Any Sunderland supporters still needing a last-minute Halloween costume this year could perhaps throw a black sheet over their heads and claim to be Spottee, the spirit said to haunt the Stadium of Light.

The home of the Black Cats is reported to be one of the most haunted sporting venues in the UK with players and staff members over the years having reported sightings of a ghost in the ground’s corridors. Spottee is said to not only reside at the Wearside stadium but also around the club’s training ground in Cleadon.

The ghoulish story appears to have first come to light in April 2005, as the Championship season was drawing to a close for Mick McCarthy’s men. The mysterious figure was spotted as a dim shape in a corridor by staff members and even striker Stephen Elliot, who feared it may be a supernatural being. The BBC reported on the sighting on April 14, days after an eight-game unbeaten run had been ended at the Stadium of Light by Reading with some fearing the apparition could curse the club’s promotion campaign.

Sunderland went on to win the league that season, so that wasn’t the case, but top-scorer Marcus Stewart told BBC Radio Newcastle: “What made me think it’s true, is Stephen Elliott has seen it. He’s adamant that he’s seen something.”

The figure had also been spotted by backroom staff, who described Spottee as a ‘strange back shape’. The ghost is said by some to be an 18th-century fiend who guided ships to crash on the rocks.

Some eagle-eyed viewers watching Sky Sports coverage of a meeting between Sunderland and Everton in 2016 thought they too might have seen Spottee. During Monday Night Football, a figure appeared to walk onto the screen in the background and then suddenly disappear from the image altogether.

“Check out the ghost behind Phil Neville on MNF…,” one Twitter user wrote. Another added: “Groundsman disappears into the Stadium of Light Bermuda Triangle.”