Mark Gillespie

Goalkeeper - NEC
30 Aug 2026
Sunday
Process
Overview Personal Contract News 2 Transfers Relations Events 12 Awards Matches History

Marked for Mark Gillespie

3 Edition

The NEC Chronicle

17 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Uneasy

Squad17 Aug 2026

Bram Nuytinck damages knee ligaments — 129 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 129 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.

Squad17 Aug 2026

Tjaronn Chery in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NEC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad17 Aug 2026

No hiding place for Tjaronn Chery

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Tjaronn Chery, and the manager let it.

The terraces17 Aug 2026

The crowd has taken to Ahmetcan Kaplan

At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.

Player ratings17 Aug 2026

Nobody could get near Kodai Sano

Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.

Player ratings17 Aug 2026

Ninety minutes of Ahmetcan Kaplan at his very best

Marked 8.14. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at NEC.

Market17 Aug 2026

NEC and Mark Gillespie are talking past each other

“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.

Match15 Aug 2026

Honours even between NEC and Groningen

1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.

Squad17 Aug 2026

Jim Croqué dropped after a run of poor form

The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.

In brief

Back issues
1 Edition

The Newcastle United Post

3 Aug 2026
From our football correspondent Steady

Market3 Aug 2026

Joelinton raises the bar for Newcastle United

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Newcastle United heard it as anything else.

Squad3 Aug 2026

Nick Pope signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Nick Pope commits to Newcastle United for another 2 years.

Squad3 Aug 2026

Tempers go at Newcastle United

Nick Woltemade was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.

Squad3 Aug 2026

Words at Newcastle United training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bruno Guimarães is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.

Market3 Aug 2026

24 months and counting on Nick Pope

Still no offer on the table, and Nick Pope’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.

Squad3 Aug 2026

Joelinton knocks on the manager’s door

“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Joelinton trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

In brief