by A house move, a routine check-up at a new doctor and then the heartbreaking news that changed Geoff Thompson’s life forever. The six letter word that shatters so many lives. He had cancer.
The 61-year-old has been South Shield’s chairman since 2015, saving the club from extinction, building them a new home in the seaside town on the south bank of the River Tyne, turning out crowds of around 200 into a middle gate. of more than 2,000.
But after surgery and the chilling diagnosis that he might die, Thompson had to consider everything and prioritize his family over his childhood obsession. Reluctantly, South Shields is up for sale.
“I’m doing it with a heavy heart,” said Thompson, who is not giving this interview because he wants to feel sorry for him, but because he wants to find someone who will finish what he did. He began.
“We’ve made good progress in terms of promotions and investment in infrastructure but, unfortunately, this time last year I was diagnosed with cancer, which was unsuspected.
“I had surgery in March. I’m not completely out of the woods. I hope the surgery went well, but I’m still being tested and the risk of it happening again is always there. I hope not…”
Thompson once dreamed of returning his hometown club to the Football League and after four promotions in nine years, the Mariners have been promoted to the National League North, two tiers below the English Football League. It is the same division as Scunthorpe, Darlington, Scarborough and Blyth Spartans.
They won their last promotion under former Sunderland and England striker Kevin Phillips and are currently eighth in the table. Former Sunderland and Middlesbrough star Julio Arca was in the dugout but was removed on Wednesday after just one win in their last seven league games.
In a proud town, the home of the Sand Dancers (as the townspeople are affectionately known) is often overlooked and forgotten, like so many others, and the football club was a beacon of light amidst the gloom of neglect. Thompson won’t let him die. If he cannot continue to be a benefactor and a leader, he remains a hero.
“It scares you when you hear that word, cancer, absolutely,” he continued, the memory of that day forcing him to lower his gaze and turn away as he composed himself. “I had the operation in London and at the first consultation I told the surgeon how scared I was about the surgery.
“He said, ‘don’t worry, if anything goes wrong she’ll cry (pointing at my wife), we’ll all be upset but you won’t know about it because you’ll be dead.’
“It wasn’t quite what I wanted to hear to be honest. But he said ‘you have high grade cancer, the tumor is still contained and hopefully we can deal with it.
“I haven’t been to the doctor in six years but I moved house to be closer to my dad, who has since died, so I changed surgery. They called me in for a routine check up and blood test. It’s my prostate.
“I had no symptoms other than having to get up in the middle of the night and need a little something, which described me as enjoying a glass of wine in my 60s. I got the test on Tuesday and the doctor called me on Thursday saying my PSA was through the roof. That was it, various tests, scans and cancer.”
Anyone who heard those words will know what followed. There was a lot of emotion. His family was traumatized. Confronted with his own sense of mortality, and knowing that time was precious, Thompson had to make some changes. Make sure whatever time he had left was given to more than a football club not a league.
“We have had four promotions, . we saved the club from oblivion,” said Thompson without any hint. “We have invested in infrastructure. We have a 3G pitch, a separate training centre, and a new stand built. Emotionally and financially I am fully invested.
“I think it’s about that cliché. I am a local businessman who has done quite well and I wanted to give something back to my local community. Unfortunately, the rug has been pulled from me. I’d like to think we have a club worth buying.
“I have to recalibrate and rethink how I’m spending my time and what my priorities are. I hope I will be cured, but you never know for sure. It has made me reevaluate my life I guess.
“I feel my health and my age, I’m coming up to 62, it’s time to pass the baton to someone else.
Like many others, South Shields isn’t just where Thompson, who founded energy consultancy firm Utilitywise, is based. he is from, he has defined who he is. The football club is also good.
“I’m a South Shields boy, educated up north,” he explained. “I went to Sunderland University and Newcastle University, my business interests were in the North East.
“I still live in South Tyneside, my family still live in and around South Shields. My late father used to take me to our old Simonside estate with my late Uncle. When I discovered the difficulty the team had in 2015, homeless people, exiled to play our games in front of 200 people in Peterlee, which is 30 miles to the south. The club was on the verge of liquidation. I couldn’t stand by and let that happen.”
And he can’t let that happen again. He is looking for a buyer and has some tentative interest from America. But unlike Wrexham, which was bought by Hollywood duo Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney and turned into a world-famous soap opera thanks to a Disney documentary, it’s hard to find the right people or person.
“We’re torn between Sunderland and Newcastle here,” Thompson said proudly. “In fact, I’d say watching South Shields play is the only place you’ll find Newcastle and Sunderland fans standing shoulder to shoulder with no hint of trouble.
“We have three sides of the Academy, we have an international academy in conjunction with Sunderland Uni so that international students can come here to play football while they study. We are no longer in survival mode.
“If you look at the history of the club, in the late 1920s. South Shields were sitting in the old Second Division as they beat the likes of Chelsea and Manchester United. Unfortunately, the club went bankrupt in 1930 and moved to Gateshead. It was restored in 1936 and sadly fell into disrepair again in 1974. I just wanted to make sure it didn’t happen a third time.
“If it wasn’t for my health, I would have tried to keep going. We are a town of close to 100,000 people. South Tyneside has 150,000 inhabitants. My view has always been that the club belongs in at least the National League and possibly the EFL. It was never blind ambition or an ego trip, it’s about getting to where I felt we belonged.
“I would have given him a few more years but I have to be faithful to my wife, Andrea, my children and my eight grandchildren..”
But what happened at Wrexham could be a bigger obstacle because people have unrealistic expectations of what a club like South Shields needs.
“We had a few approaches,” Thompson continued. “But what’s in the headlines is what happened at a club like Wrexham.
“I’m not talking to Ryan Reynolds, unfortunately, but there is a lot of interest in English football clubs in America. But, no, we’re not talking Beyonce or Taylor Swift, although we’d be more than happy to do that. That would be great.
“I’m thinking of all the famous Sand Dancers and the first name that comes to mind is Sir Ridley Scott. But he’s not on the phone. I will have to contact…
“The risk is that people think you need Hollywood money to do this, you don’t. I have done a lot of the spade work, the one time cost. The ground is suitable for the National League and is also a small step for EFL grading. You don’t need to spend huge sums, we just need an owner who can build on what we’ve started.”
The search continues.
