Port Vale 1977-78

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The 1977 – 1978 season saw Port Vale Finish in 21st place, they were relegated to the Fourth Division. Manager Roy Sproson was severely criticised for his poor judgement of players and seemed to place greater priority on his newsagent business than the club. Sproson did not attend a meeting in pre-season but was informed the board would review his position after fifteen games.

He was sacked in October after a poor start to the season and rejected the offer of an executive position at the club. Things did not improve under his replacement Bobby Smith, despite spending big money to bring in new players. Smith left the club at the end of the season. The Football Association also hit the club with a £500 fine for their continuing problem with player indiscipline, despite Sproson’s argument that no Vale players had been sent off in the last two years.

The Chatterley Whitfield Colliery site is acknowledged to be the most comprehensive survival of a deep mine site in England, with a range of surviving structures and buildings unequalled in any other former or surviving coalfield site in Britain.

Having supported our successful pottery industry with coal, the colliery was the largest in North Staffordshire and was the first to produce 1,000,000 tons of saleable coal in a year.

Coal extraction was first recorded in 1750, and the site remained in production until 1 March 1977. In 1978, the site became the Chatterley Whitfield Mining Museum, operated by the National Coal Board. In 1993, the museum went into liquidation, and the site was handed back to the freehold owner, Stoke-on-Trent City Council in 1994.