NEWPORT sports teams are the bringers of joy.

Retaining Faletau is a fine boost for the Dragons’ hopes. Being at Rodney Parade for County’s glorious return to the League was a lifetime thrill. The pre-match chat was hopeful, with a nervous edge of apprehension.

Promotion is often followed by humiliation and relegation. Doubts were atomised by four glorious goals by brilliant strikers.

All deeply satisfying – especially for those loyal fans who courageously raised County from the hell of despair of 1988.

County’s tale of chicanery, debt, failure, closure, resurrection, exile, rebuilding, plus a happy ending, is a great romantic story. It cries out to be made into a book. Before memories fade, get scribbling, someone.

● The Gwent debacle may kill off police and crime commissioners for good.

Not just for the local acrimony.

Hard cash choices by the next government could be the fatal blow.

Money for crime-busting is swallowed by bureaucracy.

The cost of running Gwent PCC office is 23 per cent over the previous system, plus £79,000 for the forced ‘retirement’ of the chief constable.

The Commons Select Committee will pursue this. They were irritated by the Gwent PCC’s tweet suggesting a Welsh MP had been ‘planted’ on the committee to embarrass him. Not true. Not necessary.

He can manage that himself.

● They even offered me a grass skirt. It was Hawaiian day at Newport LloydsTSB when I visited.

Twenty-five years ago I attended the opening of this Newport success story. The great family atmosphere is infectious, with a full social life of charity work, buoyed along by the recent addition of 100 new jobs.

Bankers have had a hard time but LloydsTSB Newport’s future is bright.

Sorry for rejecting the skirt. It was not my colour.

● Bad news: Gwent crime is to increase. Good news: it’ll be by magnifying piffle crimes. Gwent Police tweeted on the theft of a pie from the Premier Stores in Aberbargoed. Information is wanted on this hideous threat before piegate undermines local civilisation.

The new broom of PCC zero tolerance is working.

Tough on pie theft and the causes of pie theft.

● I first met her in 1987. She was a pupil at St Julian’s Junior School in Pat Drewett’s class.

Jayne Bryant impressed then. She still does. Her election to the winnable second place for the 2014 Euro vote is great news. The grass roots crushed the crachach.

Good luck, Jayne.