Man City, Arsenal, Villa, Wolves vie for ‘Who are You?’ awards

Another update on this year’s “Who are You?” awards from Salut! Sunderland, with news of an extra prize to add to the goodies already promised by our friends, who happily include a Sunderland supporter, at When Saturday Comes …

This is the contest that will not change the winners’ lives. Or not much.

Each year Salut! Sunderland judges choose the best contributions from opposing supporters to our “Who are You?” series, the questionnaire that precedes each SAFC game home or away, league or cup, provided we can find someone which, with one sad exception involving Stoke City, is generally the case.

We have been blessed again this season in being able to coax fascinating sets of responses from editors, broadcasters, former players, website owners and also ordinary supporters with points of view worthy of a wider audience. The net is cast wide each week; we didn’t really expect any luck with Jack Straw, Jeff Beck or Gerry of Pacemakers fame but did nearly get some from an approach to Piers Morgan, only to be brushed away as briskly as if we were a mosquito that had settled on his expensive skin.

Judging for the 2010-2011 season should be complete within days and the awards will then be announced as soon as I can do the arithmetic and work out who has won and come second and third.

From the short list offered to judges – who were invited to ignore it if they had ideas of their own – I can say that frontrunners are beginning to make their presence felt. Great Q&As with supporters of Arsenal, Manchester City, Wolverhampton Wanderers and Aston Villa have scored well in the votes already cast. Click on each of those four club names to see the nominated article. There could be further twists; the contest looks as tight as the bottom half of the Premier League in the season just ended.

But let me just add that having welcomed back the good people from When Saturday Comes as prize sponsors for this years awards, we can now say the Octopus Publishing Group has agreed to set aside a copy of a sublime book of black and white photographs from 1900 to 1985, assembled by John Tennant and called Football: the golden age. My own copy – a treasured birthday present; I then ordered it for the 60th of Salut! Sunderland‘s Pete Sixsmith – has a different photo on the cover than you see above but you’d need a heart of stone not to enjoy the contents.

Again, watch this space. The judging panel consists of several Salut! Sunderland writers): Paul Dobson (Sobs of ALS renown), Jeremy Robson, Malcolm Dawson, Mr Sixsmith of course and last year’s winner Martin Haworth, a Citeh lad. I’m there, too.

Otherwise, I need to repeat only that if any reader thinks he or she can match anything likely to appear here by way of analysis of the season just gone, they should contact me at colinrandall1@gmail.com. The address also appears, complete with clickable link, to the right between the Easy-to-Book and Etineris hotel ads.