Great knowledge with Stokoe and Clough link via Bury I did'nt know that(or had forgotten ) But he gave all Sunderland fans special memories in '73 and the widet world with hisFA cup victory hug of monty
Bob Stokoe was probably a much more humble character than Brian Clough, its only the fact that we missed the opportunity of a lifetime when we overlooked Clough. imo I thought that day in 73 was the beginning, not the end of a very short era, memories yes, but no legacy. . Maybe all these stories are true, true maybe not, the facts are , one was a great manager the other wasn't. With Clough you either loved him or hated him, he was part of Sunderland folk lore in the 60's, and one of the most successful managers of his day. Stokoe won the Cup yes, but was a second division manager at best. Off tack, does Southampton or Wimbledon have statue's of their FA Cup winning managers outside of their grounds.. A club of Sunderland's size should have more to its history to celebrate than one Cup success, however memorable it was, in the last 60 years,
I think its only 5 clubs that have won the league more times than us. Yes, we haven't won it since the 30s but we still have that pedigree. That era in our history is largely forgotten or not spoken about. Obviously its outside of living memory for most people but it should still be celebrated. If Bob Stokoe deserves a statue then Johnny Cochrane deserves one more. Or at the very least, Raich Carter.
Totally agree with the sentiment. However I think it would bad PR looking to celebrate someone from a bygone age. It would just emphasis the lack of any sustained success in the last 70 or 80 years.
Yeah, see what you mean. Mind you, I reckon putting up a statue of a bloke that's not even dead yet (Shearer, Thierry Henry for example) is completely lacking in class. In most other spheres, you have to have been in the ground for a while before anyone sticks up a statue of you.
When Sunderland won those titles back in the 20's and 30's we were one of the "Big Boys" so while I agree we should celebrate the clubs success whenever that may have been, I do think the statue for Bob Stokoe is warranted simply because Sunderland we were (at that time) about as big and influential a club as say Rotherham are today. Imagine Rotherham Beating some of the premier leagues best and then going to Wembley to beat the absolute best....That's what makes Stokoe a legend, In Sunderland...thankfully to thousands of fans he always has been and always will be highly regarded and absolutely deserves his statue., regardless of what we achieve in the future, his achievement will be hard to beat.
Oh yeah, totally. I'm not saying he doesn't deserve it. It must be the most talked about cup win of all time. I'm just saying that those fellas from the 30s represent our golden age and that is a more normal thing to celebrate than a brief, if outstanding, peak.
Stokoe and Sunderland captured a lot of the countries good will that day - emotionally & our unexpected win - The Monty double save - the whole occaision and our cup run - a division 2 club beating heavyweights of Man City ,Arsenal and Leeds - magical times indeed of the highest order Although I did'nt get a final ticket the atmosphere and raw emotion the at Hillsborough for the Arsenal semi was truely awesome - we all knew our name was on the cup that year (3 & 7 connection ) ..
Well, hang on a minute lads. Our glory years weren't the 20s or the 30s. We won four of our titles in one decade - the 1890s, and if one manager deserves a statue on footballing achievements alone, then it has to be Tom Watson (1889 -1896). His team won three titles in four years - 1891, 1892, and 1894. But Stokoe made a remarkable difference off the pitch as well as his single cup win. In 1971, we were 13th in the second division. In 1972, we were 5th and pushing for promotion. Yet the difference in average home crowd was a just a couple of hundred! There were about 15,000 hard-core SAFC supporters left in the whole of Co. Durham, and it didn't matter what we did, very few others were coming back. Sunderland was rapidly becoming a non-soccer town, like, say St. Helen's or Wakefield. Stokoe's great achievement was that he turned that around. Sub-15,000 into 30,000+ inside six months - Stokoe turned the heads of Co. Durham around again - and we shouldn't ever forget it.
been meaning to share this for a few weeks. absolutely brilliant story about Cloughie http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/spo...dean-saunders-brian-clough-contender-11837671
