'King Kev' gives lovers and haters in the media something to talk about. And do they ever
We are caught in a vicious circle of Geordiedom. A set of media-driven archetypes have dominated the back-page reports of Kevin Keegan’s return – hailed by both the Sun and the Daily Mirror as God On The Tyne – and are vigorously embraced by the very people they patronise. The main thrust of this onslaught was gleeful, ridiculous hyperbole about the special nature of Newcastle. Kenny Dalglish, communicating via the Daily Mail’s Steve Curry, saw St James’ Park as “a thrill centre where the password is passion”. In the Daily Telegraph, Henry Winter quickly identified “Toon Army foot soldiers”, reading news of Keegan’s arrival “with such awe, like scholars feeling the Dead Sea Scrolls, touching the words to check if they were really true”. The People’s Dave Kidd told of his father-in-law cutting short a holiday for Keegan in 1982: “Take the tent down, pet, we’re ganning home.” A standard-issue Geordie tale, until Kidd breathlessly informs us that he wasn’t “one of those tattooed, topless-in-the-snow Newcastle fans either. He was a coroner.” Thanks for that, Dave.
