.C. 30-27; and 2004 the Falcons beat 37-33 against Sale Sharks. The following season the Falcons recorded their best ever Heineken Cup performance by winning their pool and progressing to a quarter-final tie against Stade Français in the Parc des Princes.

In August 2005 Falcons toured Japan pre-season. They beat NEC Green Rockets easily but lost to a fired-up Toyota Verblitz.

In August 2006 Rob Andrew left the Falcons to be in overall charge of the England set-up ahead of the 2007 World Cup in a wide-ranging role that encompasses all aspects of the professional representative game in England. John Fletcher succeeded Rob Andrew as director of rugby at Newcastle Falcons with immediate effect. Fletcher, a former England A centre, had been the club's academy boss and he headed up a team of Peter Walton, Steve Black and Bob Morton, with ex-Falcons prop Ian Peel taking over as acting academy manager.