Stoke City: Fans want to carry on singing Delilah at the Britannia Stadium

Stoke City supporters have defended their right to use the Tom Jones song 'Delilah' as their unofficial club anthem.

The song has come under fire this week with former Plaid Cymru president Dafydd Iwan calling on Wales rugby fans, who have long since sung the No 2 hit from 1968 at international matches, to find another song to blast out to try and inspire their players.

Iwan claims the original lyrics of the song "trivialise the idea of murdering a woman" but the Welsh Rugby Union is disinclined to ban the song.

Stoke fans have been singing Delilah, first at the Victoria Ground and then the Britannia Stadium, since the 1980s although the lyrics have been altered to make them X-rated.

Bryan Shaw, a spokesman for the Stoke City Supporters' Club, said: "It's just a song we sing to encourage the team.

"I don't think anybody among the fans would ever even think it has anything to do with domestic violence.

"It's all tongue-in-cheek and I'm sure it's just an issue of today's society where 99 per cent of the country just get on with it but someone looks for a hidden meaning."

A spokesman for the Welsh Rugby Union, quoted by the South Wales Evening Post, said: "Within rugby, Delilah has gained prominence through its musicality rather than because of its lyrics.

"There is, however, plenty of precedent in art and literature, prominently in Shakespearean tragedies for instance, for negative aspects of life to be portrayed.

"The Welsh Rugby Union condemns violence against women and has taken a lead role in police campaigns to highlight and combat the issue.

"The WRU remains willing to listen to any strong public debate on the issue of censoring the use of Delilah but we have not been aware of any groundswell of opinion on this matter."