Niall Quinn recalls his best Sunderland moment, trying to hire Louis Van Gaal and a brilliant Cantona tale

Piper has been sharing them with fans on twitter, and has recorded with the likes of Stephen Elliot and Julio Arca.

In one of his recent episodes, he spoke to Niall Quinn about some of his best Sunderland memories...

His best Sunderland moment….

"I think the one that sticks out is my header against the Mags. Micky Gray whipped one in from the far corner flag and I was galloping up the pitch.

"I was a bit slow getting there as we had been defending a corner and I ran as fast as I can and I got there just in time, planted a header in the corner and beat Shay Given.

“I went up to Micky and the fans. We had about 700 fans up in the gods like pigeons and I remember looking up to them and thinking that was the moment my Sunderland career pivoted.

"It was just a great time. They show it occasionally on TV and it sort of brings back the goosebumps.

“It was something else in those days.

"We used to finish regularly in the top half of the Premier League and there was such a buzz around the place.

“Middlesbrough were getting to cup finals, Newcastle were getting to the Champions League and we were knocking on the door of different things and we had the golden boot winner in Kevin Phillips.

“It was a great time for the North East.

"But that one day when I scored a header against Newcastle is the best moment of it all."

Something a lot of fans won’t know….

“We made an audacious bid to try and lure Louis van Gaal to Sunderland in my time as chairman.

"I don't know if anybody knows about it but he did speak to us, his wife spoke to us and he was just in between jobs.

"Everything was looking nice but he kind of got a bigger offer.

“I was dreaming a little bit but he was really good with us. He spoke to us, his wife spoke to us another time.

"We were just giving him the details of what the project will look like and it was one to one, really good, but unfortunately, he had bigger fish to fry."

One of Quinn’s funniest Sunderland stories...

“I got substituted against Manchester United at Old Trafford with about 20 minutes to go.

“Eric Cantona picked the ball up and waltzed through about three of our players, chipped the goalkeeper Lionel Perez, and famously turned round to take the adulation from the Old Trafford faithful, he put his collar up if you remember and struck that pose.

“When he scored, our kitman John Cooke, he's a Manchester United fan born and bred.

“As soon as Cantona scored, he jumps up and sticks his hand up in the air.

“Everyone looked at him and he just went, 'offside ref!'

“Everyone was giggling but Peter Reid was going to kill him.”