Having only replaced Johnny Cochrane in the March, Bill Murray was still taking early steps as Sunderland boss come August 1939. A former player under Cochrane, Murray knew the standards expected at Roker Park and his long-term vision was to get the club back to where it had been prior to his predecessor’s final season, when the 1936 league and 1937 cup winners fell away badly from their previous heights.
An 1939-40 opening day win over Derby County had suggested that good things were back in the
offing, but the game that followed, which took place on this day in 1939, quickly tempered those expectations. Visitors Huddersfield Town left Sunderland with both points courtesy of a much more rounded performance, and their superior organisation only emphasised just how much work needed to be done by the Lads if they were to one again become a consistent force.
At the back the hosts were indecisive and struggled to mark up, while the forward play rarely got into gear. Press reports the following day suggested that a failure on the part of the officials to clamp down on a string of borderline fouls by Huddersfield did not help in that regard, but the main issues appeared to stem from captain Raich Carter taking ‘a knock’ and being unable to move as freely as usual. His teammates were criticised for not stepping up to fill the void, and the only player to come out of the clash with any credit was stopper Johnny Mapson, who it was agreed could have done little with either of Town’s goals.
There was some debate about an early opener from Clem Stephenson’s side, with some onlookers feeling strongly that Billy Price’s header went straight in, even though the referee recorded the strike as an own goal off Jimmy Gorman, who had challenged Price for the cross. Carter did level things up after half an hour, but Price got a winner in the closing stages, and few fans were arguing with the outcome as they departed in the minutes that followed. Whilst pondering on their journey home about what to expect from their team next however, there were growing doubts as to whether football would even be taking place in the coming weeks, and whether the headaches of a supporter watching a side in transition were to become the least of anybody’s worries.
Anybody who had bought a newspaper prior to the game will have found the front page to be awash with updates on growing international tension and the alarming prospect of a second world war. The Sunderland Echo and Shipping Gazette for instance told of French radio having to be handed over to military authorities and continued talks between various European powers, with an accompanying image of workmen building a precautionary sandbag wall in front of the Royal Infirmary. There was also a rather foreboding piece about helmet and respirator arrangements for Sunderland parents, who were being informed of demonstration and collection points at various schools. Redby, Hudson Road, Cowan Terrace, Thomas Street, Commercial Road, Hylton Road, Diamond Hall, High Southwick, James William Street and Barnes were all venues at which children could be kitted out, with specially adapted versions being made available for infants.
It all made for sobering reading and presumably impacted the atmosphere at the match, no matter how much people wanted going to the game to be an escape. Amongst those in attendance at Roker were soldiers and sailors in uniform that had already been called up for the emergency and were given half price entry as a consequence – assuming that they were willing to enter the group via what was normally considered the ‘boys gate’ – yet the performance on the pitch will have done little for the general morale of the area. Some may have wanted to make the most of it still though, suspecting that this would be their last visit for some time.
By the time of the following weekend’s game at Arsenal, Poland had been invaded by German forces, and larger scale war was inevitable. It was agreed that the Highbury game would kick off at 17:00, later than first scheduled, when emergency timetable public transport would be under less strain and a hastily arranged evacuation of nearby children had been completed. Football was of secondary importance, and it wasn’t long before the Derby, Huddersfield and Arsenal scores were expunged from the official records; Murray, rather than plotting a rebuild, spent his time overseeing fitness training for troops based in Country Durham and Roker Park, quickly earmarked as an evacuation zone, otherwise sat largely idol for the next two years.
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Saturday 30 August 1939
Football League Division One
Sunderland 1 (Carter 33’)
Huddersfield Town 2 (Gorman o.g. 4’, Price 80’)
Sunderland: Mapson; Gorman, Hall; Housam, Lockie, Hastings; Duns, Carter, Robinson, Smeaton, Burbanks.
Roker Park, attendance 16,315
