NUFC owner Mike Ashley turned up for what was his first competitive Newcastle game (it is rumoured that he attended a pre-season home game and watched from an executive box).

There was no doubt about his presence at this one - sitting in the Directors Box clad in a Toon shirt (Smith 17 on the back) and with a rather large gentleman quite literally watching his back a few feet away. He'll earn his money if his gaffer repeats this feat at the Stadium of Light....

TV footage showed him failing to contain his excitement when our goals went in and getting to his feet to give it large with his companion Chris Mort.

Our take on the Mido events:

With Mike Ashley's appearance on Sunday providing a visible riposte to reports of him selling the club for a quick profit, those same journalists unfortunately didn't have far to look for their next Toon-related headlining-making target. 

Clearly audible chants from the travelling Toon fans directed at home fans and Boro striker Mido visibly wound the player up and provoked an outbreak of gesturing as he confronted the away section after scoring. 

As well as reporting on the game, press box occupants were kept busy deciphering the chants, before suppressing grins and then penning their outraged missives. 

While some reports correctly labelled the chanting as "distasteful" (The Mail), other more hysterical writers donned their UN peace keeping body armour before reporting on: 

"vile and ignorant Islamophobic abuse.... stereotyped as a terrorist bomber in a barrage of anti-Arab abuse" (Guardian)

Post-match comments of Mido on Sunday:

“I just think it’s ridiculous. They were taking the p*ss. Maybe some of them were drunk or something. I heard it, it was very clear and I understood what they were saying.

“The chants made me want to score more goals. I was delighted to score and I wanted another.

“I am used to it from opposition fans - but I was really frustrated when the referee gave me a yellow card.

“I don’t understand why I got booked. I was told it was for security reasons but I don’t see how that’s possible. I don’t see what I did which would affect the security of the fans. 

"I just put my finger to my mouth to say ‘quiet’. But I suppose that’s football and you have to get on with it.”

Taking the p*ss eh? whatever next?

RE: the hand signals though - that's the player lying and the press box occupants either unable or unwilling to see what went on before them live or on the video playback. Just report the facts that fit eh?

3,000 people behind the goal though will tell them exactly which Olde English gesture Mido revealed on two occasions - whether it gets "officially" reported or not.

But in the words of Catherine Tate - are we bothered? Can anybody explain what difference any of this made?

Did we rush to find a constable and report our righteous indignation? did we f**k - we just gave Mido back what he gave us and thought no more about it.

It certainly didn't stir up the locals (those that bothered to turn up at all), the post-match mood echoing that of the pre-game buildup in being less and less threatening year on year.

And it's a bit rich for football writers to suddenly start becoming outraged at the utterances of the Newcastle fans on Teesside. 

Variants of the unsavoury child abuse anthems that are trotted out annually were first heard back at Ayresome Park - talk of "paedo's" isn't new, even if rhyming it with Mido was.  

So:
 
kiddy fiddling jibes = OK 
terrorist talk =  bang out of order

Did those same writers and those same papers embark on a sizeist crusade after those same travelling fans sang songs about Sammy Lee being a dwarf two weeks ago? No.

Mentions of hung monkeys, sex with flocks and floods could be heard in our pre-season away games, while countless examples litter our back pages - foot and mouth, throwing petrol bombs at Londoners etc. 

It's called terrace humour - it's cruel, bawdy, coarse, always offensive to someone and often not funny.

It's got nothing to do with people in £300 coats making shapes in the street or chucking darts at each other - it's just football, along with people drinking to excess, crap toilets and the bloke next to you smelling like he's not washed his strip since he bought it.

Go anywhere else and you'll hear the variations on familiar themes - scummers, Munichs, Yiddos, whatever. 

Mido was baited as opposition players have been since the game began - Frank Worthington, David Speedie, Dennis Wise anyone? - and he reacted, as he has done previously.

We're not suggesting everyone shouting "Mido, he's got a bomb you know" or "he's gonna blow in a minute" was aware that the player was once banned for six months by his country for kicking off with his coach at pitchside.

What a few more people are aware of though is that the bloke seems to have a sizeable ego, previously told journalists he'd signed for us when he hadn't and often seems "excitable" when seen live and on TV.

In short, perfect wind-up fodder - just like Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink was here previously - when christened "Fat Eddie Murphy".

And what about the gentleman who scored our second goal? One-time "fat Aussie bastard" when at Boro and Leeds, now a canny lad.

Double standards? of course. Infantile? undoubtedly. Humorous? sometimes.

In reality it's all regrettable and avoidable and makes us look like a bunch of clowns, but that's just our opinion - where does one draw the line - and who draws it? Who defines what is religious or sectarian abuse and just exactly how do you police it?

When people with learning difficulties are being kicked to death twenty minutes up the road from here and children shot in the head at the other end of the M62, forgive us if we find it  hard to get really worked up about any of this frankly juvenile cobblers.

PS - The waffle below is deliberately Mido-less as we've covered our angle above. However it was noticed that the striker spent the seconds before the second half got underway having tape applied to his hands - was it really to stick his fingers together and stop him making more of those gestures?