The Andy Walker Column: Why I loved Newcastle United getting relegated

May 26 2009 By Andy Walker

CALL me a sadist but I took great pleasure from the images of blubbering Geordies at Villa Park on Sunday.

‘Sob on the Tyne’, ‘Shear agony’ - the headlines screamed out yesterday morning as if the Premier League should be mourning the loss of an old friend. I was tempted to pop open the bubbly and start celebrating.

Finally we can enjoy a break from the embarrassing circus that is Newcastle United, finally we can dispel this ‘big club’ myth and finally narrow-minded football fans will realise no club has a God-given right to be in the top flight.

One national radio station had the audacity to debate whether or not sanctions should be in place to prevent ‘huge’ clubs like Newcastle being relegated from the top flight. We’ve been here before with Leeds United and Nottingham Forest and what has happened since? If anything the Premier League has gone from strength-to-strength. Now is the time to banish the phrase ‘too good to go down’ from football vocabulary once and for all .

Try telling supporters of teams such as Hull, Stoke, Wigan and now Burnley, previous Premier League virgins, that certain clubs should be protected from slipping through the trap door that leads to the Championship (or even lower a la Southampton, Norwich and Charlton).