Billed as the “must have retro football annual”, Studs! is an intriguing collection of cuttings from the long running Shoot magazine.

Covering the 70’s and 80’s the book is a refreshing reminder of how uncomplicated and fun football was before the stylists and advertising men took over. Unguarded features with the players at home show how detached modern day footballer’s can be in comparison to their older counterparts, who played during a much more innocent, and naff, time.

Although actually intended to be a coffee table book more than anything else, it’s quite hard to put down – and every turn of the page brings another indication of how just two decades ago can seem like being light years away. To be fair, there aren’t that many direct Sunderland references, although quite a few players are included before or after their time with the club, like Pop Robson whilst at West Ham; “Bryan wanted a new car to go with his new house – and chose a Volkswagen”. See what I mean? It’s a far cry from the unobtainable lifestyle led by your Ashley Cole’s and Rio Ferdinand’s, although I bet it could get quite lively at Asa Hartford’s house when his matchbook collection came out.

Complier Ronay must be a fan of Eric Gates’ marra Malcolm MacDonald for some reason as he gets quite a few acknowledgements, but the one real attention grabber for Mackem readers is a few paragraphs buried in the middle of the delightfully titled “Donny Osmond was smuggled into Spurs looking like a tramp” article – yet another delightful 1973 anecdote from a game that seems to have impacted on the rest of the country as much as it did around here; (although earlier in the book “Showbiz Stars” Freddie ‘Parrotface’ Davies had predicted that Man. Utd. would win the Cup that year, whilst Lovelace Watkins no less plumped for Man. City)

‘Sweet lead singer Brian Connolly is a Spurs fan, but is also a close pal of Billy Hughes. “I did a very clever deal with Billy. I swapped my silver disc, which I got for selling a quarter of a million copies of ‘Little Willie’, for his complete playing strip from that Cup Final. I got the better part of the bargain because given luck we’ll get quite a few more silver of gold discs. But Billy’s strip is something special.”

Brain admits that on that Cup Final day he became a trespasser at Wembley and could have been thrown out!

“There was so much panic and fuss round the dressing room area that I was able to slide into the Sunderland pad and actually slip champagne from the Cup ITSELF! If the Wembley officials had found out I’d sneaked through, there would surely have been trouble. Being a mate of Billy Hughes would have been no excuse on my part.”’

That’s pretty much it for the Lads, but it is still well worth getting a copy if you like a giggle – with the assorted ‘You Are The Ref’ sections in particular again highlighting what a different world people lived in during the 1970’s. Some may remember a similar set up in the club’s home programme’s during the late 80’s and early 90’s so you can try these two on for size (copied word for word)…

“You are refereeing a charity match between teams of stage personalities when one player, a well-known comedian, decides to add a little fun to the game by lighting up a large cigar, is there any objection to this?”

“One of the players of a visiting African team prefers to play without boots. Does this matter?”

The answers to this, and many similar posers can be found amongst the scores of player profiles and quaint adverts packed within the purposefully garish covers. Anybody that got hold of The Best of Charles Buchan’s Football Monthly at Christmas will already have an idea of what the book is about, although the quality of the subject matter means it has been done with a little less reverence, and a lot more irony.

I’m told the old Topical Times Football Annuals can do quite well on eBay etc at the moment, but at £9.99 you might be better off just getting a copy of this great little book instead – it’ll keep the younger fans amused whilst you go up in the loft looking for your old Snoccer set – the answer to that long asked question of “How do you play Soccer and Snooker together?”

Andrew Smithson