Massively Violent & Decidedly Average

by Lee Howey

  A stone’s throw from the North Sea, Roker Park was a famously cold stadium, although in the summer, temperatures could surge all the way up to tepid. This day was spectacularly cold. There was a light scattering of snow on the pitch and the air was bitter around the ears. Not unusually, I was on the bench at the start of the game. I ran up and down the touchline to warm up in the most literal sense, not just to stretch the muscles a bit, hoping as always to be given some time on the pitch. I would be given all of the second forty-five minutes which, injuries aside, is as much time as a substitute can realistically hope for.

  The respective stadiums of the two clubs were (and still are) about thirty miles or a half-hour drive apart. This proximity means that most adult Sunderland supporters will know several Middlesbrough counterparts personally and vice versa. The fixture has an element of local rivalry, but it’s the Middlesbrough fans who feel it more intensely. They are stuck geographically between Sunderland and Leeds United, who are similarly uninterested in Boro. The nearest club to Middlesbrough is Hartlepool United, whom they have never met in a league fixture.

  Sunderland and Newcastle fans don’t feel too badly about facing their Teesside work colleagues in the aftermath of a defeat to Boro. Middlesbrough attract about as much emotion from the Mackems and Geordies as do Fulham, Doncaster Rovers, Bournemouth, Stoke City, Gillingham or any other random opposition obstructing the acquisition of three points.

  Actually that’s a little unfair. As both player and fan I wanted to do well against them. There is a slight edge to Sunderland v. Middlesbrough; but not much of a one from a Wearside perspective and largely down to the efforts of the North East media. Many Sunderland supporters were pleased for Boro when they won the League Cup and reached the UEFA Cup final in the 2000s.

  I’ll put it another way. When Newcastle were thumped at home by Sunderland in 2013, some of their fans were so furious that they rioted in their own city and one of them was infamously imprisoned for punching a police horse. When the black and whites were relegated from the Premier League in 2016, the red and whites staged the expected gloat-athon. But some expressed regret that there would be ‘no derby match’ the following season, even though Sunderland would play Middlesbrough three months later. It was a them-or-us relegation in 2016 and, while Wearside whooped as Tyneside wailed, neither party seemed to care or even notice that Middlesbrough had been promoted.

  When the 2016–17 fixture lists were released, the media were keen to pretend that Sunderland–Middlesbrough was a ‘derby’ (partly perhaps because their first meeting would be televised). It was simply not a derby. Only one club provides derby opposition for Sunderland, and we all know which one. It’s only a derby if it feels like one. You can feel a Tyne–Wear derby through your feet from a many-mile radius. This is regardless of which league or competition the fixture is part of. Fans of both clubs worry about its outcome to the point of ulcers and other illnesses, and this occurs days before they actually enter the stadium.

  But back to Sunday 16 January 1994. The game was broadcast live by Tyne Tees Television. Sky Sports had been on the scene for a couple of years by then and, regardless of anyone’s opinion of Sky and Rupert Murdoch, their state-of-the-art, umpteen-camera football coverage had instantly made that of Tyne Tees look little better than something John Logie Baird might have whipped up.

  The first forty-five minutes was toothless and forgettable, with neither side playing well. To address this I was told at half-time that I would be replacing the injured Gordon Armstrong. Great – for me, if not Gordon. The substitution worked too. Ten minutes into the half I jabbed the ball forward to Craig Russell who, not for the first time, got ahead of the defence and was upended by Nicky Mohan just inside the box. Penalty in front of the Fulwell End. Phil Gray. Down the middle. One–nil.

  Four minutes later we were awarded a corner. The skilful Martin Smith delivered a left-foot in-swinger. I stood in the ‘D’ and, with nothing owed to scientific thought, decided to simply attack the ball wherever in the air it might travel. With the added advantage of poor marking, I trotted up to meet the ball with my head and battered it towards the goal. Other than ensuring it was on target I hadn’t aimed for anywhere specific, so it might have gone straight into the arms of Stephen Pears. It didn’t. The header entered the net from eight yards out, although it would have done so from eighteen. It was actually quite central but the power beat the keeper. This wasn’t anything we had worked on in training, merely a piece of improvisation that went right. Ha!

  The Tyne Tees summariser that day was Chris Waddle, then a Sheffield Wednesday player. He spoke of my goal in complimentary terms (‘He’s timed his run perfect and you can’t stop them’) and I was introduced to him after the game. Apart from that, I can honestly say that the presence of television cameras added nothing to the occasion for me. I had scored the winner against our ‘local rivals’ in front of the Fulwell End, absorbed the noise and watched the excited crowd surge forward as they still did in those days of standing spectators. I also enjoyed the final whistle in a way that only a victory can bring.

  That sort of mutual joy between player and fan is not improved upon because the telly is in town. I like to think that the supporters were by now thinking that, at the very least, the six grand given to AS Hemptinne to secure my signature had been worth it.

  In true Sunderland fashion, we allowed Steve Vickers to pull one back, which meant the final fifteen minutes were more interesting than we would have liked. But we squeaked home 2–1, and deserved to. However, my day wasn’t over. I was drugs tested.

  Before I reached the dressing room I was taken to one side and told that, along with Kevin Ball, I was one of the two Sunderland players who had been randomly selected. Jamie Pollock was one of the two Middlesbrough players. The testing team weren’t wearing hi-vis jackets with the words ‘Drugs Bloke’ emblazoned across the back, but we were left with no uncertainty as to who they were. Until we had each provided 200ml (a third of a pint) of urine we would not be allowed to leave the ground. This isn’t easy when you have just left the pitch dehydrated; in fact we thought they were taking the piss (it’s faintly possible that the Drugs Blokes had heard this joke before).

  I drank some water. I also used to like a cup of tea after a game. I still couldn’t manage it. I had to be watched in the shower, which was not an entirely comfortable experience, but they had to make sure that no one else could provide a sample for me. What a job they had. I explained that it was customary to have a few pints after a match. That was fine. They weren’t interested in whether or not there was alcohol in my sample; it wouldn’t mask anything illegal. Drugs Bloke had to stand in my company while I drank a few cans with my family and gave several interviews. Eventually I was ready to leak.

  But ooh. You know when someone’s watching you, you struggle to go. So it took me about another quarter of an hour to deliver. Bally wasn’t much of a boozer and had played ninety minutes, so he was struggling even more. An hour or so after the game he was still about 193ml short. He would be there for some time.

  Apart from traces of Vaux’s Scorpion Dry lager in my sample (perhaps more than a trace, now I think of it) we were both clean, as were the two Middlesbrough lads. It was a minor inconvenience rather than a problem. The same would not have been said of another member of Sunderland’s squad had the Drugs Blokes ever pulled his name from the hat. I won’t identify him. I won’t even say whether he was on the pitch, sitting on the bench, in the stand or watching the game in the pub that day. I don’t believe he was ever drug-tested in his career and he will have been mightily relieved at this, because illegal substances would have been found. And not of the performance-enhancing variety either.

  • • •

  The Middlesbrough game might not have been a derby, but the whole day is chiselled into my memory. This is partly because it was the first time I ever heard the song. Anyone who remembers me playing for Sunderland – and quite a few who don’t – will know exactly what I me
an by the song.

  I was warming up behind the linesman and in front of the Main Stand when the chant was struck up. I was accustomed to hearing the opinions of the crowd: ‘Get on there and batter them, Lee’, ‘Give us a hat-trick’ or ‘Sit down, man, Howey. You’re shite!’ and similar witticisms. It was generally good fun. On this particular day, they came up with something different. It was sung to the tune from the commercials for Direct Line Insurance, a sort of cavalry charge jingle.

  Lee Howey! Lee Howey! Lee Howey! Your brother is a cunt!

  I caught the use of my name but didn’t hear the song properly at first. Brian Atkinson, who was warming up alongside me, evidently did, because he was greatly amused. It wasn’t exactly ‘Figaro’s Aria’ and was a terribly easy ‘song’ to learn. So when an encore was delivered it was with more volume and spirit as other sections of the ground began to join in.

  Lee Howey! Lee Howey! Lee Howey! Your brother is a cunt!

  It seems unlikely that any consideration was given to whether or not I was offended by this musical imputation of the good name of my only sibling. Football crowds tend not to be overly sensitive. They needn’t have worried (not that they did). Even though the song isn’t clever, witty or melodious and relies on an extremely offensive word for its impact, I thought it was very funny. Perhaps it’s funny because it isn’t clever, witty or melodious and relies on an extremely offensive word for its impact. It’s the joy of obscene language. Of course swearing isn’t ‘necessary’. This is part of its appeal. Herbaceous borders and Chanel Number 5 aren’t ‘necessary’ and no one disapproves of them, because they make life ever so slightly better.

  To the best of my knowledge the song has never been performed by Aled Jones at Christmas, but it was an instant and ongoing hit on Wearside. It can be heard regularly in the Stadium of Light to this day; often chanted by people too young to possibly remember me playing. After the Middlesbrough match it was aired every time I warmed up as substitute – and I was substitute an awful lot at Sunderland (seventy-nine times in total, which is the ninth highest of all time; of the eight ahead of me on the list, seven are goalkeepers and the other is Paul Thirlwell). The song was almost a fixture of Roker Park in the mid-1990s. In essence, it’s really an anti-Newcastle song and not about me as such. Yet it makes me feel strangely proud. It reminds people that I was there and this book would be incomplete if I didn’t mention it.

  Years later, a Sunderland fanzine, A Love Supreme, printed T-shirts with the ‘lyrics’ on the front, minus the last five words for decency’s sake. They asked me to model it and I agreed to this after they submitted to my exorbitant demand of a free sample. I wear it every time Sunderland play Newcastle. The first occasion was the 3–0 away victory for Sunderland in 2013; the first of six consecutive wins over the Mags and the horse-punching day. It’s my favourite T-shirt. Ever.

  The song refuses to die and has a longevity that is rare for a football chant. It will probably be around when I’m not. When I attend Sunderland games these days, especially away from home, I zip up, wear a baseball cap and attempt to keep a low profile. But it only takes one person to recognise me and they’re off: Lee Howey! Lee Howey! Lee Howey!

  I don’t suppose our mother gives wholehearted approval to the song, with its blunt and offensive reference to her younger child, but it has never offended me. Any time I am questioned about the oft-repeated, foul-mouthed choral abuse of my brother, my answer is always the same.

  ‘Well he is.’

  • • •

  Later in the year, Steven joined me on my stag night in Edinburgh, where I refrained from singing the song. We were still rubbing along reasonably well, even if we weren’t together too often. A jolly time was being had when my attention was taken by stitching on his head. He had clearly just had his ears pinned back. Looking now at ‘before’ and ‘after’ pictures, you can see how prominent his lugs had been. Photographs where he doesn’t appear to have a pair of Pyrex saucers clamped onto the sides his melon fall into the ‘after’ category.

  It could have been vanity, or it may have been applied physics to benefit his game as the drag coefficient was slowing him down; either way, he had decided to go under the knife. He must have been embarrassed by this because when I asked him his reasons for the op he explained it to Eddie Harrison and me with a story about consulting a medical professional for something far more serious and career-threatening, and that while he was in there he told them they may as well perform the pin-back too. Things turned out to be not quite as they sounded.

  Guinness played a part in me accepting the tale. I have no wish to elaborate on exactly what was said, but I was shocked and traumatised by it. Matters were deteriorating further.

  • • •

  Sunderland had a brief yet eventful FA Cup run. We drew Carlisle United at home in the third round; a team two leagues below us and a formality on paper. But as they say, the game is played on grass and not paper.

  Despite their being fifteenth in Division Three at this point, we were only sixteenth in Division One and the Carlisle supporters could smell blood; perhaps literally, as there was quite some unpleasantness around Roker Park during their big day out. Derek Ferguson gave us the lead with a shot that bounced four times before crossing the line; the only goal he would ever score for Sunderland. But Darren Edmondson equalised ten minutes from time, and this was the minimum that Carlisle deserved. It was a bad afternoon for us, although I was at least personally untainted by it as I hadn’t featured.

  The replay came at Brunton Park ten days later and this time I started because Don Goodman was injured. Between the two cup games, we had won at Oxford, and only two days earlier there had been my own personal glory against Middlesbrough. But this upturn in results did not lessen the importance of the replay. Confidence remained fragile and defeat to the archetypal plucky minnows could have set us back to the despondency levels experienced under Terry Butcher. This was a fraught fixture for Mick Buxton in particular and it would be an extremely arduous evening in Cumbria for everyone who wanted the best for Sunderland. Carlisle were rightly buoyant after their performance at Roker. The game was a sell-out and we were being spoken of as underdogs.

  The Brunton Park pitch, famously under six feet of water in 2015, was not exactly in pristine condition in January 1994 either. Before the kick-off, we didn’t know whether to warm up or pick cabbages. The game itself was almost as much of a slog for our large following as it was for the players. It was goalless after ninety minutes when we were given the usual exhilarating rhetoric from Mr Buxton. None of your carpe diem and all that. It was like being geed up by Sooty. Whatever Mick said – and as usual no one was listening – the toneless noises leaving his lips were drowned out in my mind by a single pervading thought. Namely: ‘Christ. Don’t let it go to penalties.’

  Joy came eventually and was hard-earned. The game went remorselessly into extra time and the 101st minute, when we were awarded a corner. As against Middlesbrough, Martin Smith raised his right arm (for no reason at all) then delivered another of his left-foot in-swingers. This one bounced tamely off a Carlisle head and plopped onto the saturated six-yard line to be jabbed home before the visiting supporters by a player who was having a very good couple of days: me. It is widely considered to be one of the greatest goals in the history of the FA Cup.

  The previous sentence is of course complete bollocks. It was an unremarkable goal and all it achieved ultimately was a 2–1 defeat at Wimbledon in the next round. Wimbledon would finish the season sixth in the Premier League, so losing there would not be demoralising or embarrassing. But the same would certainly not have been said if we had cocked it up at Carlisle. The aesthetic value of that goal was irrelevant; it was the only one in the game and essential in maintaining morale among a side that couldn’t afford to be any less confident. The goal can be seen today on YouTube (go on, look it up, you know you want to) and what is most remarkable about it is the reaction of the Sunderland supporters who had become incr
easingly tense about the tie – as had we.

  Usually, scoring in the cup against ‘lowly’ opposition is unlikely to elicit much more than an appreciative cheer. But when the ball hit the net that night our fans went potty. I ran over to them to celebrate, but soon abandoned the idea when I saw how they were rather dangerously surging forward. Some of them ran onto the pitch. This outpouring was not because they thought we were about to open a new and glorious chapter in the club’s history, or even win at Wimbledon. It was sheer relief, both when we scored and when the final whistle blew.

  The relief was not because we had won; it was because we hadn’t lost. There had been nothing of note to celebrate for a couple of seasons and on the night we beat Carlisle, Newcastle sat third in the Premier League and had been declared (by their good selves) as ‘everyone’s second favourite team’. Our fans (who could emphatically confirm that this was not necessarily the case) didn’t need further humiliation from their black-and-white colleagues at work because we had failed against a team from the fourth tier in a cup tie. To sum up that dark January evening at Brunton Park then: ‘Phew.’

  None of these wider considerations were in my thoughts at the time. I was just delighted to have won and scored another winner for Sunderland. I remember nothing of the rest of that game, although the records show that Kevin Ball was shown a yellow card – if you can imagine such a thing.