As a fan of football first and foremost, I suppose it's customary to follow at least one other team in another division. For me, in Scotland that has always been Deveronvale ("just who the f*ck are Deveronvale?" you're all wondering? Well, go Google and find out just who the best team north of the river Don is!). 

But when it comes to English sides it's always been a bit trickier. I don't go down to Englandshire that often, and I don't have much affinity with any of the teams down there either. I hate Manchester United not just because they're the Rangers of England but also because my mother in law supports them. I cant be doing with Chelsea, the rotten upstarts that they are, Liverpool are just too uninteresting.  I could support Arsenal because they play nice football but at the end of the day, some home grown talent might be nice, no? The rest of the EPL, or the English Pre-meer League as our American cousins call it just doesn't do it either. 

Instead, I've been getting my English footballing kicks along Route M6, down Potters way. I've been following Stoke City for about 20-odd years now mainly on the basis that I had a nice dinner there once back in 1987 on our way to Alton Towers (we missed the turn off and ended up in Stoke instead), that Stoke is actually quite a nice town (no, really!) and that Stoke is one of the grand old ladies of English football. 

Stoke City FC is, for those who don't know the worlds second oldest football team in the word, having been founded in 1863 a year after Notts County and was one of the 12 founding members of the Football League. Amongst its best known players is Stanley Matthews (pictured right) who made 321 appearances and scored 54 goals at the Victoria Ground (in two different spell, he also played for Blackpool in between).  Stoke won the old Football League just once, back in 1972, and won the League Cup that same season beating Chelsea 2-1 at Wembley. That season, and the next they also qualified for the Uefa cup, but didn't progress too far.  Stoke last played in the top flight in the 84/85 season when they were relegated with a total of 17 point, a record low tally for twenty-one years. But a cracking season this year saw them promoted again following a 0-0 draw with Leicester (who were relegated, which is sweet revenge for not letting me go to University there because I only got a 'B' for my Higher Economics) and avoiding the play-offs when Hull lost 1-0 at Ipswich. 

Teams promoted from the Championship tend not to do too well. Birmingham look like they're on the way down again. Derby, arguably the worst side ever to grace the Premier League are also down.  I think Stoke are better teams than both of those two teams and I feel that together with West Brom (and hopefully Crystal Palace) they'll make a good addition to the top flight. In a way I hope Hull dont make it up, because it's about the only football trivia I know with any great certainty (i.e. "what is the largest town in England never to have a team in the top flight?"). 

So congrats to Stoke City, Premiership football at last - long may it continue!

Useful Links
http://www.stokecity-mad.co.uk/
http://www.stoke.vitalfootball.co.uk/
http://www.teamtalk.com/football/stokecity/0,16370,1805,00.html