Sunderland v Aston Villa: Guess the Score and help a good cause

When the glittering occasional prize of a Salut! Sunderland mug was reinstituted for the Everton game, it was a safe bet that Eric Bowers would win. After all, he’s already got three, though in fairness one was bought – making him as rare as, say, a priest who finds the painting he bought for £400 is a van Dyck worth £700,000.

The only snag was that he predicted a Sunderland win by a single goal at Goodison. We all knew that could never happen.

But happen it did, prompting this generous response from Eric:

It looks like my crystal ball is in full working order. However, as I am already the proud (?) owner of 3 mugs, would it be possible to put this one up for auction with the winner donating an amount to a charity of his/her choice (although what the charity will do with 1s 4d is beyond me). Cheers and roll on Cardiff. 1-0 if you’re interested.

Leaving aside his defamatory trashing of the mug’s value, the idea will be adopted for the Aston Villa game on New Year’s Day.

There’s no charity fascism here. You can have a go on the usual basis that it’s just for fun. But if you’d rather like a mug, and to offer modest help to a charity of your choice, add a sum of money of £10 or over to your comment predicting the scoreline and the name of the charity you wish to support.

If you choose that option and are right with the score, you get the mug but donate the nominated sum via Salut! Sunderland to your chosen good cause. So you win but also lose, albeit nobly.

Any reader can enter. A Villa fan would receive a mug with suitably modified design. If you want to make a charity entry but find the scoreline of your choice has already been taken, you have the option of bidding more. Therefore, the first to post the correct scoreline may not be the winner if someone later ups the stake.

I hope that’s clear. Monsieur Salut’s decision shall be final but, conscious of the state of his own finances immediately after Christmas, will make no criticism if no one opts for his refinement of Eric’s suggestion – and he would simply become the “proud (?) owner” of yet another mug.

Oh, and Ha’way the Lads.

Catch the Villa ‘Who are You?’ at https://safc.blog/2013/12/safc-vs-aston-villa-who-are-you-looks-too-tough-gus/

Extract:

Salut! Sunderland: Any thoughts on Sunderland – the club, the fans, the region?

Tom Joliffe (replying before our four-point Christmas): Decent club. Very passionate fans and generally easy to get along with. To some extent they have a similar outlook to Villa fans generally. We’re laid back, we like a bit of gallows humour, we like a bit of moan too, but we’re generally not arrogant, nor complete doom mongers. I think Sunderland have the basis to cement themselves in the Premier League. The right man at the helm and a bit of stability will eventually make that happen. Poyet could be that man, but you’ll probably have to go down, before coming up again.