Colin Randall

Salut! Sunderland was edited by Colin Randall up until December 2019 - read more

The First Time Ever I Saw Your Team: Burton Albion

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Sixer: soon to be reunited with cricket grounds and tasty cornets

Salut! Sunderland didn’t get round to entering this year’s football blogging awards. This was not a case of sour grapes after our also-ran status in previous years; the deadline simply came and went. Perhaps we should just have sent the organisers links to Pete Sixsmith‘s matchday reports and the twin series, The First Time Ever I Saw Your Team/The First Time Ever I Saw Your Ground. In a fair world, we’d then have walked it. Voting still seems to be open so you can keep it in the family and give Roker Report a helping hand.

Here, Sixer admits to being a little lost for words when describing a team Sunderland have played only once (he was there) having written this cracking piece before his visit. What more is there to say, beyond reflecting on a rare SAFC win that should have changed the course of our horrendous season but didn’t? …


Tricky one this: the Brewers have only ever played us once and that was five months ago when George Honeyman and James Vaughan scored in our 2-0 win at the Pirelli Stadium. This was the game that many of us thought would see us turn the corner, move up the league and maybe get on the fringe of the playoffs.
Shows how much we know.

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SAFC vs Burton Albion Who are You?: ‘let’s jump together into oblivion’

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Dave Child: ‘sorry – we met professionally’

Monsieur Salut writes: the pain of relegation is not eased that much because everyone expected you to go down anyway. But Dave Child*, who combines being a fully-fledged Brewer with a spot of radio commentary (that’s how he met PDC), didn’t think the season would be as bad for Burton — or us for that matter – after their escape a year ago. I took the easy option for this edition of ‘Who are You?’, not because there are so few Burton fans to choose from but because Dave did a good job first time round and is a home-and-away regular who’ll be at our last-but-one home game this Saturday.

Dave is also a food critic, reviewing pies at the grounds he visits. Let’s see what he makes of the SoL fare …

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End of Season Reviews 2018: (2) Wrinkly Pete. Four seasons in a day

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Peter Lynn, aka Wrinkly Pete

Peter Lynn, wrinklier than the other regular Pete on these pages (Sixsmith, for anyone who’s just visiting from Mars), has been a persistent champion of staying to the end, suppressing any urge to boo our own players and generally keeping the faith against all odds. The first part of his contribution to this year’s series of end-of-season revews needs to be published now as there are time-sensitive references …

Yes, I know it is not the end of the season. Yet.

However, as I walked away from the Madejski stadium last Saturday evening I was overcome by the feeling that I had just witnessed not only our last chance of survival go begging but also our whole season in one match.

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SAFC vs Burton Albion prize Guess the Score: a mere battle for second bottom?

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There is a prize. You judge whether it’s a great one

First of all, let Salut! Sunderland add its tribute to the supporters who have put up with this season’s woeful absence of quality, commitment and results and attended games week after week.

Almost as a further act of torture, the mathematical possibility of survival cannot vanish altogether if SAFC beat Burton Albion in what otherwise looks little more than a case of who avoids bottom place.

And if two out of three – Bolton (home to Wolves), Barnsley (away to Leeds) and Birmingham (home to Sheff Utd) – were to lose this weekend, a win for us would keep a weak flame flickering. It’s more complicated than that, with three possible relegation sides battling for points and Barnsley also having their game in hand at Forest on Tuesday, but that about sums it up.

It’s also the stuff of flying pigs. Bolton and Birmingham only need to draw and SAFC to lose for us to be down whatever happens to Barnsley.

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Salut! Sunderland’s 2018 end of season reviews: (1) Nick Barnes urges unity

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Cheers

Monsieur Salut writes: unfashionable as it is to praise the press or media more generally, I believe local and national writers and broadcasters covering Sunderland by and large do a good job. I think in particular of the Sunderland Echo‘s Phil Smith, the Chronicle‘s James Hunter and The Guardian‘s Louise Taylor but could mention a number of others. And for supporters who cannot get to many games, there is the excellent double act provided by BBC Radio Newcastle, Gary Bennett’s passionate and astute reading of a game complementing Nick Barnes‘s impeccable commentary.

Nick is a West Country man and could even find himself having to report on SAFC against his own Exeter City – currently fifth in League Two but with a game in hand on two clubs above them – next season. But 15 years of covering Sunderland have left their mark (how could they not?) and there’s obvious affection for the club and especially its fans. At Facebook, he generated a lively debate with this heartfelt appeal for a sense of togetherness, an end to understandable but unproductive vitriol.

Not every one of his Facebook ‘friends’ agreed – 89 comments have been posted as I write and range from ‘wake up and smell the bulls*** from the club; it stinks’ to ‘wonderful summation’.

Either way – or some way in between – Nick’s brief thoughts, reproduced with his consent, serve as a useful starting point for the 2017-2018 edition of Salut! Sunderland‘s the end-of-season reviews* …

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Reading vs SAFC Who are You?: dark magic

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This is not our Who are You? interviewee

Salut! Sunderland is not too keen on anonymous Who are You?s. It seems bizarre to insist on being a nameless supporter but we must respect all choices, especially when we’re the ones asking for favours. Rarely, we grant @TalkReading* that anonymity (but then the alternative was not to have a Reading (a) Who are You?). His/her explanation? ‘@TalkRaeding is completely anonymous on Twitter (keeps the magic going!) hope that is okay with you – would still love to help. The replies are good all the same …

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Reading vs SAFC Guess the Score: the clock ticking down

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Guess the Reading-SAFC score and you could win a mug – whoever you support

Monsieur Salut writes: by the time you read this, I’ll be on holiday and trying very hard not to think about football …

We have an oddly anonymous Reading Who are You? still to come – maybe they’re all recluses in the Thames Valley – and the result, as I write before the Leeds game, is unlikely to matter a huge amount to us.

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The First Time Ever I Saw Your Team: Norwich City

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Pete Sixsmith

John McCormick writes: the cup tie at Carrow Road mentioned below has a certain resonance but I don’t remember the replay. 1968 is very much a time when I’d have been there but there’s nothing, absolutely nothing, that I remember about it.

Pete Sixsmith, once again, comes to the rescue. He was there. He remembers it. He leaves me hanging my head in shame.  I can say no more and I humbly apologise, much as so many of our players should do.

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SAFC vs Norwich City Who are You?: on Grabban, Delia … and Ricky van Wolfswinkel

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Black Dog: ‘Black Cats don’t scare me’

Monsieur Salut writes: the curtain seems almost down on as bad a season as most Sunderland fans have experienced. Thanks Ellis Short – near the top of the Championship table for money spent of agents’ fees, near the bottom for investment on players and next to bottom of the league when not actually bottom.

Martin Penney is our Norwich City interviewee. He has missed all of five of the Canaries’ home games in 30 years. He’s from the Norwich MyFootballWriter site and the dog you see above, poised to bark loudly at the Black Cats, is ‘a Patterdale called Geezer after the best bassist in the entire world – Geezer Butler from Black Sabbath’. There you have it, and here are his excellent responses to Salut! Sunderland‘s questions …

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