View from the opposition – Stoke City
A bit about you:
Name: Peter Machin Current home town: Leicester
Birthplace: Stoke on Trent
How long have you supported your team?
Always. My first live game was in March 1978 where Garth Crooks scored a hat trick in a 4-2 win over Blackburn.
Overview of your club:
Favourite thing about your home ground:
It has to be the noise, especially at night games when Delilah is being belted out.
Favourite match played by your team & why:
Can't really choose between two.
Stoke v Wolves – last game of the 83-84 season we need to win to avoid relegation and do so handsomely with a 4-0 win. Just fantastic for a 13 year old. Unfortunately the next season we were relegated with 17 points and -67 goal difference, but wouldn't have missed the feeling of that 4-0 win.
Sorry to say the other was May 2008 v Leicester. It was a pretty dire game but we finally got into the premier league which I had basically given up on ever happening. It was also my last game as a season ticket holder as my eldest daughter was born that summer. Friends think it is hilarious I watched so much drivel in the lower leagues and we finally get promoted and I stop going on a regular basis.
Favourite player of all time who played for your club:
Has to be Mickey Thomas. He first came when i was an 11 year old and was our player of the season scoring 11 goals in the old first division in 1982-83. What i really liked was if he thought he'd been badly fouled he would spend the next 10 minutes trying to get his own back without the ref seeing. He came back to us later in his career when we were relegated to the third tier and brought a bit of class to our midfield again. Plus who can't be amused by his counterfeit fiver's scam as he said"Roy Keane was on £50,000 a week, but so was i until the police found the printing machine". A true maverick
About our forthcoming match against you:
Your favourite current player in your squad and why? Marko Arnautovic – the one truly exciting and dangerous player we have
Player in your squad we should most fear and why?
Marko Arnautovic or perhaps Joe Allen ghosting in to score the winner
Player in our squad you most fear and why?
Jamie Vardy – pace against our defence is always a problem
Up and coming prospect in your squad?
Our academy seems incapable of producing a player to come through to the first team. Of the young players Ramadan Sobhi a 19 year old Egyptian international can be exciting when running with the ball.
How do you think you’ll do against us?
Lose 1-0
General Questions:
What did you think of the winter activity both in and out of your club?
… well I didn’t get my wish of a 20 goals a season striker.
Where do you think you’ll finish this season? Comfortably in mid table, hopefully higher
Which three teams do you think will get relegated from the Premiership?
Hull, Middlesbrough & Sunderland
Any other comments?
Really pleased to see Huth get his champions medal. He is universally liked by all Stokies