Earliest Memories...

What are your earliest memories?

When I was a kid I was lucky enough to go watch the football in one of the boxes at Roker Park. It wasn't every home match 'cos my brother was older so he got first dibs!

My dad got the box throuh a supplier of his (can't remember who) and it was a massive treat to be asked to go. We'd dress up really smart and there would be a bit of food before the match. Between me and my brother we managed to amass a stack of match day programmes signed by the players who would come up the stairs from the dressing room - the staircase where the picture of us v Villa by Hemy used to hang.

Bruce Grobbelar stands out in my mind...really friendly and always seemed a bit nuts. Unfortunately all the programmes were sold by my dad as they were just clutter in garage a couple of years back. Luckily they were bought by a fan who'd lost his in a fire. They'll be well loved even if a few of the autographs are little more than scribbles and impossible to decipher!

I've also got a vague memory of a white plaque that used to be in my bedroom. It was round and white in a square white frame on a red velvet backing...with the old crest and the signatures of all the seasons players...anyone still got one?

Just thought I' share a bit since we haven't signed anyone today.....

What's your earliest?

 

1976 FA Cup QF v Crystal Palace.
I remember Q'ing for tickets with me Mam and Dad and the Q stretching around Roker Park three times.

 

My first game was against Leeds at Roker park in about 1967. And my abiding memory of that day was the noise of the crowd and how green the pitch looked: black and white tele in them days!

 

No idea, being born a stones throw from the ground and family working there, there was always tickets for matches.. So i was the little kid stuck on a wooden plank, so i could see the pitch, right next to the away teams dugout......

 

I honestly cant remember but I would be around 14 before I saw my first game and was hooked from then on. My dad was not into football or sport, gardening, leeks, tommotoes and work were his life, all to provide the very best he could for his kids.

We never had sport on TV or talked about it so apart from my Wolves strip, no idea where Wolves was but liked the old gold, I did not know about football.

I know my first game was by coach, probably Roberts Tours, who with and why I was there, no idea. No pub so it would be chips from the chip shop near the New Derby. Dont remember the game or what end, Fulwell or Roker but do remember the grass, green and big and I remember the excitement, the noise. It would be a while before I became a regular but it was then the Fulwell end every week and I do remember when I started to go in the Derby pre match.

Why I am a Sunderland fanatic, no idea I just know I am. A few times I have tried to turn my back on them but never have, stopped smoking and drinking but my SAFC vice will be with me for life.

 

Being bottle fed by my mam.

Nee trouble going back years, it's yesterday I can't ****ing remember.

 

73 cup final. I was 2 and sitting on my mams knee, I bawled my eyes out when we scored because my mam was shouting so much. I remember I had a plastic red and white bowler hat on.

 

I remember being about 5 in the back bedroom of our house ( General Havelock Rd, Ford Estate) and you could here the Roker Roar when they scored, my dad had been taking me for a while before that but I can only remember digging out lady birds from the cracks in the concrete in the roker end with a lolly stick another lad there used to use my board on two ropes.loved them ever since.

 

Canit remeber but it was in the days of Shack and Trevor Ford

 

1962-63 season, games against Huddersfield and Plymouth. A cup match against 'Posh' score was 5-1 I think.

Charlie Hurley was my hero, mulhall beat full backs for fun, also saw Cloughie play and score with the goalies cap!!

Saw lots of the games in the promotion season 63-64

Stood in the Fulwell end with my dad and his mates, right hand corner in line with the touchline and two barriers back .......... loved it.

 

Chelsea game around 10 years ago, it wasn't my first game, but the earliest I remember. And I only remember it because I got the ball kicked at me by their goalie (think it was Cudicini)

 

Born in Sunderland. Dad started to take me to Roker Park when was about ten years old. First game I can remember was against Arsenal with a crowd of around 60,000. Les Compton was playing but not his brother Dennis.
Standouts over the early years were Shack, Trevor Ford, Willie Watson, Joe Hall, Jack Stelling (wonder if the Hartlepool loving Sky presenter is related to him?)
Jonny Mapson, & later Ivor Broadis, Ronnie Turnbull & good old Don Kichenbrand.
Good days- although getting squashed against the iron rails was aproblem.

 

Bloody hell, hence the user name i guess.....


60,000 brilliant..

 

My first match was in our very first relegation season 57-58

I was 10 years old .

Sunderland 3 Leicester City 2

I recall the vivid images of red and white (and blue) on 'bright' green grass (under the original Roker Lights)


Prior to then I recall listening to a match on the 'wireless' versus Moscow Dynamo .........

 

Jinx it is all your fault, them centuries if despair..

 

....Ive worked out that it must have been 1959...reserve matches to start with ...clock stand I think.... just remember the wingers being fast....there was loads of wing play!!..and as a kid thats the nearest thing you can see.....I remember Jacky Overfield flying up the wing and his stupid hair standing up on end....Ive just trawled through Leeds history....fantastic detail theyve got....Overfield came from Leeds managed by our own Raich Carter but he`d gone by the time Overfield transferred to us....He wasnt good at all but my first memory....

Leeds games of the sixties.....Jesus they were tough.....all those years ...made 73 ...special`s not the right word.....

 

1973 FA Cup versus Man City replay at Roker Park 3 - 1 to Sunderland.

 

3 years ago, we lost to Pompey 2-0 away ( I think) but despite a **** game in a **** stadium I was hooked.

 

I met Lesley Compton years ago, probably the late 70's or early 80's. He used to manage the Bell at Hendon (North London). He was not too happy that I didn't know that he had represented England in his day.
My first game was at Roker in 1953/54 season against Sheffield Wednesday. The excitement of making our way to the matches from Seaburn station, the gradual build up of the crowd in the streets, buying sweets at a little corner shop (was it owned by Shack?), queueing for the boys end then scrambling to get on the fence at the back of the Fulwell End. Pure magic.

 

Bloody hell..................