Stoke-on-Trent

Stoke-on-Trent is a city in Staffordshire, in the English West Midlands, with around 258,000 inhabitants at the 2021 census. It was created on 1 April 1910 by the federation of six towns, Burslem, Fenton, Hanley, Longton, Stoke-upon-Trent and Tunstall, and was granted city status on 5 June 1925. It is the home of the English pottery industry, known as 'The Potteries', where firms such as Wedgwood, Spode and Royal Doulton were founded or based. The Trent and Mersey Canal, completed in 1777, made it possible to bring in china clay from Cornwall, which fed the production of creamware and bone china.

Football is central to the city: Stoke City, founded in 1863 and described as the second-oldest professional football club in England, have played at the bet365 Stadium since 1997 and won the League Cup in 1972, their only major trophy. Their most celebrated figure, Stanley Matthews, was the first active footballer to be knighted, and the city has two statues of him. The other professional club, Port Vale, founded in 1876, play at Vale Park in Burslem.

Stoke-on-Trent was European City of Sport 2016. For that year the city council committed £3.5 million to a sports programme designed to run beyond 2016 and leave a lasting legacy. It then handed the baton to Bristol, European City of Sport 2017, within the British representation in the ACES network.