Let’s start by looking back to what you wrote on goalfood last spring just as promotion was about to be secured...
“Our promotion to the Premier League... represents the biggest opportunity for the ‘lost generation’ to actually reclaim their love for their local football team. A generation that has been raised on false dawns, empty promises, shattered dreams, and the sound of their city and football club being roundly hammered by the unknowing and the ill-informed...gaining promotion is not for me about watching my football club at Anfield, Old Trafford etc....What I want is for the pitches, parkland and PE changing rooms of my city to be full of the colours of both its football teams. I want this generation to have a true identity about where they live and what it stands for and not to take the soft and easy option of having Fly Emirates or AIG on their chest...”
So...
Hand on heart, when the 08-09 season kicked off, how did you really rate your chances of finishing 17th, never mind higher?
To be honest, I would say, hand on heart, most Stokies’ first concern was avoiding ‘doing a Derby’. I was pretty sure the team had a lot more fight and bottle than the sheep-worriers had shown, but I remember sitting in the pub at our first home game and categorically saying we’d go down with around 25 points.
What shocked me was the complete averageness and lack of style of most of the teams in the top flight. Perhaps I had been sucked-in by the whole media hype that surrounds the Premiership, but at the start of the season I could see us getting nailed more regularly than even the most desperate of whores.
By Christmas, most Stokies realised that with a fair wind behind us, we could survive. In the end we did. Easily. But then again, we’re not West Brom. Thankfully.
Any watershed moments you can point to and say “that’s when (a) fans and (b) players really began to believe you would stay up”?
Well, we started the season on plus 6 anyway, as we had to play West Brom twice. Where we get those points from this season is the conundrum we now face (“Bunny? It’s Phil Brown here...” – Ed). As a support we started out wanting just to enjoy our ten months in the spotlight, but it did help when we beat Villa in our first home game and in the 94th minute too. The week before bookmaker Paddy Power had acted like a plum in paying up on bets that had us relegated. If I see PP in the future I’l buy the bloke a beer – then regurgitate it up all over him, of course!
We continued to be strong at home, but for me the pivotal game was Man City at home. Until then our support had been nothing more than superb, but that day we reached another level, and one I don’t think was surpassed anywhere in this country last (or any other) season.
At the end of January we were second bottom, although it was as tight down there as Lise Riley’s hotpants. In truth, for 40 minutes Citeh were the better team, albeit in a dreadful game going nowhere. There had already been some ‘jovial’ ribbing of Robinho’s night out in Leeds that week from the Britannia stands, but it was what happened in the 37th minute that really lit the red and white touch paper.
Wright-Phillips, once again impersonating the most over-rated footballer in Europe, produced a quite shocking tackle and in the usual handbags our human-sling Rory Delap was (rightly) red-carded. The sense of injustice that SW-P had not followed Delap down the tunnel resulted in the loudest booing and whistling I have heard in 34 years of watching football.
Indeed, many have commentated just how scary it actually was. You often hear the “couldn’t hear myself think” line trotted out by nogger fans, but this was literally a human wall of shrilled, violent noise that resulted in both Wayne Bridge and the aforementioned Wright-Phillips saying that their game had been literally “put-off” by the ferociousness and sheer hostility emanating from 3 and a half sides of the Brit.
On days like that it is always written in the gods that you’ll sneak a win in a Rorkes’ Drift-style performance. We did, 1-0 with Beattie scoring a beaut to send us wild. The whole of the UK media mentioned that we had the two things that Man City’s billions couldn’t buy: a team spirit forged in pottery and laced with steel, and a crowd that was not just the 12th man, but all the way up to the 25,500th man.
The sheer quality of our support was a huge factor in stopping up, I am convinced of that. Nearly every visiting manager, from the Champions’ Ferguson to the Championship’s Shearer (sorry, couldn’t resist) all paid homage to decibels reached at the Britannia Stadium.
Problem is, I don’t think it will ever get better than that day in January 2009.
Can you explain the contrast in home & away fortunes?
The answer to the above will go a long way to answering this one. The team and support forged a bond so tight, that opposing teams were treated as invading enemy armies whom had dared to set foot in ST4. Ok, that’s more than a bit over-melodramatic, but anyone who came to Stoke last year would back it up. When you are told that you make a difference on a fortnightly basis, you kind of feel it’s your duty to reach and better your standards.
As a team, we were far more suited to the narrow-pitch and open-to-the-elements nature of the Brit. We also lack that one special commodity that all really good teams have – pace. So we play a narrow, pressing game, but we are far from the monsters or new-Wimbledon that some folk have tagged us. Indeed, those who slate us are then seen a few minutes later, getting on the away team bus after their bunch of over-paid prima-donnas has just had their sorry arses kicked. Correct, Mr Wenger?
Away from home, a lack of pace and inability to retain possession saw us laid bare to those with more footballing ability than us. But don’t let easy stereotypes get in the way of the truth: we play the game no differently than many teams in the top division. Only a couple of teams came to the Brit and really looked a class apart from us, whilst the show ponies from Liverpool couldn’t score past us in 180 minutes. Stoke can play football, but our first priority is to play to our squad’s strengths.
The Fuller / Griffin incident – pivotal & influential on the development of your season...or storm in a media tea cup?
On the night of the West Ham game, many Stoke fans wanted Fuller hung, drawn and quartered for the incident. Listen, I’ll lay my cards on the table – for me, Fuller is the best striker I’ve seen in a lifetime of watching Stoke. A player that puts a spring in your step as you trudge through the wind and rain up to the Brit.
Whilst a line had been crossed with the incident, it was purely a bitch-slap at best, and if Ricardo had been dropped/listed, then we would have gone down. The bloke is amongst the very best strikers in the Premiership. Some will have raised an eyebrow or two at that comment (just the one if you’re from Crewe, obviously), but please take a look at his goals-to-minutes-on-the-pitch ratio, and also have a look at the world class defenders the bloke puts on their arses. Regularly.
At the start of the season I had a five year old lad who hated football <insert Stoke joke here>. By May, he had posters of Ricardo Fuller covering his walls, a Fuller Legend (Bob Marley homage) t-shirt and a picture of him being hugged with the great man is on my phone. Fuller’s single-handedly got my lad loving Stoke City and football.
He could French kiss the queen whilst rubbing a cheese-grater over his privates for all I care – the man’s a legend.
Key players last season...and next? Who’s out, and who might be in? (presumably not Ricardo Carvalho, whom we notice one hopeful fan described as “worth a punt” on one of your messageboards...)
You might have noted my appreciation of Ricardo Fuller before? But the best defender outside the top four bar-none was Abdoulaye Faye. A two million buy from Newcastle (it gets better, doesn’t it??!!) who was at worst 8/10 every single game. As in the words of Electronic…”We’ve got Abdoulaye Faye he’s our brick wall, built like a sh**house, six feet tall”. But the lad can play as well. I’ll stop in case any cash-rich/common sense-poor chairmen are reading this.
In fairness, the team is such a close-knit bunch that all deserve the plaudits, but the above pair were exceptional.
At the moment it seems that Dean Ashton might be coming in, but we need a top class central midfielder quickly. We struggle to retain possession, especially away from home, so that and a bit of pace would be nice. (that Etherington’s always looked a bit pacy to me... – Ed)
Will Tony Pulis need a Plan B for next season...and if so, do you think he has one?
There are many Stoke fans who still feel that TP only has a plan A, but saying that it did alright for us last season. Perhaps Tony Moanbray would like to purchase it?
The problem we now have is this: to build on what we have done we need better quality, there’s no doubt about that. But do we negate the strength of character and spirit we have in the dressing room by making big singings, and do we gamble on results by buying better footballers than we currently have and changing our playing style?
I expect TP to play it similar to last season, but just add one or two key players to the first team. We have a sound-enough defence with a competent keeper behind them. In Fuller and Beattie we have an excellent front pair, with Sidibe being an impact battering ram as 3rd choice striker.
Where we lack is in central midfield, where we have artisans rather than artists. But TP likes players who “put a shift in and work ‘aaaaaard”. Expect us to be slightly better away from home and slightly worse at home next year.
In no more than 20 words, please complete the following sentence: “There’s far more to Stoke City than Rory Delap’s long throw...”
…..unless you are a know-nothing weapon who likes to cling brainlessly on to stereotypes written by know-nothing weapons.
Your chairman Mr. Coates seems to keep a relatively low profile by Premiership standards...please give us a fan’s eye view on his stewardship
Hated in his first tenure, feted in his second.
Realistic hopes for 09-10?
a) a pair of Adidas Kegler Supreme to be re-issued b) The roof is taken off the Brit so it becomes even more primitive c) The missus buys some better nightwear d) Ricardo Fuller wins Footballer of the Year and slaps whoever hands him the trophy e) a decent cup run and we stay up.
If you stay up again...can you see the club becoming seriously established in the Prem?
I love how the city has embraced our top flight status and I love how kids are wearing OUR strip around the city. Local kids are now talking about our players being on Sky Sports News and we have a new sense of civic pride in our city.
But for all the Match Attax cards, regular features on Football Focus, Soccer AM (unfortunately) and SSN etc, I still kinds miss those days on the grass bank at Springfield Park or getting soaked at the Abbey Stadium. A true test of any football fan is when it goes wrong. I’d like to think that the newer members of our congregation would stick with us come what may, but if they don’t I’ll still be walking to the Brit with my old man and my mates, supporting Stoke City.
Because supporting YOUR team is one of the greatest pleasures known to man. That won’t ever stop for me.
