This could be causing the confusion....the picture just does not look right for a shirt badge of its time......A crest(adorning a building) maybee or pub sign but why have us in hoops? If you look on historical footy kits we were deffo in stripes by the mid 1890s and deffo in stripes when we were at roker park. Before roker...... the shirts were ad hoc in nature and as this time is not fully researched, we could have been in hoops, but the badge apears to be too sophisticated for this time and not really important enough to the players of the time to spend time creating such an elaborate design.Remember they probably made the strips themselves .I am very interested in our past so it would be great is someone could enlighten us about this sign/badge.
Not cricket..........try this site (it does appear to be a comprehensive website but without references you will have to take it on face value) http://www.historicalkits.co.uk/Sunderland/Sunderland.htm
Will go with the beer mat idea can't see this on a shirt especially in the 1890s or whenever it looks far too complicated a design. As for which badge then the old one from the 80s (1980s that is) with the red and white stripes and the ship, looks good and is a simple design.
The badge shown by Bill was never worn on any of our shirts....neither was the badge with the black cat on or the red and white stripes with safc on the top in Chimeras link..
