Stoke City

SAFC v Stoke can wait; first a tribute to Winger

by


Mark Eltringham and Salut! Sunderland fell out a little last season in the testy aftermath of the game at the Britannia when opinions on the way Stoke played differed, shall we say, according to who you supported. All very petty in retrospect, a retrospect sharpened by the untimely death of another Stoke fan Stephen Foster (pictured). This was Mark’s moving tribute at the City fan site, Oatcake, and – for reasons past mention of Stephen here, yesterday included, would make clear – I feel it right to reproduce it now that be has brought it to my attention …

There’s only one way to learn about grief and that’s the hard way. You can read and hear about its phases and effects but you don’t really know a damn thing about it until you’ve experienced it personally.

And when you’ve experienced it a few times what you also learn is that, like snowflakes, grief is never the same twice. It chooses its own way and does things in its own time.

I’ve lost a number of people in my life but none of those losses affected me in the same way as the death of Stephen Foster, who died in Norwich in June. He was only 48. For a start throughout the whole process of mourning him I could never get used to people referring to him as Steve. I’ve only ever seen him as Winger just like he only ever referred to me as Grey Man, our epithets from the Oatcake messageboard, bringing webtards together since 1995.

Read more

Stoke Soapbox: a little something for the weekend, sir?

by


Guess which jaunty little number Pete Sixsmith is hoping to stream from the public address system at the Stadium of Light around 4.50pm on Sunday? Yes, the one that is played only when we win …

The age-old question asked by barbers of their gentlemen clients certainly applies to we Sunderland fans. Three points would suit us as well as a packet of three of the barbers little specials would suit the men of the 1950s.

This has been a tumultuous week for Red and Whites in the North East. Another home defeat, the departure of our last marquee signing, suspension for the Player of the Year and a general mood of unhappiness and frustration that could well spill over should we lose to the Potters on Sunday, means that we are in a bit of a mess at this early stage of the season.

Read more

The Stoke City ‘Who are You?’: a certain swagger

by



This week’s “Who are You?” is dedicated to the memory of Stephen Foster (pictured), whose books on supporting Stoke City – She Stood There Laughing and And She Laughed No More** – are seen by many as being among the finest written about football. Tragically, having been the subject of one “Who Are You?” interview and offered to make it an annual event as long as our clubs remained in the same division, he died in June, aged just 48. RIP Stephen.

Richard Hulme* was one of the Stoke City supporters who left comments here after we published a tribute to Stephen. The son of a man who nearly played for City, he readily agreed to try to fill Stephen’s giant-sized boots – and has done a grand job. It is a long read, displaying all the new-found swagger of the Stoke fan, but well worth the effort ahead of a night when we must hope Dynamo Kiev leave his team too shattered to threaten at the SoL on Sunday …

Read more

A Sunderland farewell to Stoke City’s Man of Letters

by
From Stephen Foster's Guardian profile

No, we are not playing Stoke City this weekend. So Salut! Sunderland‘s questions and Stephen Foster‘s replies might seem out of time. They appear, however, as a tribute to a Stephen, a successful author who loved City with a passion that remained undiminished after life took him to London and then East Anglia. He died last week – read more here – robbing friends and family of a much-loved figure in their own lives, and Salut! Sunderland of a willing volunteer in future Who Are You? features; he had promised to participate each year – as long as we both stayed up. RIP Stephen …

Back in November last year, just after that mauling at St James’ Park, Sunderland had a must-win game coming up: lose to Stoke City after the 5-1 trouncing at Newcastle and alarm bells would not merely be sounding but exploding into a million fragments. And we were proud to have found Stephen Foster to handle the Who Are You? questionnaire ahead of the game at the Stadium of Light that we won 2-0 thanks to a pair of Gyan goals and some illegal but unspotted goal-line derring-do from Lee Cattermole. I’d told Stephen Stoke City was, for reasons I could not pinpoint, the toughest club from which to find willing candidates for the series. “I can’t understand your previous difficulties,” he told me, “most Stokies are proper gobs****s.”

See how his death has prompted a wonderful stream of condolences and tributes by visiting the Stoke fansite Oatcake, to which he occasionally contributed as “Winger”. This is how the Q&A with Salut! Sunderland ran, starting with the original introduction …

Read more

Stephen Foster RIP: supporter of Stoke, friend of Salut! Sunderland

by



Salut! Sunderland last heard from Stephen Foster, a richly talented man whose books on supporting Stoke City probably made him little or no money but stand as Hornby-standard classics of football writing, in January.

Two months earlier, Stephen had contributed an excellent set of answers to the Who are You? questionnaire for the Sunderland v Stoke City game. When I thanked him, he replied: “Make it an annual event, unless one of us goes down.”

Tragically, there won’t be an annual event. Stephen was found dead at the early age of 48, probably having drowned, at Trowse Meadow, Whitlingham Broad, not far from his Norwich home last Thursday. He had earlier been reported missing.

Read more

Another Gyan scare story, but don’t worry. It’s only Stoke City

by


Maybe one day, we shall be offering Alan Nixon of the Daily Mirror the same sort of “full, free, and absolute pardon” for Gyangate that his part namesake, Richard Milhous Nixon, received 37 years ago over Watergate.

For now, however, he must remain liable to impeachment.

Hot on the heels of his much-denied exclusive from yesterday, claiming an agent close to Sunderland AFC had circulated Asamoah Gyan’s name to other clubs as a player available for transfer, Alan N tells us Stoke City are – stand by for some hardcore footballspeak – “lining up a £10m raid … to test Sunderland’s resolve to keep Gyan”.

Read more

Birflatt Boy: can we have Stoke City’s squad back again?

by

Steve Bruce has been around football long enough to realise why people are calling for his head today. Some have been questioning his survival as manager for a little while. It goes without saying that anyone who disagrees- Martin in Canada? – should contact Salut! Sunderland, which will find room for the opposing view. But our shadily cantakerous Birflatt Boy is no mood to grant a reprieve. It is hard-hitting, maybe harsh stuff and M Salut would take issue here and there. But these are parlous times for SAFC; supporters now seeing yet another the season unravel can hardly be blamed for feeling aggrieved …

How many more nails to close this coffin?

Football managers can make some horrible decisions. Selling or buying players in transfer deals that should never have seen the light of day, dropping key men in vital games, getting tactics hopelessly wrong (if they ever had any tactics at all) and usually ringing up a series of poor results.

In our case, this combination of shortcomings and blunders has led to relegation on more occasions than people of a certain age can remember without wincing.

Read more

Darren Bent, the curse of the ‘calculated gamble’ and a Stoke ps

by


Missing your goals

At some stage this week, we need to stop banging on about how to apportion blame for an atrocious run that has taken Sunderland from the fringes of European competition to the bleak familiarity of a relegation scrap.

We need to get behind the team, whatever some may think about its leadership, and provide encouragement for the home game (nearly said vital but they all are, potentially, now) against Wigan Athletic.

As seems to be our lot, we will face newly emboldened opponents. The 3-1 win at Blackpool has Latics fans simpering at the prospect of survival, not least when they see our state of disarray. It also shows, ominously, that they can score goals.

Read more

Ha’way the Lasses – with apologies to Manchester, Stoke & Bolton Lads

by

Image: Women’s Football North East


Once again Salut! Sunderland has reason to salute the Sunderland Women’s Football team, victors in the FA Cup match that actually mattered …

The FA Cup semi-finals will be played between Manchester United and Manchester City, and Stoke City and Bolton Wanderers.

It has not escaped the attention of everyone that M Salut’s four semi-finalists, as nominated in a preview that appeared here on Saturday morning, were Arsenal, Reading, West Ham United and Birmingham City.

Read more

Cup wishlist: Man United, Man City out. Arsenal or Reading’s trophy

by

Bob Stokoe statue, Stadium of Light, SunderlandImage: Mrs Logic

Salut! Sunderland has absolutely nothing against the city of Manchester. We hold no grudges against Stoke or Bolton.

But choices have to be made. Sunderland’s humiliating exit at the earliest possible stage of the FA Cup means we have been able to pick our runners at will in subsequent rounds.

So to do our bit to restore interest in the ailing old competition, colours will now be nailed to the FA Cup mast.

Read more