When the Circus Leaves Town: What Happens When Football Leaves Home

By David Proudlove

What happens when a football club ups sticks and leaves its traditional home for pastures new? What replaces the terraces, stands and floodlights that tower above old town centres and terraced streets? How does football relate to the new landscapes that the clubs head to? What happens when football leaves home? When the Circus Leaves Town: What Happens When Football Leaves Home explores the impact of the ruptures created when clubs and supporters wave goodbye to their homes. It examines disruption to matchday routines, erasure of geographic memories and the difficulties in repairing these, and considers whether such moves have been for better or worse. Writer Dave Proudlove walks the streets of towns and cities across the country visiting housing estates, retail parks and shiny new stadiums. He talks to those involved with the relocation of football clubs - club officials, developers, politicians, fans - to understand the reasons behind the upheaval, and to bring us the full story of what happens when football leaves home.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Sep 19, 2022
• ISBN: 9781801503327

Book preview

Introduction

‘The social spaces of distraction and display become as vital to urban culture as the spaces of working and living’

David Harvey

FOR MOST of my life, I’ve had an interest in buildings, architecture and places, maps and plans. And I’ve always had a bit of an obsession with football grounds and the social environment that sustains them. All of this has come together with this book.

My first experience of a football ground was my first trip to see Stoke City play at the old Victoria Ground. It was the second leg of a League Cup tie with Manchester City. I was five years old, and it was a school night, 28 October 1981. Stoke won 2-0 on the night but went out on penalties having lost the first leg 2-0. I remember very little of the game, but the atmosphere – the sights, the sounds, the noise, the smells – filled up my senses and will stay with me forever. This was the mysterious place called ‘Stoke’ that Dad disappeared to, and I had become a part of it.

That Christmas, I received what became one of my favourite gifts of my childhood, Casdon’s Kenny Dalglish Soccer Game, which Dad and I played to death. I was also into Lego in a big way, and I ended up combining the two: I built a football stadium around the Kenny Dalglish game which was my first venture into development and construction.

The following season – 1982/83 – was my first real season, and a very good Stoke City team played some wonderful football which helped me to fall in love with the game. I was hooked and began to devour books and old copies of Dad’s Football Weekly and collect Panini football stickers, and I continued to go to watch Stoke City with Dad.

Towards the end of the 1980s, I began to go to the occasional away game – my first was a 1-1 draw at West Bromwich Albion, one of the oldest fixtures in English football – and I enjoyed seeing and experiencing other football grounds in other places greatly.

One of the grounds that I was most looking forward to visiting was Anfield. Old footage of the Kop – that huge old terrace, home to a swaying mass of humanity, often singing Beatles songs – captured my imagination, and although my trips there turned out to be disappointments, it has always been a ground that is up there with my favourites.

The night that I attended my first ever game, Dad promised me that one day he’d take me to Wembley to see Stoke City play. He kept that promise when we beat Stockport County 1-0 in the 1992 Autoglass Trophy Final. But that wasn’t my first trip to Wembley. I’d been on five previous occasions to watch England schoolboy internationals, but, of course, it was nothing like seeing my own team play there and win. While a trip to Wembley was always going to be special, I actually thought that the old place was a bit overrated. Mind you, I also think that the modern iteration is overrated too.

***

Everything changed on 15 April 1989. It was a warm, sunny, early spring day. Stoke were away to Bournemouth; Dad and I weren’t planning to travel to the south coast for that one. And it was also FA Cup semi-finals day: Everton were facing Norwich City at Villa Park, and Liverpool and Nottingham Forest were meeting at Hillsborough.

By 5pm, Stoke had recorded a rare away win, beating the Cherries 1-0 thanks to a goal from the late, great Paul Ware. Everton had beaten Norwich 1-0 to reach the FA Cup Final. But none of it mattered. Everything paled into insignificance given the news that was coming from Hillsborough: a large-scale crush involving Liverpool supporters had left hundreds injured, while there was an ever-increasing death toll.

Dad and I drove the 15 minutes to my grandmother’s house in silence. This isn’t a revision of history; I remember it like it was yesterday. Dad was a happy-go-lucky person, who loved nothing more than a good chinwag and a good laugh. When he was quiet, it was because there was something wrong, something that had affected him. During that short drive, he was deep in thought, and he didn’t say a word. The journey seemed to take forever.

Ninety-seven supporters eventually died as a direct result of the crush, while a large number of others passed away indirectly, and hundreds more were left traumatised. It was the biggest disaster in British football history. And if that wasn’t bad enough, it led to the biggest cover-up in our country’s long history, with the Establishment via the South Yorkshire and West Midlands Police forces, the Thatcher government, and The Sun collaborating in a plot to blame Liverpool supporters for the disaster. Thus began an ongoing fight for justice, a fight that still continues to this day.

Despite the findings of the Hillsborough Independent Panel and the reopened inquests, which made clear where responsibility for the disaster lay, no one has ever been prosecuted for the identified failings. It’s a national disgrace.

Most football supporters empathised with Liverpool Football Club and all of those affected by the Hillsborough disaster, including everyone from Nottingham Forest, and still do. And it’s not virtue signalling to do so. Football supporters were one of Thatcher’s ‘enemies within’, and with the state of football grounds back then and the way that football supporters were often treated, it could have happened to any of us. Indeed, just a couple of months prior to the Hillsborough disaster, my club, Stoke City, faced Barnsley in the fourth round of the FA Cup. After a thrilling 3-3 draw at the Victoria Ground, we travelled to Barnsley three days later for the replay. We took a big following to Oakwell, and a section of our support was caught up in a crush outside the ground, and the South Yorkshire Police force didn’t handle things well. Coincidence?

Lord Justice Taylor was commissioned to carry out a report into the disaster at Hillsborough, and an interim report was published just a few months later in August 1989, with the final report issued in January 1990.

Taylor found that the main cause of the disaster was a major failure of police control, and completely exonerated Liverpool supporters of any blame. Although the report found that standing at football matches was not intrinsically unsafe, it recommended the conversion of major stadiums to all-seater models. The Football League responded by introducing regulations that required all clubs within the top two divisions to have all-seater stadiums by August 1994, though this was relaxed slightly when clubs were intending to move.

The Taylor Report and the decision of the Football League triggered some of the biggest changes ever seen in English football. A new generation of stadiums rose, with clubs big and small and in all parts of the country choosing to leave long-standing traditional homes for the brave new world of purpose-built all-seater stadiums in – predominantly – out-of-town locations. Since that fateful day in April 1989, more than 30 clubs have moved on to pastures new – with more planning to do so – creating a physical legacy from the disaster.

But the Taylor Report is only one part of the story. That, combined with the birth of the Premier League and Sky TV’s ‘whole new ball game’, led to the rampant gentrification of what was previously – in the main – a working-class pursuit. Over time, my comprehension of what had happened changed, and I now recognise that what we have witnessed is the ultimate neo-liberal project.

And at the same time, I began to understand that football grounds weren’t simply places where people went to watch the game. They were social spaces, places where connections were made. They were drivers of local economies, working-class theatres. And they were spiritual places and became part of one’s persona in some respects. Is this still the case? Are they still the ‘folk cathedrals of modern Britain’ as John Bale described them? Or are the newer stadia simply places where financial transactions take place?

One of the clubs that chose to move is Manchester City. Having been established in Gorton in east Manchester in 1880, the club moved to Maine Road in Moss Side in 1923, but in the early 2000s were persuaded to return to east Manchester and the City of Manchester Stadium.

And the roots of this book can be found in Maine Road’s redevelopment. While working for the former housing and regeneration body, the Homes and Communities Agency, I got to work on Maine Road, and I got to thinking that the relocation of football clubs and what happens when they move would make great subject matter for a book. Fortunately, Pitch Publishing agreed.

The book isn’t just about new football stadiums per se, though they are very important to the story, of course. It’s also about the impact of the relocation of what are important local institutions on the places in which they are located: the emotional impact and changes to routines and experiences; the social impact; the environmental impact; and the economic impact. And along the way, we have also seen the loss of a lot of the Archibald Leitch legacy. The first generation of football grounds rose from the 1880s until 1923, when Maine Road and the original Wembley were built, and Leitch had his fingerprints over many of them, be it the building of stands, or in some cases the whole shebang. Much of this has now disappeared.

And so I made 20-odd road trips – well, mainly rail – across the North, the Midlands, the South, and South Wales. And it wasn’t easy. The book was researched and written at the height of a global pandemic, and so getting around was a bit of a pain, disrupted by restrictions and the various lockdowns; I didn’t break any rules though, Prime Minister.

On a few of the trips, I had companions.

Stephen Stoney, once my boss, and now a good friend, joined me on trips to Yorkshire – his manor – and the Midlands. His pearls of wisdom and knowledge of both patches were a great help to me, and I am very grateful to him.

And then there was Karl Francis Connolly, who sadly passed away while I was writing the book, at the tragically young age of 53. I was in a meeting with Karl regarding the old ABC cinema on Liverpool’s Lime Street when Pitch Publishing informed me that they wanted to take the book. Karl visited Manchester and Shrewsbury with me, and I will always associate him with When the Circus Leaves Town. I miss him terribly.

Of the places I visited, I greatly enjoyed my trip to the North East – Sunderland and Middlesbrough – and two of the first post-Taylor Report stadiums. I can also say the same for Huddersfield with Stephen, and our excursions to Marsden and Stalybridge on our way back. Bolton’s Reebok Stadium is quite possibly my favourite of the generation of new stadiums; it’s a thing of real beauty. But as a whole – the new stadium and redevelopment of the old place – the best that I’ve seen is Arsenal’s: the Emirates and Highbury Square are magnificent, though Highbury Square is possibly too gentrified for my liking.

Obviously I began my journey in Stoke and looked at the relocation of my club – Stoke City – before heading north, coming back south to the Midlands, and then moving on to southern England and South Wales. I concluded matters in Liverpool, having a look at Everton’s progress with Bramley-Moore Dock. I should also add that when referring to the new stadiums, I use their original names; for example, the Reebok Stadium as opposed to the University of Bolton Stadium.

So here we go. Next stop, Stoke-on-Trent.

Prologue: Home

‘The stadium is caught somewhere between spectacle and social condenser: this is its potential and its tragedy’

Tom Wilkinson

HOME. THAT word is central to our very existence as a species, and though it has various meanings depending on context, it always comes back to the same thing: home is a place where we make human connections, where we belong. Without those connections and that belonging, we are nothing; a house on its own is not a home, it’s just a pile of bricks.

Let’s take a look at the various definitions of home … ‘the place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household’ … ‘an institution for people needing professional care or supervision’ (more on this below) … ‘played at the team’s own ground’ (definitely more on this below). All of those have human connection and belonging at their heart. Home is a spiritual thing; it’s about the soul.

When it comes to home – or ‘wom’, in Potteries speak – I’ve been a bit of a vagrant over the past decade or so, flitting from the Potteries to Stockport to Crewe, and then back to the Potteries again. I’ve gotten around a bit for a myriad of reasons; life has had its ups and downs, let’s say.

But although there has been plenty of personal upheaval, there has been one constant, and that is Stoke City Football Club. Indeed, while working in Manchester, I was known to one or two colleagues simply as ‘Stoke’, because of my place of birth and footballing allegiance. Football and the Potters have always provided me with an identity, and a bit of stability, for good or ill.

And it came from my dad, a unique but common theme. A friend of mine always had a strained relationship with his dad, but the one thing that they shared and which provided a bond was their love of Preston North End. My dad and I had that bond too and, for 16 years, we went to watch Stoke City together at the club’s historic spiritual home, the Victoria Ground.

The Dalai Lama said, ‘Home is where you feel at home and are treated well.’ That basically sums up the Victoria Ground and me. Surrounded by people that were like my family and I, in a place – in this case, the Boothen End – where I felt safe, warm and alive. Home. A place where I wasn’t just a face in the crowd.

And as the club closes in on its 25th anniversary at the Britannia Stadium, I still see the Victoria Ground as home – in a footballing sense – even though it doesn’t exist anymore.

***

Stoke Football Club – as it was known originally – was formed in 1863 by railway workers, or 1868 if some historians are to be believed, and originally played their football at various locations around the town, including the site of what is now the Southern Graveyard off Lonsdale Street – before it was a graveyard, of course – and at the old County Cricket Ground which was located behind the North Stafford Hotel opposite the city’s main railway station, and which now forms part of Staffordshire University’s Stoke campus.

In 1878, the club merged with the Stoke Victoria Athletic Club, and subsequently moved on again to the Athletic Ground which was laid out on glebe land adjacent to what was to become the Victoria Ground. The move to the Victoria Ground arose in 1883 when the church sold the Athletic Ground to developers who built a series of terraced streets, which still stand today. The club didn’t have to move very far though, and after more than a decade of vagrancy the Victoria Ground, as they named it, became their permanent home, named after the Victoria public house across the street and not the monarch, as many people have assumed. The ground’s original layout was quite basic, and included banking on three sides, and a 1,000-seat stand on the Boothen Old Road side. It also included a running track for the club’s athletics section.

Football was first played at the Victoria Ground on 24 September 1883, a game in which the club first wore its famous red and white stripes. Five years later, Stoke Football Club made history and became a founder member of the Football League.

During the early years of the Football League, the club experienced a number of ups and downs, dropping out of the league in 1890 but returning within 12 months. However, this did not stop them developing the Victoria Ground, building a small pavilion and dressing rooms – over which was a viewing balcony for club officials – at the end of the Main Stand, described by football historian and stadium obsessive Simon Inglis as ‘a humbler Craven Cottage’, in reference to Fulham’s tidy home alongside the Thames.

The next stage in the evolution of the Victoria Ground came in 1904 when a full-length roof was erected on the Butler Street side of the ground, which provided cover for 12,000 spectators at a cost of £2,000. However, this investment in the club’s facilities didn’t pay dividends, something which was to become a recurring theme. By 1908, the club had been relegated to the Second Division, and with debts of more than £1,000, the board took the decision to resign from the Football League and place the club into liquidation.

Following an appeal led by former Football League secretary and local printer Harry Lockett, a new limited company was formed after a strong response from the local community. But this wasn’t enough to preserve Stoke’s league status, and the club were consigned to non-league football for a decade, finally returning to the Football League in 1919.

The club were promoted to the First Division in 1921, and this gave them the confidence to invest in a new Main Stand seating 2,000 people. But once again, relegation quickly followed, consigning the club to a three-year spell in the Second Division, during which time they added ‘City’ to their name after the six pottery towns were federated as the city of Stoke-on-Trent. Their spell in the second tier came to an end in 1926, but not in the way they would’ve hoped: Stoke City Football Club found themselves relegated to the Third Division.

However, they bounced back quickly, and a couple of years after returning to the Second Division the club took the decision to remove the athletics track from the Victoria Ground, thus enabling them to create the Boothen End terrace, which was to become the most popular part of the ground; the home end.

By the mid-1930s, Stoke City had returned to the top flight of English football, and were drawing in crowds of 20,000–30,000, while a young local right-winger was exciting supporters. That young winger was Stanley Matthews, who was born just up the road in nearby Hanley.

And it was during this period of exuberance that the club took the decision to build a new stand on the Butler Street side of the ground, which included 5,000 seats and a paddock with a capacity of 2,000, with a barrel-vaulted roof. A bridge was also constructed over the River Trent which ran to the rear of the Butler Street side, which provided access to the club’s training facilities. Twelve months later, further works were carried out, which included concreting the Town End and the Boothen End, raising the Victoria Ground’s capacity to 50,000. The following March, the ground recorded its record attendance, when 51,380 turned up for a First Division clash with Arsenal and were treated to a riveting goalless draw.

It was almost 20 years until the club undertook any further serious investment, when floodlights were finally erected. By now, the Potters once again found themselves in the Second Division, just a decade after almost winning the First Division title under Bob McGrory, and the new floodlights were first used for a Potteries derby with neighbours Port Vale.

As well as a prolonged spell outside the First Division, one of the club’s biggest concerns was the condition of the Main Stand which was in a state of permanent decline, and by the dawn of the Sixties they could no longer afford to delay replacing the stand, despite being in the Second Division.

The new stand was built in three phases over a three-year period and was completed as the club were on the verge of returning to the top flight and saw the demolition of the old Fulham-esque pavilion. This was replaced with a gym, and a balcony for club officials and guests, with the changing rooms relocated in the new stand.

And thus began the club’s pre-Premier League glory years under the astute and inspirational management of Tony Waddington, as they re-established themselves as a First Division club, reached two League Cup finals – winning one, beating Chelsea 2-1 at Wembley, the club’s only major honour – played European football, lifted the Watney Cup, and went very close to winning the title during the 1974/75 season, a campaign disrupted by broken legs for four key players, and numerous other injuries.

But this golden era was brought to an abrupt end in January 1976 when a post-Christmas storm tore the roof from the Butler Street Stand. It subsequently transpired that the club’s insurance policy did not cover all of the damage, meaning a fire sale of some of the better players to fund a new roof, which was completed during that year’s famous long, hot summer. As a result, the Potters went into decline on the pitch, and with the club heading for relegation in March 1977 the long-serving Tony Waddington departed.

As the 1970s drew to a close, Stoke were back in the First Division, after winning promotion under Alan Durban, and the Town End was redeveloped, the old banking cleared to make way for a modern-looking two-tiered stand, with 4,000 seats on the top tier and a terrace beneath. The building of the new Stoke End, as it became known, also necessitated the replacement of two floodlight pylons with a different type of lights.

The club’s next spell in the First Division didn’t last too long, and by the mid-1980s, they were heading back into the second tier after a season (1984/85) that broke all sorts of records for the wrong reasons. Many supporters feared that they would plunge all the way down to the Fourth Division – something that old rivals Wolves managed – and gates began to fall dramatically.

However, former England captain Mick Mills joined the club as player-manager, and provided some stability, and at one point, it looked as though promotion back to the First Division may be on the cards. Sadly, things began to stagnate towards the end of the decade, but it didn’t prevent the club’s last major investment in the Victoria Ground, with the creation of a series of executive suites at the back of the Butler Street Stand, and a new corporate entrance.

On 15 April 1989, Stoke City were away to Bournemouth where they won 1-0, thanks to a goal from promising youngster Paul Ware, their only win in the last 14 games of what was a dire end to the season. However, all of that paled very quickly into insignificance.

That day was also FA Cup semi-final day, and champions Liverpool were facing Brian Clough’s Nottingham Forest at Hillsborough, the home of Sheffield Wednesday. We all now know what happened on that fateful day in Sheffield, and the events would ultimately change British football forever.

In January 1990, Lord Justice Taylor published his final report into the Hillsborough disaster which led to a revolution in the design and management of football grounds. Despite concluding that terracing in itself was not unsafe, regulations were introduced that meant that stadiums at clubs in England’s top two divisions would need to be all-seater by August 1994.

At the time of the publication of the Taylor Report, Stoke were bottom of the Second Division and staring down the barrel of relegation to the third tier for only the second time in the club’s history. However, while a prolonged spell outside of the top two divisions may have been advantageous in terms of providing the club with additional time in which to properly consider their response to the Taylor Report, this would never have proven acceptable to the club’s support. Therefore, they began to look at what their options were, with the first implication being a reduced capacity of 24,071 at the Victoria Ground, down from 35,812 prior to the Hillsborough disaster.

***

By the summer of 1993, Stoke City were back in English football’s second tier after Lou Macari led the club to promotion as champions, with the second tier now confusingly known as the First Division following the old First Division breakaway, the formation of the Premier League and Sky TV’s launch of the ‘whole new ball game’. And with the club’s promotion, they were presented with three years in which to meet the Taylor Report’s all-seater requirement.

At the time, there was an undercurrent of dissatisfaction from the support towards the board and how they were running the club, though that wasn’t reflected in the gates. But there was one thing that unified both the board and the support, and that was that the club needed to revolutionise their home, or risk falling behind and failing to compete with other clubs with better facilities.

Of course, the club considered the redevelopment of the Victoria Ground in the first instance, which – given that when the training ground was brought into the equation, they had 18 acres of land to play with – would always have been the case. But despite the club insisting that plans had been prepared and given serious consideration – they were never shared with the support or general public – they concluded that a redeveloped Victoria Ground would be a compromise.

And so it was during the 1994/95 season that whispers began to circulate that the club was seriously considering leaving the Victoria Ground. Relocation had been mooted in the past, with even a suggestion of ground-sharing with local rivals Port Vale at a purpose-built stadium at the former National Garden Festival site in Etruria, a proposal that was quickly dismissed. However, this time, it quickly became apparent that the proposal had some legs.

A short distance away from the Victoria Ground, Stoke-on-Trent Regeneration Limited – a joint venture between the City Council and ‘regeneration specialists’ St Modwen – were in the process of reclaiming the former Hem Heath (Trentham) Colliery which had closed in 1993, with a view to transforming it into a large business park to be known as Trentham Lakes. And the City Council were very keen for Stoke City to take a 25-acre plot just off the new A50 dual carriageway.

Early in 1996, permission was granted for what the City Council had badged the ‘Stoke Community Stadium’, insisting that it was to be a facility for the whole city, not just Stoke City Football Club, much to the ire of football supporters in the north of the city. And at the same time as the club’s future home was rubber-stamped, things were going equally well on the pitch, with the team under Lou Macari in serious contention for promotion. After finishing in fourth place, the Potters were beaten by Leicester City in the play-offs, with the Foxes going on to secure their place in the Premier League.

And so the following season was Stoke City’s last at the Victoria Ground but, despite the previous campaign being a largely positive one, off the pitch the pressures associated with the proposed move began to show, leading to the sale of four key players, which raised over £1m. Indeed, rumours circulated that the club’s hierarchy were actually relieved that the Potters missed out on promotion, for financial reasons.

Despite the pre-season doom and gloom, the Potters began the 1996/97 campaign with three straight wins which saw them top the table. However, Stoke’s form soon became patchy and inconsistent, with Lou Macari announcing his intention to step down at the end of the season to concentrate on a court case with his former employer Celtic. It also became apparent that Stoke were struggling to find their financial contribution to the construction of the new stadium at Trentham Lakes.

The cost of developing the site of Stoke’s new home was put at £25m, with £14.5m of that going on the stadium itself. The club had committed to raising £6m, while the City Council promised £10m, with the rest coming from a cocktail of grants from various sources, including the European Union.

Towards the end of the 1996/97 season, the club announced a £1.3m deal with the Britannia Building Society for the naming rights of the new stadium, a deal which also included shirt sponsorship. This eased some of the pressure on the club, but as what was now the Britannia Stadium was starting to take shape atop the hill overlooking Stoke-upon-Trent and the Victoria Ground, the Potters’ season was quickly petering out – in the main thanks to dreadful away form – the one bright spark being the emergence of young full-back Andy Griffin.

However, their home form continued to be strong, and although the club ended their final season at the Victoria Ground disappointingly in 12th position, they won their final two fixtures at the old place, firstly beating Port Vale, our cousins from Burslem, 2-0, before closing the season with a 2-1 win over old foes West Bromwich Albion in front of a full house, with Stoke’s final goal at the Victoria Ground bagged by Graham Kavanagh.

I was at that final game. I missed a few games that season because of work, but I wouldn’t have missed that one for the world, or ‘for a golden pig’ as Dad would have put it. And I was confident that we’d sign off with a win, as we tended to do well against the Baggies in those days. But the football was almost a sideshow that particular day. Of course, we all wanted to win, but it was more important that we gave the old place the send-off she deserved. And we did that. The three points were a bonus.

As with thousands of others, Dad and I hung around for a while after the game with our friends on the old Boothen End, talking about old games, and players that had graced the Victoria Ground over the years. It was where we watched the game. I had been in other parts of the ground, but it was the Boothen End where I most enjoyed it. That enormous old terrace behind the goal, the home end, our end; at the end of that final season, it was the biggest terrace left in English football with a capacity of 9,700. The place had an atmosphere like no other. The sounds, the sights, the smells, the humour; especially the humour. My biggest fear of the move to Trentham Lakes was whether or not it would be the same; the fear of the unknown. And it was this that occupied my mind as we walked away from the Boothen End for the very last time.

I was going to miss the place.

***

These days, it’s not often that I visit that part of Stoke. Now, you’d need a very specific reason to go there, and unless you live that way, there aren’t too many. But on this particular day, I had one, and it left me lost in silent reverie …

It was more than 40 years ago, but I remember my first visit as if it were yesterday: 28 October 1981 – my first trip to the Victoria Ground, the home of Stoke City Football Club, to see the Potters take on Manchester City in the League Cup. An evening game beneath the lights, which the Potters won 2-0, but went out on penalties having lost the first leg 2-0. I don’t remember much about the game – I was five years old – but what I do remember is holding Dad’s hand and walking out on to a darkened Boothen Old Road after the game alongside hundreds of other Stokies, almost mesmerised by the noise, the smells, and the hustle and bustle, a black river of humanity flowing towards the heart of Stoke town centre. It is something that will live with me forever.

As with many boys, it was my dad that introduced me to football, and in particular to Stoke City Football Club. When I was young, I began to notice that Dad would disappear for a few hours on a Saturday afternoon, and when I asked Mum where he went, the reply that I got was simply, ‘Stoke’. After pestering him about ‘Stoke’, Dad promised that when I was big enough, he would take me with him, and Dad always kept his promises, hence my pre-Halloween trip to the Vic. After the