Neil Martin, 80

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ROKER PARK said:
I was devastated when he was sold. If my memory serves me well I think he was sold the day Ian McColl was sacked.
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Headline in the Chronicle was 'Mccoll sacked, Martin sold' the first but not the last of the melodrama I was to experience as a Safc fan.
 


Sandman said:
Headline in the Chronicle was 'Mccoll sacked, Martin sold' the first but not the last of the melodrama I was to experience as a Safc fan.
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Thanks for the confirmation. I wasn't sorry to see McColl go but Martin was a mainstay of the team and we struggled to replace him.
Sounds familiar doesn't it.
 
Greengroft said:
Bang them in Neil Martin bang them in..
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vinegar hill said:
A good centre forward was Neil Martin.
I remember in ‘67 when we stuffed the Mags 3-0 at Scum Park he scored a bullet header from a Len Ashurst diagonal cross in the Leazes End.
That was a great day.
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Happy Birthday Neil, I remember him well. A class act and a proper centre forward, bought from Hibs. He could get up above the goalies and always powerfully headed down and scored some crackers.
This was in comparison to Welshman and famous no 9 Wyn ' The Leap' Davies who got up well but nearly always headed upwards.Not a patch on Martin.
We beat the Mags 3-0 away and 3-0 at home. They couldn't live with Baxter who ran the show.
It was Neil and Jim Baxter who were the two Sunderland players named in the song ' The Red Flag ' -- flyin high.
Why we sold Neil to Coventry I'll never know. A massive miss and not replaced until we signed Dave Watson from Rotherham as a centre forward.
 
E Tenebris Lux said:
Happy Birthday Neil, I remember him well. A class act and a proper centre forward, bought from Hibs. He could get up above the goalies and always powerfully headed down and scored some crackers.
This was in comparison to Welshman and famous no 9 Wyn ' The Leap' Davies who got up well but nearly always headed upwards.Not a patch on Martin.
We beat the Mags 3-0 away and 3-0 at home. They couldn't live with Baxter who ran the show.
It was Neil and Jim Baxter who were the two Sunderland players named in the song ' The Red Flag ' -- flyin high.
Why we sold Neil to Coventry I'll never know. A massive miss and not replaced until we signed Dave Watson from Rotherham as a centre forward.
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Neil Martin was one of my all time favourite Centre Forwards for Sunderland. I was at that game at N'ctle when he scored that Header in the 3-0 win, what a win that was! I seem to recall that he always sort of twisted him body in mid-air as he rose to head the ball. It must have given him more momentum, before he powered-in another header.
All the best Neil.
 
Metro Man said:
Excellent player. Happy birthday!
Just googled him. He was playing alongside Duncan McKenzie for Notts Forest during the infamous fa cup 6th round pitch invasion at St James Park!

I was there but hadn't realised it was him.
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Was that the game where the mags were getting beat so they ran on the pitch?
 
Great player.

Happy birthday, Neil.
E Tenebris Lux said:
Happy Birthday Neil, I remember him well. A class act and a proper centre forward, bought from Hibs. He could get up above the goalies and always powerfully headed down and scored some crackers.
This was in comparison to Welshman and famous no 9 Wyn ' The Leap' Davies who got up well but nearly always headed upwards.Not a patch on Martin.
We beat the Mags 3-0 away and 3-0 at home. They couldn't live with Baxter who ran the show.
It was Neil and Jim Baxter who were the two Sunderland players named in the song ' The Red Flag ' -- flyin high.
Why we sold Neil to Coventry I'll never know. A massive miss and not replaced until we signed Dave Watson from Rotherham as a centre forward.
Click to expand...

Absolutely spot on.
 
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ROKER PARK said:
Thanks for the confirmation. I wasn't sorry to see McColl go but Martin was a mainstay of the team and we struggled to replace him.
Sounds familiar doesn't it.
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Absolutely and a later post says we sold him to Coventry which I'd completely forgotten about, another reason to dislike them!!
 
vinegar hill said:
A good centre forward was Neil Martin.
I remember in ‘67 when we stuffed the Mags 3-0 at Scum Park he scored a bullet header from a Len Ashurst diagonal cross in the Leazes End.
That was a great day.
Click to expand...
One of my favourite players and I was devastated when he was sold to Coventry. In reference to that 3-0 win at the Mags, in 'Black Catalogue' there's an eye-witness account of how Baxter was carried out of Wetherell's Night Club ,blind drunk, in the early hours of the morning, yet starred at St James Park just over 12 hours later!
 
Very good striker, our best No9 in the 64-70 spell in the First Division...sold him too soon, for sure. He had a very good partnership with Colin Suggett. Losing those two in pretty rapid succession undoubtedly led to our 1970 relegation.
The cheaper replacements we signed (Ralph Brand, Joe Baker) were past their best and just not up to it.
 
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