Newcastle United in Tokyo: Shields Gazette touch down in Japan
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00:00So we're here at Manchester Airport getting ready to jet off to Tokyo, Newcastle United's pre-season in full swing after a whole yesterday.
00:10Good game, good warm-up from Newcastle, now this is the crux of it.
00:14Yeah, it's the proper stuff this, isn't it?
00:16Yeah, we've got a long journey ahead, a couple of hours till we take off from Shanghai, about 11 hours I think the flight is,
00:23and then we've got a couple of hours waiting in Shanghai before we go to Tokyo.
00:26But yeah, how can we complain, we're both looking forward to it, aren't we?
00:29Really, really exciting. This, we'll see the likes of Bruno for the first time,
00:35we'll see Fabian Scherminger and Armand come back, Martin Dabrowski as well, those international players.
00:41We won't see Anthony Gordon and Kieran Trippi unfortunately,
00:44but it'll be good for Eddie how to get the sort of meat and bones of his squad back together ahead of the new season,
00:52which starts in less than three weeks' time, so it's going to be really important.
00:56We saw at Hull yesterday, Eddie Howe named as strong a starting XI as he could,
01:01but there were still a lot of players who would do well to play Premier League football in the positions they played.
01:08It's still a bare-bones sort of squad at the moment.
01:11Yeah, I think the desperate, well I wouldn't say desperate, but you want to see recognised players back,
01:17you want to see international players back, obviously you mentioned too that wouldn't be there,
01:20Trippi, Aaron, Gordon, but you've got the likes of, who's come back?
01:25Shea is a big one, Bruno is a big one.
01:27Yeah, well Bruno is the main one.
01:29He's the main man.
01:30I think seeing him will give everyone a lift, and hopefully as well, there might be some transfer activity,
01:35but as we spoke to Eddie Howe after yesterday, nothing is closed.
01:39But yeah, I think seeing the likes of Bruno will give someone a lift,
01:42and what would give someone a bigger lift would be to see a player come through the door,
01:45and you can't start working hard on that, but as we said to Ian now, no news.
01:49But yeah, good commercial opportunities over there as well, we should mention,
01:53that's why they do this, why they're not straight at the end of last season,
01:56as much as that sort of was criticised in some parts.
01:59It was, I would say probably the first game against Spurs was good for the commercial side,
02:04maybe not the loss to the AEG All-Stars, but coming here playing against two GLeague sides,
02:10hopefully get a new fan base, the players and stuff will be out in the public meeting local fans,
02:15so it should be a productive trip and we'll be covering every step of the way.
02:41Are you impressed by Shanghai, Jordan?
02:44No.
02:54And konnichiwa, we're in Tokyo, Japan.
02:58It's been a long, long 24 hours, I don't want to sound too full of complaints,
03:04we're here, I'm glad we're here, but I think the clock's just struck,
03:09we've been awake exactly 24 hours and we're just walking to the hotel now,
03:14so in the Shinjuku city region or world of Tokyo, if you like,
03:20slightly quieter at the moment, we're in the shade.
03:23First impression of Tokyo, Jordan?
03:25I think you'll agree, I think the shade is no respite,
03:29it is possibly the warmest place I've ever been.
03:32It's so hot, like so humid, as soon as we got out of the train station there.
03:38It's something I've never experienced before, and even walking around now,
03:41you can probably see it on our face, especially mine,
03:43there's literally sweat dripping from my forehead.
03:46Tough for Newcastle then.
03:48I know, that's what I mean, yeah.
03:49They've got to go and play on this on Wednesday night and Saturday night,
03:53but then we've got to probably sit in it as well,
03:55there might be a bit of sunshine on us, so I'm glad you brought suncream,
03:58because I didn't, so I'll be nicking some of your suncream,
04:01but I suppose we'll get used to it, but it's finally good to actually be here,
04:06because, as you mentioned there, it's been such a long journey.
04:11The Shanghai.
04:12The Shanghai saga.
04:14Yeah, so we'll start off getting to Shanghai,
04:16which was just under 11 hours of turnout in the end, I think.
04:19Yeah, which, I mean, we knew it was daunting, but hey,
04:22a few films on the plane, a bit of Hunger Games for you, Jordan.
04:25Hunger Games, yeah, and a couple of my films as well,
04:28as I'm finding any crashes in there.
04:30Sorry if I'm off camera, I'm with both the suitcases, it's Jordan's.
04:34I can't multitask, but it's beautiful.
04:36I'm not usually good walking with a selfie stick, so I'm trying.
04:39I would have thought, get it done on our walk to the hotel.
04:43We don't know what the hotel's like either, but we're in Shinjuku City,
04:47which is also where Newcastle are based as well,
04:50so Newcastle, probably here, around about now,
04:54flew from Newcastle via Uzbekistan, so that's an interesting journey for them.
05:00So, yeah, we might see players out and about,
05:03but I imagine, like us, they're probably quite tired.
05:06Yeah, well, I mean, I probably hope Aircon's in their room as well.
05:09I'm sure it will be in the hotel.
05:10I really hope so, because, yeah, it's not the heat,
05:15it's the humidity, isn't it?
05:17It's hardly that, yeah.
05:18It's clinging to you, it's not nice, but look, we're here.
05:22Yeah, yeah, to be positive.
05:24It's great to be here, you're looking around.
05:26I mean, we were in the hustle and bustle earlier next to the train station.
05:30We thought, actually, we're going to probably struggle to do a video here,
05:34and we haven't even got our bearings yet.
05:36But at the moment, we think we're going in the right direction for the hotel.
05:40So, yeah, and it is a bit quiet out other than that.
05:44A little alarm going off at the moment.
05:46Yeah, we'll put these mics on to try and cancel out.
05:50Might sound like we're a bit underwater, a bit muffled, but hey.
05:53We do try.
05:55Yeah, but just as we're getting on the plane to Manchester, actually,
05:59Newcastle's squad list dropped.
06:01Yeah.
06:02So we've got confirmation of that.
06:03No real surprises, would you say?
06:05Yeah.
06:06No, there's no real surprises.
06:07I thought Sandro Tannoli was an interesting one.
06:09Yeah, they named him, obviously, con player, but yeah,
06:11they named him on the squad list.
06:12But I think the only notable absentees were the two I already knew about,
06:15Kieran Trippie, Anthony Gordon.
06:16Yeah.
06:17And then if you look at a few others as well, Matt Target, Joe White.
06:21Hey, Alex Murphy, if you want to include him as well.
06:23Yeah, yeah.
06:24So there was a couple of known absentees, but as expected, really.
06:32I think Matt Target's injury, I presume Alex Murphy's an injury as well.
06:37Joe White, we know, was an injury.
06:38So lots of injuries still in there, but Newcastle have narrowed off.
06:43They've definitely got a better squad, a more senior squad,
06:45than they did against Fulham.
06:46Yeah, bolstered by the likes of Bruno, who's been making his own way there.
06:50Also the likes of Joe Linton, facetiming.
06:53So, yeah, it'll be good to see them all back together.
06:58And two decent tests, because I think the weather will certainly be…
07:02Bruno might be used to it, having played in South America,
07:05but this is certainly not north-east England weather,
07:09and certainly not hull weather, even though it was quite nice in Hull the other day.
07:13Yeah, I'm just looking at my face now, it's got more and more red.
07:15It's the start of the war.
07:16I hope this hotel is close, so we can stop for a little bit and talk.
07:19I think it's close. I hope it's close.
07:22Yeah, let's go back the journey, I suppose,
07:26because that was what we sort of touched upon,
07:28where it was a bit of a nightmare in Shanghai, really, wasn't it?
07:33I mean, it just didn't make any sense.
07:35No, so we were given boarding passes to get through…
07:41I don't know if we're being naïve here,
07:43but in our experience getting connections, of which we've got many,
07:48it's not that difficult.
07:51You just walk through to the next one.
07:53Shanghai wanted us to basically check in all over again,
07:58but then couldn't check us in properly.
08:00Yeah, yeah, yeah.
08:01Still at you and me?
08:02Yeah, they shut the door.
08:04I thought I'd lost you.
08:05It was shocking.
08:06But basically, they give you a boarding pass to board the plane at Shanghai
08:09to get to Tokyo, at Manchester,
08:11and then we had to get another queue to get another boarding pass.
08:13To get the same thing, basically.
08:15And then we went through the gate that we knew we were going to go through.
08:18No one was happy.
08:19There was a woman who was waiting for a flight a lot later than ours,
08:22and she was like,
08:23I just want to go to the departure lounge.
08:26They weren't letting us do any of that.
08:28Yeah.
08:29It wasn't seamless, but I'll tell you what,
08:31once we got to Tokyo, it absolutely was.
08:33Yeah, it really was.
08:35Through immigration, customs, all that,
08:38within about 20 minutes of landing,
08:40which for a major city like Tokyo,
08:43even though we went to the outskirts airport, Narita Airport,
08:47yeah, it was seamless.
08:49And then, short, I'll say short,
08:51about the Narita train journey here,
08:53direct to Shinjuku,
08:56and now we're walking to the hotel.
08:58So yeah, first impressions of Tokyo.
09:01We haven't really seen much of it.
09:03It's just a quiet sort of street we're walking on now.
09:06I can see the hotel there.
09:08Oh, my God.
09:09Lovely.
09:10We nearly made it.
09:11I thought we were walking aimlessly.
09:12No, no, I can see it there.
09:14So yeah, first impressions,
09:16it's warm, but hey,
09:18we'll have a further look around later on,
09:21maybe after a bit of sleep, a bit of work.
09:24I've no Wi-Fi either,
09:25so that's been another bit of fun.
09:28I hope you get to see this video.
09:30I hope the hotel has Wi-Fi as well as air con.
09:33But yeah, more to come, obviously,
09:35over on Shields Gazette from myself
09:38and Jordan on Newcastle World as well.
09:41Yeah, plenty more to come in the next couple of days,
09:43starting with Tuesday,
09:45which the time difference here,
09:47Tokyo is eight hours ahead.
09:49But we're going to see Eddie Howe and these players
09:52early morning, I think it is, about half ten?
09:54Yeah.
09:55So it'll be sort of midnight,
09:57like just after midnight.
09:59Yeah, keep an eye out on our Twitter pages.
10:03Obviously, I mentioned there,
10:04Newcastle World, Shields Gazette,
10:05for any content from that.
10:06I'm sure I'll get lots of video from that.
10:08Opportunity to speak to Eddie Howe
10:10and a player or two as well.
10:12So a good way to start the trip.
10:14And then obviously on the Wednesday as well,
10:16the first game they kick off against
10:18Eurora Red Diamonds,
10:19I think that's how you pronounce it.
10:20Yeah, yeah.
10:21So yeah, plenty more to come.
10:24So yeah, stay tuned.
10:26You can hear us.
10:27Yeah.
10:28That's deafening, that.
10:29Right, we'll call it there.
10:31But as I say, stay tuned,
10:32Newcastle World and Shields Gazette.
10:34Lots more to come in the coming days.