Ex-Sunderland man reveals 'terrible' dressing room under ex-Rangers star and bizarre Newcastle United story

Former Sunderland favourite Lee Howey has discussed Terry Butcher's tenure as Sunderland's player-manager.

In February 1993, Butcher was named manager of Sunderland and re-registering himself as a player two years after his last game.

The England legend achieved survival at the end of the 1992-93 season, but was sacked the following December after a run of poor results.

Seaham-born Howey played under Butcher at Roker Park during his early days at Sunderland having signed for his boyhood club during the same season as the former Rangers player's arrival on Wearside.

Howey, however, states that Butcher lost the dressing room at Sunderland and deployed an interesting motivational tactic ahead of a derby game against Newcastle.

Asked what the club and dressing room was like at Sunderland under Terry Butcher by the UnderTheCosh Podcast, Howey replied: "Terrible. It was terrible when I signed...

"To me, Terry Butcher was an absolute icon, a hero. I had watched him put foot through doors, I watched him nearly strangle Gary Speed. I watched him do so much but as a manager, he was awful."

"It was them and us," continued Howey. "He seemed to alienate the likes of Gordon Armstrong and just got on people's goats, to be honest. There was always arguments.

"At times, we would play bad and obviously Terry was player-manager and he would just it there and he wouldn't say anything - then someone like Don (Goodman) would say, 'Are you going to say anything?' And then it would all kick off again.

"There was once we were playing Newcastle and it was absolutely lashing down, it should have been called off but it was live on TV. We had just come back from Scotland and he (Butcher) was missing, nobody had seen him. It was an hour before, 45 minutes before.

"And then he turns up with his head shaved saying 'no surrender' and we had Irish lads from the Republic of Ireland. I knew what the connotations were. People thought he was joking.

"The first thing Butch does when we go out is get the ball and hoofs it out. We got beat 1-0 and it should have been nine."