There is also a chance Newcastle could play a friendly at Gateshead if the scheduling can be worked out.”The deal with Cameron Hall was renewed on a handshake this summer but now, three months into the season, we’ve been told that the latest instalment is the last,” Gibson said. “We don’t own our own ground because we play at the International Stadium, which we rent from the council. So we can’t make money from the social club or exploiting the facilities. We run to a budget, owe no money and have no overdraft facility at our own request. But we rely on the sponsorship.”What Gazza has done is quite staggering Without being asked, he volunteered £10,000. It’s not as if it’s a company that can write it off against tax He’s sticking his hand in his pocket. I would have been thrilled to received a single autographed shirt to raffle.

It shows that his body might have travelled the world but his heart is still here.”. Eight months on and there is still no definitive description of Tiger Woods’s feat in winning a fourth successive major championship at the Masters earlier this year. Better yet, simply refer to it as the greatest stretch of dominance in golf history.”
In his book, Tiger Woods: The Championship Years (Headline, £16.99), Tim Rosaforte, who has followed the brilliant career of the world No 1 as a writer for Golf World US, quotes that passage at the end of the largest section in the book, simply entitled: “The Greatest Year Ever”. All Tiger’s greatest triumphs are recreated but perhaps the most telling section is “The Reconstruction”, the period between the 1997 Masters runaway and his 2000-01 exploits. Woods believed he could become ever better by becoming more consistent ­ the “slam” was the result.Woods reveals some of his secrets in Tiger Woods: How I Play Golf (Little Brown, £25). It is unlikely the likes of David Duval and Ernie Els can learn anything they do not already know about the best player in the world and the book is probably equally unhelpful to the vast majority of its target audience: that is, all us hackers and duffers.But that does not mean there is not a golfer in the country who will not be desperate to get his hands on it, just as they want to try out an ERC driver or the Pro V1 ball, those hi-tech properties are a mystery to all but the talented few. The book is based on Tiger’s tips in the magazine Golf Digest and a perusal of its pages maintains the hope that something will lodge in the subconscious and make the crucial difference.

One tip that can be followed by anyone of any talent is Tiger’s nutritional guide. His foods to win include orange and green vegetables, fruit and fruit juices, turkey, baked fish, grilled chicken, skimmed milk, egg whites and rice. His foods to lose include pizza, ice cream, cheesecake, roast beef, fried chicken and fish, gravy, crisps, ham and soft drinks. But presumably it only makes a difference to winning and losing if you have the former burger guzzler’s talent in the first place.A more sobering read is the autobiography of Barclay Howard. Out of the Rough (Mainstream, £14.99) is subtitled: “Booze, birdies and a driving ambition”. An alcoholic who was banned from the game at one point, Howard won the silver medal as the low amateur at the Open at Royal Troon in 1997 A few months later he was diagnosed with leukaemia. This is a ghosted but utterly honest account of how he got through the chemotherapy with humour and courage.Champions and Guardians (Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, £40) is the second volume of a trilogy covering the history of the game’s foremost club.

The period covered is between 1884 and 1939, following on from Challenges and Champions, the opening volume, and covers a rich time in the development of the game both in St Andrews and internationally. The final part will be published in 2004, the R and A’s 250th anniversary. This was the last work of the co-author, John Behrend, a former captain of the R and A, who died last year.Two reprints are of interest. A Golf Story (Aurum Press, £12.99) by the late Charles Price is the inside story of the Masters tournament and the Augusta club, up to 1986.