Calum Mills says…
We’ve had some absolute belters over the years so this is a tough one, but my favourite is Allan ‘Magic’ Johnston.
He’s the first winger I can remember in a Sunderland shirt and although he left under a bit of a cloud, I only have good memories of watching him. He was brilliant in our 105-point, title-winning promotion season under Reidy.
An ever-present in the team, he ran defenders ragged, loved a step over and had a penchant for finding the top corner. It was a shame we never saw him playing for Sunderland
in the Premier League!
Ewan Bowman says…
For me, it can only be one man: Nicky Summerbee.
A hugely vital player in the Peter Reid era, his crossing ability was up there with the best players in the country, consistently picking out the likes of Niall Quinn and Kevin Phillips in the box.
People compared his crossing ability to David Beckham and I actually agree with the statement. He never had to beat a man to get a cross into the box — Summerbee turned this into an art.
A fantastic player during a successful era for our club.
John Wilson says…
I’ve seen some magical wingers during my six decades of watching the Lads, so sometimes choices like this are akin to choosing a favourite child, or a favourite album or song.
I have a ‘go-to’ department in my brain where I’ve thought about these sorts of dilemmas many times, and have decided on an answer for future reference!
So, favourite winger? ‘Little’ Stan Cummins.
The ‘little’ always seems to get tagged onto his name, but what an exciting player he was — like a magician on the ball. Many a time, he’d be marked by two or even three opponents but like a rabbit out of a hat, he’d appear with the ball.
I have a distinct memory of him being surrounded by three defenders at 5”6 and nine stone wet through. I lost sight of him towards the Clock Stand corner flag and fully expected their defenders to come away with the ball, but out from the crowd came ‘Little Stan’ to get his cross in.
An absolute joy to watch and unusually for those times, he regularly flirted with the USA.
Although a Middlesbrough apprentice, we got him from Minnesota Kicks, where he was out on loan. We loaned him back out to America after two years, to Seattle Sounders, before he had a second spell with us from 1983, before finishing his career at Kansas City Comets.
He made 159 appearances for Sunderland, scoring thirty two goals. He could shift with the ball stuck to his boot; his size became irrelevant and he popped up with some very vital goals for the Rokerites.
Jon Guy says…
My fellow writers have picked some of our outstanding wingers but I’m going to show my age and say I always loved watching Colin Pascoe in that side won promotion in 1990 and beyond.
He was everything we needed in that side, feeding the ‘G-Force’. He was a hardworking winger and not the type of winger you only saw when he had the ball at his feet, putting in a real shift when out of possession.
He was a bit of an unsung hero at a time when Marco Gabbiadini and Eric Gates grabbed the headlines, so I’m going for the Welsh wing wizard Pascoe.
