Cirque du chippy tea

Take That are excited about bringing The Circus back to Manchester – and getting a cheese and onion pie

- By DIANNE BOURNE

TAKE THAT may have just sent their fans into a frenzy with the announcement that they're taking their most famous, and extravagant, show The Circus back out on the road but there's only one thing on the mind of Mark Owen when the M.E.N. catches up with the band.

And that's chips and gravy back in his Oldham hometown.

The M.E.N. caught up with Mark, Gary Barlow and Howard Donald fresh from that eagerly-anticipated announcement made on Friday morning, to the delight of their army of dedicated fans.

But all the talk of two huge Manchester homecoming shows at the newly-expanded Etihad Stadium next summer has got Mark thinking about home comforts.

He grins: "All I can think about today is chips and gravy. I don't know why, it's since I've started talking about Manchester!"

He continues: "As soon as I arrive in Manchester, it's my big mistake, the first thing I'll do is I go to the chippy. It's the one I've always gone to.

"I'll go there, I get the biggest tray, I'll eat it, and then I'll fall asleep."

So what's his order? "Usually a pie, cheese and onion pie with chips and gravy, and loads of vinegar and salt," he confesses, despite my look of disgust at the prospect of cheese pie mixed with gravy. "I know, it's so wrong," he laughs.

It's fair to say the chippy teas are not the only lure for the reunited Take That threesome to head back out on the road in the summer, though.

In announcing the rather unexpected news that they're going to reprise an old tour for the first time in their career, they're aware they're also breaking new ground in a slightly converse way.

Old, yet new, and something not ever done before by a pop band is their belief.

As Gary explains: "One thing for us is we never want to feel like we're going backwards, we always want to feel like we're going forwards.