If you listen carefully, you can hear it.
The early beginnings of a huge roar; the first crackles of electricity. A fusion of noise and colour. Listen…it’s definitely there in my mind’s eye.
I recently about us being in the ‘Shadowlands’, a quiet place we reached after a lengthy battle, and where we can now rest and recover until we go again. In some mythical cultures, the Shadowlands are sustained by a life force that flows from the deceased.
Our forefathers who were part of the Roker Roar and the twelve pit deaths at Monkwearmouth Colliery in 1862 and 1869, directly under the Stadium of Light. The force from the departed miners, glass blowers and shipbuilders, all knitted into the fabric of this great club.
Soccer - Barclays Premier League - Sunderland v Fulham - Stadium of Light Photo by Owen Humphreys/PA Images via Getty Images
The roar was commented on by many visiting players and fans, none more so than in the potentially true story of a newspaper reporter seen hovering around Roker Park in 1973 after the FA Cup tie with Man City.
When asked what he was doing, he replied that it was a ‘great gimmick’, but where did we hide the speakers to make the crowd noise so very loud?
It’s been described as a coming together of fans cheering and shouting for their team, blended with the emotion and togetherness they feel for their club and community. A boring scientific theory is that the noise was picked up by the onshore breeze from the coast, and mixing with a dense sea fret resulted in a swirling cacophony of noise.
Whatever it is — it’s coming.
Be ready. This huge ship of a club was heading in the wrong direction. It’s gone through many stretches of choppy water in its history but since its refurbishment at the Stadium of Light, Ellis Short first put it into reverse.
Maybe it was a necessary evil, but perhaps Stewart Donald helped to slow the rate of knots at which we were going in the wrong direction, but Kyril Louis-Dreyfus and his team have managed to turn the vessel around and we’re now trying to pick up speed towards familiar waters.
Sheffield United v Sunderland - Sky Bet Championship Play-Off Final Photo by Alex Dodd - CameraSport via Getty Images
This is a mighty club on the banks of the silvery Wear.
Don’t let anyone tell you we’re not a big club — no matter what the definition of that may be — and never let anyone try to curtail history and trim it to fit their own criteria.
History is the past, the past in its entirety. Of the total number of top flight champions there have been, Sunderland are joint seventh, with Chelsea. Of the total number of seasons spent in the top division, we’re tenth, and of the total number of seasons spent in the Premier League, we’re fifteenth.
I can see the full beam of the Stadium of Light’s searchlight, reaching into the night sky as if calling everyone to arms. I’d love to see that back in working order and I can feel the rumblings of euphoria heading our way.
Native American Indian scouts used to put their ears to the ground to listen for the sound of horses’ hooves that might be approaching — and the great liner HMS Sunderland is picking up speed.
The excitement around the city and supporters is almost palpable and you listen carefully, you can hear it.