What the world was like in 2005 when Newcastle last paid a club-record fee

| 31 January 2019

What the world was like in 2005 when Newcastle last paid a club-record fee

Newcastle paid Real Madrid £16million for Michael Owen 13-and-a-half years ago.

It has taken almost 14 years but Newcastle have finally broken their transfer record with the signing of midfielder Miguel Almiron from MLS side Atlanta United.

The Paraguay international, 24, moves to St James' Park in a deal reported to be worth £20million, exceeding the £16million fee they paid Real Madrid for Michael Owen in August 2005.

Here, Press Association Sport takes a look at what the world was like when Newcastle last paid a club-record fee.

Football

Soccer – FA Barclays Premiership – Chelsea v Charlton Athletic – Stamford Bridge — Jose Mourinho lifted the Barclays Premiership trophy after guiding Chelsea to the title (Rebecca Naden/PA)

A fresh-faced Jose Mourinho was at the height of his powers, having won the Premiership and League Cup with Chelsea in his first season in England – coming straight after his Champions League success with Porto.

Greece were European champions, Sven-Goran Eriksson was England manager, the new Wembley was still under construction, Zinedine Zidane (£45.6million) was the world's most expensive player and Harry Kane was 12 years old.

Politics

US President George Bush Visits UK — Prime Minister Tony Blair (right) and United States President George Bush outside 10 Downing Street (Kirsty Wigglesworth/PA)

In 2005, we saw the re-election of Tony Blair's Labour government for a historic third term, while George W Bush was president of the United States.

Social Media

Wow, that's big. pic.twitter.com/j97g551KGg

— Twitter (@Twitter) November 29, 2018

Twitter was still being created and was not launched until March 2006. Myspace was the largest social networking site in the world at the time and Bebo (remember that?) had only just been launched. Facebook and YouTube were only 18 months old.

Music

Live Earth Concert – London — James Blunt was voted Best New Act at the Q Awards in 2005 (Yui Mok/PA)

"You're Beautiful" by James Blunt was number one in the singles chart when Owen signed for Newcastle, while Blunt also had the number one album with Back To Bedlam.

Technology

NSPCC on social media — The first-generation iPhone was released in June 2007 (Chris Radburn/PA)

The iPhone had not been launched yet and the Nokia 1110 was the best-selling mobile phone at the time. Nintendo Wii (2006) and Kindle (2007) were also still just ideas.

In the news

London Terrorist Attacks — The number 30 double-decker bus in Tavistock Square, which was destroyed by a terrorist bomb (Peter MacDiarmid/PA)

The London terror attacks remained fresh in the mind in August 2005, while NASA launched the first Shuttle landing since the Columbia disaster of 2003.

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