Hall Charlton

When one thinks about the group of young backs that came through our youth system at the turn of the century, the usual names of Wilkinson, Walder and Noon come up quickly.  One often forgotten is scrum-half Hall Charlton.

Yet since making a try-scoring Premiership debut in 1998, Charlton has quietly amassed well over 100 appearances for the Falcons.

Indeed, after making his debut for the first team in a friendly against Cardiff, Hall scored in both of his next two games, in the Premiership against West Hartlepool on December 27^th 1998 and against Richmond in a Cheltenham & Gloucester Cup tie (the latter as a replacement for Allen Chiltern).

Charlton edged out Chiltern in the battle to become Gary Armstrong’s understudy over the next three years, and was an unused sub in both the 1999 and 2001 Cup Finals.

After making just 7 starts in 2000/01, Charlton shared the scrum-half duties with Armstrong in 2001/02 as the great man drifted into retirement (well, towards a move to Borders) and seemed all set to become our permanent number 9.

However, the signing of James Grindal from Leicester meant Charlton had to continue to compete for his place, and towards the end of the season it looked like he’d lost as Grindal started all of the last 8 Premiership matches as the team pulled off The Great Escape.

Hall did play his part too though, notably at Leeds where his try deep into injury time secured our only away win of the season in February 2003.

Over the last two seasons, the two have often been rotated (Charlton tending to play more home matches) and whilst Grindal got the nod to start the 2004 Cup Final, Charlton not only came off the bench for the first time at Twickenham but became the only Falcon to be a replacement (used or not) in all 3 professional Cup Finals.

Not content with this record, Hall was also called up by England during the 2004 Autumn friendlies and was an unused replacement against Canada.

Now a more than established member of the Newcastle squad, Hall has proven to be a strong player was has pace with the ball in hand. Unfortunately his lack of speed at breakdowns is what is probably keeping him from making the step up to the international scrum-half he has the potential to be.

However, he is still improving and may yet battle Harry Ellis for the 2007 number 9 shirt.

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