Roker Park

Infobox_Stadium
stadium_name = Roker Park
nickname =


location = Sunderland, England
broke_ground =
opened = 1898
closed = 1997
demolished = 1997
owner = Sunderland A.F.C.
operator =
surface = Grass
construction_cost =
architect = Archibald Leitch
former_names =
tenants = Sunderland A.F.C. (1898-1997)
seating_capacity = Initially: 30,000
Record attendance: 75,118

Roker Park was an English football stadium situated in Roker, Sunderland. The stadium was the home of the English football club Sunderland A.F.C. from 1898 to 1997 before the club moved on to the Stadium of Light. Near the end of the stadium's history, it's capacity was around 30,000 with only a small part of the stadium being seated. Despite this, the stadium's capacity had been higher in previous years, attracting a record crowd of 75,118. [cite web
url=http://www.stadiumguide.com/rokerpark.htm
title=The stadium guide, roker park
accessdate= 2008-03-28
publisher=stadiumguide.com]

History

In the 1890s, the then Sunderland chairman and his brother decided to build a bigger ground for the club, to replace what was then the club's current ground at Newcastle Road. The club had negotiated to buy farmland that belonged to a Mr. Tennant and part of the agreement was that sunderland would have to build a house on the site as well as their new stadium. Until this house was built, Sunderland still had to pay rent on the land.

Within a year of the land being bought, Roker Park had been built, with the wooden stands only taking three months to build. The Clock Stand had 32 steps, no seats, and a crush barrier for safety. The turf was brought from Ireland, and was of such a high quality that it lasted for 37 years. The pitch was designed to have a slight drop of about one foot from the centre of the pitch to each corner to help with drainage. On 10 September 1898 Roker Park was officially opened by Charles Vane-Tempest-Stewart, 6th Marquess of Londonderry. The first match at Roker Park was a friendly against Liverpool F.C. which Sunderland won 1-0, with Jim Leslie scoring the stadium's first ever goal.

The Roker End was concreted in 1912, and by 1913 the capacity had risen to 50,000.Then in 1929 the old wooden grandstand was demolished and replaced by a new Main Stand, which was designed by Archibald Leitch, whose influence, the criss-cross lattice work, can still be seen at Ibrox (Rangers), Home Park (Plymouth Argyle) and Goodison Park (Everton). The work on the new Main Stand nearly bankrupted the club. By this time the official capacity of Roker Park was 60,000 but at some matches they would have crowds as large as 75,000. More work continued in the 1930s and in 1936 the Clock Stand was rebuilt. The 114 m (375 ft) long structure was officially opened by Lady Raine, whose husband was Sir Walter Raine, the Chairman of Sunderland AFC at the time.

A bomb landed in the middle of the pitch during the Second World War, killing a policeman who was walking past the ground. In 1952, Roker Park was fitted with floodlights, being only the second ground in the country to do so after Arsenal's Highbury stadium. The lights were only a temporary addition, and were replaced by permanent structures at the end of the season after proving to be a success. When England hosted the 1966 World Cup, improvements were made to the Clock Stand, involving the addition of seats, and a roof over the Fulwell End.

During the 1970s, there were even more improvements to Roker Park. These improvements included installing underground sprinklers, upgrading the floodlights to European Standard Lux Value, installing electronic crowd monitoring systems, and re-sheeting the roof. In the 1980s, with a downturn in the club's fortunes (which included a season in the Football League Third Division), Roker Park started to see a demise. The capacity was severely reduced, with the Roker End suffering the most.

In the early 1990s, new FA rules after the publication of the Taylor Report meant the stadium would have to have been upgraded to all-seater status, which would have consisted of a much smaller capacity than the sort of attendances that Sunderland could expect, as they had played in the penultimate First Division campaign (1990-91 season) before the creation of the Premier League and were aiming for a swift return to the top flight (although promotion was ultimately not achieved until the 1995-96 season).

The site was too confined for expansion, so chairman Bob Murray decided to look for a site for a new stadium. In 1992, plans were unveiled to build a 48,000-seat stadium near the Nissan car factory in Washington, which would be part of a mega leisure complex, but Nissan objected to such a site being developed near their headquarters. Instead, five years later in 1997, Sunderland moved to the Stadium of Light, in nearby Monkwearmouth, on the site of the closed Monkwearmouth Colliery.

And so Roker Park was demolished after being the home of Sunderland for 99 years; the last game being a specially-organised friendly against Liverpool, which Sunderland won 1-0, with John Mullin scoring the ground's final goal (the final competitive game being a 3-0 Premier League victory against Everton, with Allan Johnston scoring the final league goal). In a special ceremony after the final game Charlie Hurley (voted the club's Player of the Century) dug up the centre spot of the ground for it to be planted at the new stadium. The site of the old stadium was redeveloped for housing. The name Roker Park will be always remembered for the passion and atmosphere that the fans of Sunderland AFC created, and it is such a testament to this that the noise of the supporters received its own unique name - 'The Roker Roar'.

References