Alan Shearer was one of Cushin’s first heroes, but his idol as a kid was a Toon player who stopped goals, rather than scored them.
“I first went to St James’ when I was very young, but my first proper memory was against Stoke in 2008,” he explained. “We were 2-0 up at half-time, and I remember being on the concourse at half-time and thinking how great it was to be a Newcastle supporter.
“That didn’t last long – we ended up throwing the game away, conceding a couple of late goals and drawing 2-2 – but it was watching Shay Given pull off some big saves that day which made me want to be a keeper.
“Everyone else looked the same, wearing the same shirts, and it was just that one player, the goalkeeper, standing out. You are the last line of defence and you can be the hero, and I always liked that gamble – if it went wrong it was my fault, or I could be the reason why we get the points.
“I was quite keen on that, and then I suppose that transitioned into me being a musician, where it is my name on the poster. I guess I’ve always liked the attention!”
Cushin’s career between the sticks saw him play in the youth team for non-league Newcastle Benfield, but he has had to hang up his gloves to focus on playing the guitar.
“It was a sad day when I had to stop playing, but it came after I’d spent some time in the studio with Noel Gallagher, and I realised I couldn’t afford to carry on as a keeper and risk breaking my fingers,” he added.
“So I always say it was Shay who inspired me to put the gloves on, and Noel who told me to take them off again!”
Chris Sutton and Andrew Cushin were speaking to BBC Sport’s Chris Bevan.
The AI predictions were generated using Microsoft Copilot Chat – we simply asked the tool to ‘predict this weekend’s Premier League scores’.