Sid and Robin at the Vikings Stadium in Minneapolis ahead of a Chelsea friendly against AC Milan
One of the many joys of the various seasons’ editions of ‘Who are You?’ has been the way it has unearthed sparkling anecdotes, unexpected encounters between supporters, or supporters and players and/or officials and fascinating details of people’s lives. David Millward* has been here before, telling us about his allegiance to Chelsea but, much more interesting, recounting the story or why everyone calls him Sid. An uncle was the British bandleader Sid Millward (of Nitwits fame, no less) and the tale is told here .. Sid is now in the USA from where he sends this welcome set of answers to our questions, thus ending the 2016-2017 series. We learn, for example, that he was dumb-struck by the shortness of girls’ skirts on a cold Wearside night and also how much he loathes the sight of sponsorship advertising on players’ tops …
Last game of the season means last of the 2016-2017 ‘Who are You?’ interviews. We have not one but two from Chelsea supporters (a consequence of Monsieur Salut panicking unnecessarily and fearing we might get none). Mark Williams* comes to us via a Sunderland supporter, his friend and occasional Salut! Sunderland contributor Jim Minton. If you ever need to catch the pair of them and there happens to be an African Cup of Nations tournament on, that’s where to head. They make it each time but be aware the next one is not until January 2019. Book now for Cameroon … and thanks Mark for a splendidly thoughtful set of responses …
Jim Minton and his Chelsea-supporting pal Mark Williams at the Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon in January
Chelsea secured the Premier League title by beating West Brom a week ago. On the day of the 38th and final Premier League games for each club, the Blues will meet Sunderland at Stamford Bridge. Several football predictions go with a victory for the home team.
Just before the start of the 2012-2013 season, Dom Raynor, then editor of ESPN FC, invited me to contribute regular articles on Sunderland to the club-by-club section of the site. These days, I am so used to being asked to work for nothing that I was surprised to discover they proposed to pay for these services. It wasn’t much, but there was demand for sufficient items each month to make it seem like gainful employment.
When I have been absent, Pete Sixsmith has stepped in, as admirably as you’d expect from him, and I owe him one last payment for his excellent report from a game we actually won, at Hull City.
The ESPN FC’s interest in English football is naturally concentrated on the Premier League. When teams go down, so do the writers of blog reports on those clubs’ pages. Seats may or may not be kept warm, but the gig necessarily comes to an end.
After five seasons, and with grateful thanks to Dom’s totally professional successor Alexander Shaw, it feels like a a bit of a wrench though Mme Salut will be pleased to reclaim weekends (little does she know I intend to attend every home and away match, all Under 23 games and the entire SAFC Ladies programme while still finding time for non-Sunderland football on all other days). She always said I promised to rattle off pieces in half an hour; they may sometimes look that way, but always take a little longer.
Here is my preview of the final game of the season, and therefore my final preview for ESPN FC at least for now. My brief report and marks out of 10 will appear as soon as possible after the Chelsea game on Sunday, there will then be a bit of mopping up, end-of-season assessment sort of stuff and then that will be that …
John McCormick writes: it’s good to see Pete Sixsmith keeping up to date with education matters; that GCSEs are now graded 1-9 had passed me by. I bet M Salut knew, too, he might even have a maths grade to be proud of.
Pete also keeps up to date with football, of course, and although his Premier League season may be over he made his way to the Stadium of Light to join an impressive 18,000 others in watching the youth team take on a group of players who know what it’s like to play week in, week out, in a thoroughly competitive and professional setting.
Pete Sixsmith’s season done, the baton is handed once again to Robert Chapman, ever present even though home games involve a 460-mile round trip. After the Swansea mess, he might have been forgiven for not bothering with the remaining away games, closer to home though they may be for him. He stuck to his principles and was pleasantly surprised at Arsenal, not by the predictable result but by the effort he witnessed from our side …
When we were finally relegated against Bournemouth the other week, my wife asked whether I would bother going to the remaining fixtures.
Even I, the eternal optimist, knew we were going to be relegated some time ago. I told her that as long as the team tried – by which I mean giving 100 per cent – I would carry on to the bitter end.
Monsieur Salut writes: I have offered the view of Sunderland AFC as I understand it at this link. Here is Pete Sixmsith with a wonderful tribute to Rob Mason, reluctantly departing editor of the award-winning SAFC matchday programme …
One of the consequences of relegation is that there are changes behind the scenes. Players move on to better things if they are lucky but those who work in hospitality, ticketing and admin find that their services are no longer required as there is less demand for pre-match entertainment when the visitors are Cardiff rather than Chelsea.
One of those leaving is Rob Mason who has edited the club programme for many years. He is a supporter who has always attended games, coming back from university at Sheffield to watch the lads in the early 70s. The programme he has produced has been consistently excellent, rarely reflecting the action on the pitch in that it was interesting, well put together and was most certainly value for money.
Rob Mason, departing editor of Sunderland AFC’s matchday programme, was – as has been noted here previously – utterly dignified and devoid of rancour in his pre-match conversation with Nick Barnes on BBC Radio Newcastle.
He then endured the 2-0 defeat to Swansea; take 10 percent from the fat wages of the men and leader of men involved in that sad spectacle and you’d probably fund Rob’s pay packet several times over. Pete Sixsmith has written a magnificent tribute to Rob, the man he knows as well as the programme editor he knows, and I do not wish to dilute that with this exercise in context and balance. But there is context, and maybe balance, whether or not you agree with the points being made. Pete’s piece follows here …
With apologies to the late Lesley Gore and the writers of her pop classic – it took no fewer than four of them: Walter Gold John Gluck Jr, Herb Weiner Seymour Gottlieb, and their song of teenage betrayal was elevated to new heights in the 1981 version of the non-Eurythmics, non-Sunderland Dave Stewart and Barbar Gaskin – Sunday afternoon is party time. Chelsea fans will be en fete, ours will make the most of their day, too, before taking their leave of the Premier League.
To adapt the song’s best couplet: Everybody knows where my Sunderland have gone/ But Judy (David Moyes?) left the same time
And here’s is a special prize edition of Guess the Score …
I wouldn’t have bothered putting Januzaj on, wouldn’t even have bothered telling him to turn up.
But other than that, I can’t really disagree with David Moyes today, given that Arsenal really did need to win to give themselves a top four chance, and they really did have to make an effort to get that win.
Jake: ‘come on Jordan. Just give us one more season. Please’
Monsieur Salut writes: Pete Sixsmith has done with Sunderland for this season, at least as far as attending games is concerned. You will not see his seven-word verdict but Bob Chapman’s.
After the awfulness of the last home game, our Lads at least mustered defiance and occasional threat. Forget the overwhelming dominance of the stats – shots on goals, corners and so on. Arsenal were forced to fight for this win. Jordan Pickford was superb, Billy Jones stuck as well as anyone might to Alexis Sanchez and was perhaps unlucky that the Chilean scored both goals and Jermain Defoe ran and ran. Even Januzaj ran in his cameo substitute’s appearance. Effort and concentration of this sort, much more often, would have added some points to a miserable tally …
