The Stoketshirts.co.uk blog

It’s Christmas Eve 2011 and Stoke City have arguably had their best ever year. It’s something that I believe to be true, especially when comparing it to what we sometimes consider being halycon days of 1972, days of The League Cup Victory, European Football and a league finishing position of 17th out of 22 clubs. Hang on a minute, 17th!!! How memory distorts the thruth! Looking at the table back then I was surprised to discover that we only had 6 home and 4 away victories! (It was 2 points for a win and 1 for a draw back then).
Brian Clough’s Derby County had won the title with 58 points, one point more than Leeds United, Liverpool and Manchester City. United finished eighth while Huddersfield Town were relegated.

The main point of difference between now and then is the money that the club generates and how it compares to others. Back in the 70’s Stoke City shared gate receipts with other clubs both home and away.
Our average home attendance was 24,204, which was ranked 19th in the pre Premier League days of Division One. Even Leicester had the 15th highest average attendance with 28,536. So If we were playing the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea and the other clubs in the league, then we would take half of the gate money from the away fixture and give them half of the cash from our home games. This meant that clubs back then had a more evenly split balance on revenue raised and money they could spend as gate receipts were the primary source of income, meaning that the league was being played from a more even starting point in terms of finance. I know that the argument about the periphery sales of food, programmes, etc could make a difference but back then, in the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t a major factor.
Now in 2011 every club keeps it’s own gate money and the divide between the big and not so big clubs continues to grow. Last season we had an average gate of 26,858 which ranked 13th. highest in the Premier League. However, gate receipts are no longer the primary source of income for most clubs as television monies and off the field activities generate more money than attendances.

Whilst recognising the amount of investment that the Coates family have put into Stoke City I feel that the achievements of a F.A. Cup Final runners up place behind the richest team in the world, a final finishing position of 13th in the Premier League (and being on course to better that this season) and the achievement of a final 32 place in the Europa League put’s the managerial skills of Tony Pulis in a higher regard than those of Tony Waddington, given the difference in the landscape of football between 1972 and 2011.
This in my eyes makes Tony Pulis the best manager that Stoke City have ever had.
What do you think?

 

12 Days ‘fore Christmas

Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics.

“Can you hear them? Talking about us, telling lies – is that a surprise?”

So went the Fun Boy Three song back in 1983 and here in 2010 it’s an apt question for fans of Stoke City – given the unprecedented levels of scrutiny the club finds itself under as part of Football’s Top Flight.

This is especially so this season, when with only a handful of games played, there seem to be additional critics of our style of play joining the list of “usual suspects”. Step up Mark Hughes – soft-spoken Welshman, Manager of Fulham FC and a man not afraid to throw some weight around on the pitch in his playing days. Following Andy Wilkinson’s ill-timed tackle in the Carling Cup clash last week, Hughes was not shy in adding his name to a list of vocal critics that includes among others Arsene Wenger, Mick Dennis and our old favourite Adrian Durham of Talk Sport.

Granted, we live in a free country and anyone can say what they like, but with freedom comes responsibility – and that includes not selecting someone for enough criticism (rightly or wrongly) that they acquire a “reputation” that goes before them and potentially colouring the judgement of the public, fellow professionals and most importantly – match officials.

This drip-drip campaign of hate, combined with Arsene Wenger’s continued refusal to apologise for comments regarding the team as a whole and Ryan Shawcross in particular, has obviously irked Stoke Chairman Peter Coates enough for him to comment this week. In the local press he stated that he felt that referees were not giving Stoke “the rub of the green” because of continued stereotyping of the way Stoke plays – “We have a reputation for being a strong, physical team, but the media stereotypes teams.” Coates continues – “Arsene Wenger is always complaining and trying to influence officials, but the facts don’t bear him out.”, before citing some interesting statistics that reveal that the Potters and Gunners are not so far apart in the disciplinary tables. Indeed – Stoke are 14th, while Arsenal are 17th. Furthermore, Stoke have so far recived no red cards, while Arsene’s lily-white angels Laurent Koscielny and Alex Song have collected one a piece so far.
Oscar Wilde Once said “There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”. True enough, I suppose, as long as you are being talked about for the right reasons. It would be nice, for once, if the likes of Adrian Durham actually credited Stoke with a few positives from their two and a bit seasons in the Premier League. The usual criticisms of “The Longthrow”, “Physical style of play” as well as targetting of individual players such as Ryan Shawcross and Andy Wilkinson are getting tired and worn now. How about praising the club for being largely debt-free, British owned, encouraging players to get up and keep playing instead of feigning injury and diving for no reason? I could go on, but as we all know, commercial institutions like Talk Sport are cyncial and depend on “pushing buttons” with people to get phones ringing so their advertisement reps can wave the audience figures at clients.

It’s easy to say “Don’t listen to it” and “Don’t rise to it”, but as loyal fans of our club, many of us feel duty bound to defend it against perceived lies, fact-twisting and colouring of the truth – especially in the eyes and ears of the nation’s (and the world’s) other football fans – many of whom probably see Stoke City as a gatecrasher to the Premier League party, never mind being a top-flight regular back in the days when football was a different beast altogether.

At today’s press conference Tony Pulis was asked about how teams like Stoke & Blackburn are see through the media’s eyes. He responded saying ” Perception is massive – I don’t give a damn about what others say.” Well it is massive and as long as we are given a fair crack of the whip by officials involved in the game then it’s all well and good, but the evidence of recent games has not shown that. Matty Etherington’s honesty cost us a penalty at Newcastle, even though we went on to win the game, we could have and should have gone in at half time all level rather than a goal down. Let’s hope that officials see past the crap that is spouted about those Big Bad Boys called Stoke City and judge us on our merits.

If they don’t, then to quote another FunBoy Three song title – “The Lunatics Have Taken Over The Asylum”

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So, we are seven games in to the greatest sporting tournament on the universe – The 2010 World Cup.
My main disappointment is the lack of classic world cup haircuts so far, the entire Romanian team bleaching their hair in 1998 was a classic. The Ronaldo (fat Brazilian one not the winker) 2002 “Tuft” , the Alexi Lalas beard and long locks in 1994 and the Carlos Valderrama, Colombia “king of perms” are legendary,

The best effort so far has to be from the Bela Lugosi lookalike referee (Carlos Simon) of the England vs. USA game last night who looked like he had mopped up the majority of the BP oil slick with his hair.

Best name in the tournament so far has to be South Afica’s goal scorer Tshabalala which when pronounced properly sounds like the commentator is singing. Talking of commentary the one game I wouldn’t envious of having to commentate on is the South Korea vs Greece game. Some true tongue twisters in that game including the Greeks Patsatzoglou (Pat sat zoo glue?), Papastathopoulos (Papa stat tho po lus?) and the South Koreans having 7 Kims, 6 Lees and a Ho.

Some candidates for Villain of the week are:-

Robert Green – No explanation required!!

James Corden’s World Cup show was awful despite having the world’s greatest ever goalkeeper on it.
Katie Perry and Simon Cowell as guests with our world cup legend Banks of England parked on a sofa miles away was truly ridiculous. Corden should have ripped into Perry who apparently was wearing an “England/ USA dress” – No it wasn’t, it was the Union Flag and the Stars and Stripes- England’s flag is the Cross of St. George.
Cowell’s smugness was exposed when he mentioned exactly the same fact that Corden had some two minutes earlier “England’s opening game in 1966 was a draw and look how we did then”, a near embarrassed Gordon Banks politely responded to him as if to say, I’ve only just been asked this by that other clown!

It was that bad that I had to switch it off after 15 minutes. The TFI Friday format has been done very well by Chris Evans and this poor repeat should be quickly consigned to history. Bring back Fantasy Football with Skinner and Baddiel.

My villain of the week is the joke that is ITV HD who ruined my viewing last night a few minutes in. They actually showed an advertisement for a cheap crappy car as England went on the attack. I grabbed the remote to switch the coverage to ITV (non HD) to see Stevie G wheeling away in celebration. I was gobsmacked. We wait 4 years for this great moment, an England goal in the World Cup and ITV HD totally screw it up. They should have their coverage switched to the bbc for one game, they do have previous on this when covering a Liverpool European game earlier in the season. The BBC are the real thing when it comes to coverage of football, like china produced in Stoke – on – Trent, home of the Potteries. Everything else is a poor second best.
I have just seen this viral of how ITV would have covered the 1966 World Cup Final
ITV does the 1966 World Cup? – thanks to @hinge832 via @jasonmanford on twitter

Let us know who your heroes and villians of the World Cup 2010 are by leaving a comment.

PS Happy 12th. Birthday to the BBC’s Match of the Day Pundit Alan Hansen. It’s 12 years since Scotland have been involved in a World Cup, that’s surely worth a celebration for all England fans.

 

The Artbay in Fenton is holding a “Spirit of ’66” exhibition which runs from May 22nd. to May 29th.
The exhibition is to celebrate the incredible feeling of togetherness, which comes along for every major football tournament.

Gordon Banks will be creating a piece of Art very shortly at the Artbay and this piece will be auctioned for his Safe Hands charity fund which, over the last 10 years, has raised more than £150,000 for sick children at the University Hospital of North Staffordshire.

He will also be involved in judging and presenting the winners of a children’s art competition that is being organised to coincide with exhibition.

Under-16s are being asked to produce a piece of artwork reflecting the feeling of camaraderie, charity and goodwill surrounding international sporting tournaments.

A shortlist of 10 entries will be framed and put on display in the gallery and all the young artists will be invited to meet Gordon at the gallery on Friday, May 28.

Closing date for the exhibition is Friday May 21st.

A panel of judges including local artists and Gordon will then choose a winner who will receive a prize of a perspex/acrylic print of their work worth £300.

More info here

http://www.thisisstaffordshire.co.uk/new….il/article.html
and here
http://www.creativestoke.co.uk/80430/info.php?p=3

All submitted pieces will be available to view throughout the week-long exhibition in binders.

10 winners will have their pieces framed and shown alongside the other exhibitors’ works and will be invited, with a guest, to the gallery on Friday 28th May to meet Gordon Banks and receive their prize. One, overall winner will be announced on the night and will receive the top prize of a perspex print of their artwork signed by Gordon.

Requirements. Artist must be aged 16 or under. The size of the submitted work must be A3. There are no restrictions on media. Entries will be judged on the degree to which the artist has captured “The Spirit of ’66” in his/her piece and the artistic quality of his/her piece, commensurate with age. All pieces must be received by the gallery no later than Friday 21st of May. The judging panel’s decisions are final.

This got me thinking (which as you may know is dangerous). Gordon Banks football career finished in the mid 70’s. During the next few years did Gordon study art?

The prominence of an artist, who has managed to rise to fame while keeping his identity hidden is goes under the name of Banksy!!

 

Our depiction of Gordon is shown below and this was proudly modelled by the great man himself.

 

It’s the mural, made up of lots of pictures of Stoke Fans, to form an image of Sir Stanley Matthews. The project is the result of “proud to be a potter”  see link here http://www.proudtobeapotter.com/

A story promoting the idea from the official website is here http://www.stokecityfc.com/page/NewsDetail/0,,10310~1945264,00.html

Two pictures from the website that I picked up on are  below

I must say it’s very impressive and can be seen from quite a distance away. It definitely adds to the ground.

It’s the first of two, I guess the other will go on the the twin column near the club shop.

Our own tribute to the Wizard of the Dribble is our “God is 7” T shirt.

 For every shirt sold we make a donation to the great cause The Sir Stanley Matthews Foundation www.ssmf.co.uk

Another day at the Britannia and another prima donna referee. Stoke City versus Tottenham Hotspurs saw Mike Dean hit the headlines.
There’s an old saying that goes “be seen and not heard” and too many of today’s Premier League officials really take that to heart.
They love to think we have paid our hard earned cash to watch them. Mike Dean is another one of the Rob Styles, Graham Poll school who think it’s their stage.
He thinks it’s the “Mike Dean Show”, especially with his over exhuberant gestures – what a prize tosser.
No doubt he’ll go back to the referee’s club and re-live the story of how he robbe Stoke again to his buddies.
As they get nearer the end of their career they get more controversial as it makes them more attractive to media companies.
I don’t know about you but I hate listening to Poll when he’s on 5live and often switch it off. He talks as if he has a “holier than thou” attitude.

As for the sending off, then I don’t think Whitehead should have given him the opportunity. Both “tackles” were careless and in areas of the pitch when a pressing obstruction would have been a wiser choice. A player of his experience should be making better choices and I guess that Tony Pulis, while being supportive of the player in public, will have a few words in private.

To close I think that referees should switch the earlier saying around and have the attitude that they should be heard and not seen (On the pitch and not in the media!).

With Stoke about to set to the field against Harry’s Spurs I recalled a connection about Super Dave Kitson being a Tottenham fan. I read an old piece from his Reading days about DK worshipping Spurs and Glen Hoddle.

This cutting from it shows his real empathy for football fans.
“Kitson makes no bones about his love for all things Spurs.
He said: “I make no secret of it and why should I? I think it is sad to be a footballer and not be a fan. It is almost a sin.
“There are players who just don’t see how football affects people and can’t remove themselves enough to see the impact they have. It is such a huge part of our culture.
“I am a fan and it matters to me whether Tottenham win. And it matters to my family. If Spurs lose, the week is a non-starter.”

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-505036/Kitson-aiming-rock-Spurs-idols.html#ixzz0iheJ1W9S

Also another interesting piece here
From Tavern to Tottenham via Sainsbury’s on the Dave Kitson road to stardom

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/reading/article3105540.ece

He has scored previously against Tottenham, If he gets a start today let’s hope he can pull off the same trick in red and white stripes.

Having a scout through the internet I discovered a site that made me smile. It’s called http://www.super-subs.co.uk/ and is nowt to do with substitutes.

The site uses Subbuteo figures to re-create famous moments in the glorious game.

Now being of a certain age, I was bought up on Subbuteo and possessed a Stoke City team that was proudly purchased from the Bratt & Dyke (how would this name fair 30 years on?) store up Hanley Duck.

I also bought the set of stick on numbers that were a pain in the arse to get to stay on the players backs.
They regularly trounced the opposition that were the teams that came with the set, (plain red tops and plain blue tops as per picture below) Liverpool, Everton, Manchester United, Chelsea or even Carlisle! I must admit that playing my brother who was 4 years younger than me helped me rack up double figure scores against these also rans!

I also can remember swopping the number 5 around after my Mum trood on on the Stoke team. With a bit of glue from the Airfix kits, the plastic casualty was christened Denis Smith. Somehow the glue never seemed to set properly and Den would spend time in the Airfix Box treatment room with either a red or blue sub taking his place.

Now the reason I choose to support Stoke City isn’t because I possessed the Subbuteo team, unlike Scotland Rugby boss Andy Robinson! Not a lot of people know that a young Mr. Robinson chose Stoke because his set had the team with it, while his brother supported Man. City (I think!). Strange what magic the “flick to kick” game can bring to people’s lives isn’t it?

Anyway, enough of my ramblings, and back to the website.
As I was saying, it recreates famous moments in football with pictures of subbuteo players.
These include, the Maradona, Peter Shilton “Hand of God” incident (pictured below), Terry Butcher’s England bandage moment (very Andy Wilkinson), Frank “spit the dog” Rikjaard, Roger Milla – corner flag and the ZZ butt. My favourite is the Vinny Jones/ Paul Gascoigne “cough” moment.
The others can be seen on the site here:- http://www.super-subs.co.uk/

This got me thinking!

What famous Stoke City moments could be recreated with Subbuteo figures?

Oulare’s Arse? Eastham’s Goal? Rory’s Longthrow? The Promotion Pitch Invasion?
Your thoughts and Subbuteo reminiscence’s please!

Does anyone have a replica Boothen End? 🙂