Colin Randall - SAFC Blog

A look back at what Salut! Sunderland’s Sixer made of Shrewsbury Town and its meadows

October 24, 2019 by Colin Randall

NB: we’re back after our technical problems – but you, the readers, aren’t yet back as fully as we’d like. Unfortunately, you cannot post comments. We are working on this.

In the meantime, you can always have your say on anything that appears here, or for that matter any SAFC topics which do not, at Salut! Sunderland’s Facebook group. Click on any of the preceding four words. If you are told that you need to join the group, you can do so easily. Approval is very quick.

If you do try to post a comment here, it will be stored in our beneath-the-bonnet files and one of these days, one of us will get round to reproducing them all …

Colin Randall writes: an appalling admission but yes, this is my debut for the season. Just back from France before the drawbridge is raised, I am heading for Shrewsbury hoping to witness an away win to match Phil Parkinson’s stomping first experience of being in charge of a home game. Pete Sixsmith’s superb series on his own first encounters with Sunderland’s opposing teams and their grounds ran its course last season. Here, though, is a reminder of one of its many fine moments – memories of both the old Gay Meadow ground and its successor, New Meadow …

Sixer’s Sevens. Sunderland 5 Tranmere Rovers 0. Can’t be bad!

October 22, 2019 by Colin Randall

NB: our technical problems have not been completely fixed. Readers cannot post comments. We are working on this.

In the meantime, you can always have your say on anything that appears here, or for that matter any SAFC topics which do not, at Salut! Sunderland’s Facebook group. Click on any of the preceding four words. If you are told that you need to join the group, you can do so easily. Approval is very quick.

Pete Sixsmith returned from a well-earned break to find the site laid low by technical issues and a team laid low by technical superiority.

Could a quick return to the Stadium of Light provide an opportunity for the team to recover? His seven-word, post-game text, not to mention the result, would seem to suggest it could.

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A View From the Avenue: the Sunderland ‘shambles’ Parkinson must put right

October 22, 2019October 21, 2019 by Colin Randall

Paul Summerside: ‘the worst football I’ve witnessed here in 51 years’ years’

NB: our technical problems have not been completely fixed. Readers cannot post comments. We are working on this.

Monsieur Salut writes: we are repeatedly urged to resist the temptation to nurture unreasonable expectations, an inflated sense of self-importance and Mag-like delusions of grandeur. But you do not need to be a social media keyboard warrior, letting rip after 21 pints of lager, to worry about the state of Sunderland AFC. Phil Parkinson cannot fairly be judged on one sub-standard team performance after only two or three days in charge of a team that had been producing something similar all season (except in the slightly unreal world of the League Cup). He may, for all we know, prove just the man to get the best out of the well-paid but seriously under-achieving players he inherits.

If supporters’ confidence is not to be battered further, the process should ideally start with a convincing win against Tranmere Rovers tomorrow night. It will take one to restore a little of Paul Summerside‘s faith in the club he has followed for half a century.

Some of his thoughts describe a long-term malaise that cannot be blamed on the present ownership and management structure. His criticisms will seem unduly harsh to some of those at whom they are levelled; it is undoubtedly true that plenty of time remains this season for a meaningful revival to transform both our position and fans’ morale. The pages of Salut! Sunderland are open for those wishing to respond …

Sunderland vs Tranmere Rovers: hoping for that delayed new manager bounce

October 22, 2019October 21, 2019 by Colin Randall

NB: our technical problems have not been completely fixed. Readers cannot post comments. We are working on this.

In the Premier League, we moaned as Sunderland put in one rotten display after another. In the Championship, it was the same as, far from pushing for immediate promotion, we disintegrated as a side and almost as a club.

Last season, we whinged about all those draws. Yet we reached Wembley twice and nearly got back up again, gifted an own goal in the opening minutes of the playoff final only to devise a way of losing.

And this season, we find ourselves with a new manager rather earlier in the season than appeared in the script. And in 10th place after more rotten displays, most recently a 1-0 defeat at mighty Wycombe Wanderers.

Sixer’s Sevens from Wycombe (or Prague): anywhere to avoid seeing another SAFC stumble

October 22, 2019October 20, 2019 by Colin Randall

NB: our technical problems have not been completely fixed. Readers cannot post comments. We are working on this.

In the meantime, you can always have your say on anything that appears here, or for that matter any SAFC topics which do not, at Salut! Sunderland’s Facebook group. Click on any of the preceding four words. If you are told that you need to join the group, you can do so easily. Approval is very quick.

Pete Sixsmith abandoned Sunderland AFC for the weekend, beetling off to Prague for a well-earned break and a chance to develop his skills in avoiding pickpockets. Even from there, even with the site laid low by technical issues, he knew what the defeat meant – or will mean unless Phil Parkinson gets a very avergae-looking squad playing properly …

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The Chapman Report from Wycombe: ‘so lacking in threat that with Ross, it would have turned nasty’

October 20, 2019 by Colin Randall

Monsieur Salut writes: abject apologies to all our readers. A technical issue shut us down for a while but we now appear to be at least on our way back to normality. Bob Chapman once again filled Sixer’s boots in style and ought to have a cheerful match report to offer. But hey, this is – as we well know only took well – Sunderland. Phil Parkinson can hardly be blamed having been in charge for only three days. Where we go from here – a lowly 10th – is anyone’s guess …

With the knowledge that there was a south of Lincoln match embargo in operation, I contacted Pete
to find out who was going to do the match report from Wycombe.

He informed me that he was in Prague with an ex Ferryhill colleague of ours, Peter Malkin and would I mind volunteering for the task.

Thinking that this was the start of a new era I readily confirmed that I would be more than happy to oblige as there would undoubtedly be plenty of positives to report back on.

Wycombe Wanderers vs Sunderland: a good one to win from ninth place

October 16, 2019October 15, 2019 by Colin Randall

Jake: ‘must be the kind fo game we have to win’

At first glance, the League one table makes for depressing perusal. Sunderland and down to ninth and are now eight points behind the convincing leaders, Ipswich Town, with no games in hand.

The second glance makes it seem more respectable. We are just one point behind a top six place and have two games in hand over Blackpool in sixth with the same pathetic goal difference of +2.

This Saturday’s opponents, Wycombe Wanderers, are second and only four points ahead of SAFC having played one game more. So leave aside Ipswich’s so far exemplary sprint to the top and we remain competitive.

Ross In. A dignified but incisive valedictory: ‘I leave with head held high’

October 11, 2019October 11, 2019 by Colin Randall

‘I reflect on two Wembley finals, one home league defeat, victories over Premier League opposition and overall progression’

A lot of Salut! Sunderland readers go nowhere near Twitter and as one who spends far too much time there, Monsieur Salut can but say: “Bear with me. I am hopeful of finding a cure.”

But I must admit I have been flabbergasted by the names that have been more or less officially linked with the search for a successor to Jack Ross – and what those names say about our status and ambition.

First we hear in effect that Ross was not good enough. “.. with three quarters of the season remaining, we did not feel things were going as well as they should be,” our executive director and my own former colleague Charlie Methven tells The Daily Telegraph.

Sunderland’s lengthening list of promotion rivals: Ipswich, plus Rotherham, Peterborough, Portsmouth and Doncaster (or Wycombe, Fleetwood, Blackpool and Coventry)

October 11, 2019 by Colin Randall

Another weekend without football, another weekend providing space to keep our readers – and pundits – up to date with our chosen clubs. If you think as far back as the start of the season you’ll probably recall six clubs being selected by our readership as the most likely to finish in the top six slots come the end of the season.

Sunderland made the cut but would have been selected regardless. The other five clubs were Ipswich Town, Rotherham, Peterborough Portsmouth and Doncaster. Ipswich apart, they haven’t done as well as expected. In fact, they haven’t done as well as Sunderland who, as the first two graphs show, haven’t done as well as they did last season

Sixer’s Grimsby Town Soapbox: never too early to start up the buses for Wembley

October 9, 2019 by Colin Randall

Malcolm Dawson writes….I was busy last night with what laughingly passes for the only work I do since retirement. Laughingly, because for 12 or so weeks of the year I get paid for what I might well be doing for nothing during the other 40. However, because I am getting paid and on a kind of contract, that has to take priority, so not only was I unable to attend last night’s fixture, I found it difficult to even follow the game on the interweb. When first I looked it was 0-0 with 42 minutes on the clock. Next glimpse showed us to be losing 1-0, then it was 2-2 and by the time I knew that we hadn’t needed to look for a bonus point via a penalty shoot out, Sixer’s Sevens was already posted and I expect that Pete himself had got past Houghton Cut.

I should make the next home tie, but Pete Sixsmith was there last night on another day of upheaval at the Stadium and Academy of Light. Let’s find out what he made of yesterday’s events.