He could have mentioned Liverpool or Spurs, even Aston Villa, but Peter Crouch was quick to point out a salient fact when asked about his time as a Stoke City player.
While not going as far as saying the Potters were his favourite club, the big man did emphasise it was the place where he spent his longest spell as a player. And it was not 225 appearances endured either, with the beanpole striker declaring: “I loved it. Honestly, I absolutely loved it.”
Those 225 appearances in all competitions – and 46 goals – are comfortably ahead of anything he managed elsewhere. Liverpool come next (83 appearances), closely followed by Spurs (73), and there may have been higher profile games at Anfield and White Hart Lane, but Crouch says of his time as a Potter: “I spent eight years at Stoke, and I enjoyed every single moment of it.”
Crouch joined Stoke from Spurs for an initial club-record fee of £10m late into the night on transfer deadline day, August 31, 2011.
He told Rob Adcock on BBC Radio Stoke’s 8 Games To Go show : “When people ask me about the clubs I played for, everyone’s surprised to find out that it was my longest spell at any club.
“Eight years, and I enjoyed every single moment of it. Well, I say every single moment. Obviously, towards the end there were parts of it where I was becoming a little bit disillusioned by the way things were going. But certainly the first few years, and then the couple of years under Mark Hughes, where we finished in the top 10 three years on the bounce.”
In those days, under Tony Pulis as manager, Stoke were the team most rivals disliked to go to, and for good reason. The Likes of Liverpool (beaten 6-1), Arsenal (vanquished several times), Chelsea (with Jose Mourinho as boss) and Manchester City were all sent packing at headquarters.
As Crouch recalled: “Oh, we had some amazing games. I mean, there was that one against Liverpool. It was 5-0 at half time. And Arsenal, that was like a banker, you know. We’d look at the fixtures and go, ‘Right, Arsenal at home, another three points’. We were looking at it like that.
“We had a great spell – the FA Cup run, the European campaigns. There were a lot of pluses. And whenever I speak to Stoke fans, there’s always a lot of appreciation. It’s always good-natured, reminiscing about some really good times.
“It was a really good dressing room there, probably the best dressing room I’ve been involved with. Then obviously it kind of went the other way, it went too far, but it was a really, really good dressing room then. And I think it was that kind of team spirit that carried us through.”
