Stoke City FC

[Karabiner]

Why does Aaron Ramsey get booed every time Arsenal visit Stoke?

Mindless animosity is my best guess.

[arbboy]

Why does Aaron Ramsey get booed every time Arsenal visit Stoke?

Mindless animosity is my best guess.

Think it's mainly Stoke fans total dislike for Wenger's comments about rugby tbh and nothing personal towards Ramsey.  The same reason stokie's were singing 'swing low sweet chariot' in the same era.

[Karabiner]

Why does Aaron Ramsey get booed every time Arsenal visit Stoke?

Mindless animosity is my best guess.

Think it's mainly Stoke fans total dislike for Wenger's comments about rugby tbh and nothing personal towards Ramsey.

It's definitely personal against Ramsey ever since he got his leg shawcrossed and pubis' subsequent "not that kind of player" protestations.

I just can't believe that a player would get booed for having his leg broken in two places and a year or so taken out of his career.

[Archer]

I saw Stoke at Man City at the weekend and they were absolutely excellent. I watch lots of football (live and on the box) and this was right up there as one of the best executed defensive  performances I've ever witnessed. Looked very lively on the counter as well and could have scored more. If Mourhino was at the helm (like at City and Liverpool lastt season) it would have gone down as a masterclass.

Two English players stood out for me - Shawcross and Crouch. Shawcross was brilliant and  looks far better than Jagielka who is having a lean time. As for Crouch, everyone knows what he is all about as a striker but in this game his defensive work was also brilliant.

[baldock92]

This is the greatest thread started on blonde. No doubt it will attract pure class

[baldock92]

Why does Aaron Ramsey get booed every time Arsenal visit Stoke?

Mindless animosity is my best guess.

Think it's mainly Stoke fans total dislike for Wenger's comments about rugby tbh and nothing personal towards Ramsey.

It's definitely personal against Ramsey ever since he got his leg shawcrossed and pubis' subsequent "not that kind of player" protestations.

I just can't believe that a player would get booed for having his leg broken in two places and a year or so taken out of his career.

I personally do not boo Ramsey but from my understanding fellow stoke fans do boo in order to rub arsenal fans up the wrong way. It's impossible for me as a stoke supporter to meet an arsenal fan without the ramsey vs shawcross incident being brought up within 12 seconds, which is pretty tilting. There's no love lost between the set of fans that's for sure.

[McGlashan]

What's your opinion on Peter Coates? Answer that in any which way you want, be that in his role as chairman, a business man, or in what he does for the local community.

[DungBeetle]

Why is Shawcross not considered by England.  Far better than Jagiekla/Smalling/Jones in my opinion.

[arbboy]

What's your opinion on Peter Coates? Answer that in any which way you want, be that in his role as chairman, a business man, or in what he does for the local community.

The whole Coates (Peter and children Denise/John Coates) family are what, imo, owning a football club should be about and how every football club should be run.  They are born and bred self made local supporters of the club who have the best interests of the club/city at the foremost of their decision making.  Peter is a lifelong Stoke City fan.  I am pretty sure the more business minded Denise has said to her dad on numerous occasions 'there really is a better use of £50m in the business than paying Crouch's wages' or words to that effect.  However i think they know the old man has put his whole life on the line building the family firm from what was originally just a small regional chain of back street betting shops in Stoke 20 years ago so they let him have his fun and they know ultimately owning and running Stoke City is a dream for him as a Stoke fan as a kid.  To balance that they also have an EPL product to blast the bet365 brand to the world on the front of their shirts for free effectively so it suits all parties.

As a business family they gave me my break in the gambling industry in 2001 at bet365 when the online side of their company was just starting up and i will always remember my first interview in the summer of 2001 when i was told bet365 would become one of the top 5 industry leaders globally within 5 years and the biggest firm in the world within 10 years.  Given i was sitting in an office in Stoke talking to a firm with 50 betting shops only in the local Stoke area this was pretty hard to believe and take seriously.  Looking back it just shows how good the family is at running their business.  They have steamrolled the industry whilst still remaining based in Stoke and paying uk taxes (which other operators have chosen to go aboard to avoid) and it's mainly due imo to the sheer drive and determination of mainly Denise and John in their day to day roles.  They are virtually 100% owner managed and as such just get things done better and more efficiently than so many of their plc rivals which has allowed them to give firms like Stan James/Blue Sq/ladbrokes/hills/corals/victor who had several year's head start on them in the late 90's at the start of the internet boom and go past them like they were not even there in a matter of years.  A classic example of how shrewd they were was when they took the decision to sell their chain of shops around 2006 for £1m a shop to coral (Coral massively overpaid imo for what they bought as they are desperate to keep up with Ladbrokes/Hills in a numbers race of who had the most betting shops) even though the FOBT's were booming they still knew the money was better invested building the global online brand of bet365 rather than the bricks and mortar local chain which was the foundation of the firm.  They banked £50m from that, paid off the bank their original £15m loan to start up the operation and pumped the rest into organically growing their business and the rest is history.  I assume they have been debt free ever since just as Stoke City is as well.

I think the family is very proud that, barring the local council, they are the biggest employer in the city.  They are very loyal to their staff and have a culture of promoting from within wherever is possible.  Hardly any of their senior staff across all departments have left since 2001 which was the main reason i left as i couldn't see any promotional opportunities arising after 2 years there.

[arbboy]

Why is Shawcross not considered by England.  Far better than Jagiekla/Smalling/Jones in my opinion.

He was in the England squad for several games a while back and gained a cap off the bench i think.  I totally agree with your opinion but it's the same old 'if you don't play for a big name club you never get a level crack of the whip'.  I was truely amazed Manure or arsenal didn't come in for him in the summer.  Manure have a clause to have first refusal on his signing should any other club make an offer for him.  I suppose Stoke should be happy they are so unfashionable that their best players get to stay with us rather than get stolen from us.  I think similar could be said about Crouch and Andy Carroll tbh over the past 2 years.

[DungBeetle]

Yeah - does my head in that Hodgson suddenly decides Saints reserve full back is ready for England just because he is signed by Arsenal and has played 2 games for them.  Such lazy thinking.   Happened many moons ago with John Barnes - fringe player for England, then as soon as he joins Liverpool he starts every match.

[redarmi]

Did you go during the Victoria Ground days Arb boy?  How do you find the new stadium compared to that in terms of comfort/atmosphere etc?

I only went there once during the mid 1990's with a uni mate.  It was a pretty brutal atmosphere in those days compared to the brit which as tighty says is too corporate and bland.

When did you start following them?

Did you have another team you followed before becoming a Stokie?

I'm pretty sure Stoke's Finest are Port Vale anyway

I followed Leicester as a kid as i grew up 20 miles from there and Lineker was my hero as a kid.  Went to loads of their games in the dark ages of the mid/late 1980's and loads of Forest games with a mate from school who's dad was a season ticket holder so every other week i either went to a leics game or a forest game for 3/4 years (i know that sounds crazy as they are rivals but when you are 11 you just want to go to a game every saturday).  Stopped watching football live all together around 1989/90 season with school exams/sports etc taking up weekends.  Moved to Staffs in 2001 to work for bet365 and virtually all my mates are stoke season ticket holders and/or fans and have pretty much followed them since then tbh.

Will you also desert Stoke and go and follow another club when they become rubbish? 

[arbboy]

Did you go during the Victoria Ground days Arb boy?  How do you find the new stadium compared to that in terms of comfort/atmosphere etc?

I only went there once during the mid 1990's with a uni mate.  It was a pretty brutal atmosphere in those days compared to the brit which as tighty says is too corporate and bland.

When did you start following them?

Did you have another team you followed before becoming a Stokie?

I'm pretty sure Stoke's Finest are Port Vale anyway

I followed Leicester as a kid as i grew up 20 miles from there and Lineker was my hero as a kid.  Went to loads of their games in the dark ages of the mid/late 1980's and loads of Forest games with a mate from school who's dad was a season ticket holder so every other week i either went to a leics game or a forest game for 3/4 years (i know that sounds crazy as they are rivals but when you are 11 you just want to go to a game every saturday).  Stopped watching football live all together around 1989/90 season with school exams/sports etc taking up weekends.  Moved to Staffs in 2001 to work for bet365 and virtually all my mates are stoke season ticket holders and/or fans and have pretty much followed them since then tbh.

Will you also desert Stoke and go and follow another club when they become rubbish?  

I followed Leics through possibly the worst 5 years of their history in my lifetime (1985-1990) with crowds of sub 8000 on a regular basis at the old Filbert st so it's pretty hard to throw that one at me!  As soon as they started winning under O'Neill in the 90's i never went to any games.

[redarmi]

Yeah but you had that 2-0 victory at Ayresome Park to prevent Boro going up that, given how many times you mention it to me, was the highlight of your entire footbal watching life and kept you going.

[arbboy]

Yeah but you had that 2-0 victory at Ayresome Park to prevent Boro going up that, given how many times you mention it to me, was the highlight of your entire footbal watching life and kept you going.

It was the highlight of my life when talking to you about football.  Pretty scary day for a 14 year old lad getting out of that ground alive that day!