Colin Randall

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

Aston Villa vs Sunderland Who are You?: Bruce’s winning feeling – and baffling tactics

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Josh Henwood* was an Aston Villa ‘Who are You?’ interviewee more than seven years ago. Our clubs have fallen on harder times since then though after a lean first season down in the Championship, Villa under Steve Bruce are now challenging hard for promotion whereas we, well, we aren’t.  A warm welcome back to these pages, Josh (check out his Twitter page).

Josh reckons Villa will win. Try free betting if you want a flutter on all sorts of sporting events, including a tasty package on Bayern, Barcelona, Man Utd and PSG all to win their Champions League games on Wednesday …

 

 
Salut! Sunderland: a few years have passed since we last met on these pages, Josh. Not been a great time for either club but now you’re pushing for promotion – how do you feel about the way things are going?
Josh Henwood: Yeah I took a look at that post the other day and just marvelled at how our fortunes have changed. But that’s football! In terms of how things are going for the Villa, I’m more positive than I’ve been for years, but we need to get through an injury-fuelled Christmas period by the looks of it which could change a promotion drive into mid-table obscurity!

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The First Time Ever I Saw Your Ground: Aston Villa and Villa Park

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Sleek Sixer …

John McCormick writes: I suspected this would be one of the grounds that Pete Sixsmith counts among his favourites. After all, not only  is it old and venerable, like the man himself,  with international matches and semi-finals galore on its cv, it has the Archibald Leitch connection that he relishes.

And there’s a bonus for me, by some coincidence. Some random bloke I met this morning started talking about the ’73 cup final and the save, which got me mentally singing “Aye Aye Aye Aye, Monty is better than Yashin”. But I couldn’t  for the life of me remember who was better than Eusabio. Now I know, and I’ll sleep happily tonight. So it’s a double thankyou to Pete, for filling in that gap, and for another excellent read:

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Chris Coleman and the gentle art of Sumo

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In 1991 Chionofuji Mitsugo announced his retirement as a Sumo wrestler.

He had had more than 1,000 wins, which included the longest run of consecutive wins in the post-war era (54) and been a honbasho champion 31 times (there are six honbasho, or tournaments, per year). He was the 54th person to become a Yokozuna – the top rank – in Sumo wrestling’s modern history, and the greatest sumo wrestler of his generation.

Yet he claimed he had lost his fighting spirit, and in a solemn ceremony his topknot was cut off and his career as a fighter was over, for there is no coming back when a Sumo wrestler’s topknot is cut off.

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New man for Sunderland hot seat, an older man on the A list

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Colin Randall writes: About the only way I could get through the first half of the Millwall game, even via the Barnes & Benno commentary on the club site, and what Gary Bennett called the worst goalkeeping (Robbin Ruiter) he could recall witnessing, was to read Pete Sixsmith‘s account of a night out with past players. Sadly Tony Coton couldn’t make either the event or the match (he might have got a game on either side as goalkeeping howlers led to a 2-2 that established Sunderland, on one statistical test, as England’s worst home side in history) …

 

As I walked into Quinns Bar last night for the launch of Tales From The Red and Whites Volume 2, Nick Barnes, the estimable BBC Newcastle commentator shot out and dashed downstairs in a tremendous hurry.

I hoped that it was not bad news for him e.g. the restoration of David Moyes as manager, the sale of the club to Robert and Grace Mugabe, the closure of the Harris Tweed industry and wondered if it could be news on the managerial front. All was about to be revealed……

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Sixer’s Sevens. For the record, Millwall exploit our defensive frailty

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Jake: ‘it’s not always pretty’

Pete Sixsmith will soon be excused duty from Salut! Sunderland in order to carry out his traditional Santa tasks but before he goes he’s giving us enough to keep us occupied. There’s a look at Villa Park scheduled for Monday, a match report some time tomorrow, some thoughts about a probable manager later (and a book launch with former Sunderland stars present) this evening and he’s starting the ball rolling with an instant, seven-word reaction to today’s game at the Stadium of Light, a 2-2 draw against Millwall after a catalogue of goalkeeping errors on both sides that lumbered us with that rotten record as the team with the longest winless home run in history, It can only get better, Chris Coleman, can’t it? …

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The first time ever I saw your team: Millwall

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Sleek Sixer …

John McCormick writes – I  do remember a trip to the Old Den in the ’70s but like Pete Sixsmith, I struggle to remember seeing Millwall at Roker and it’s possible I never did.  From 1970 I was a student down south in Yorkshire and I often played sport rather than watched it. I did get back to some games so I can’t rule this one out, especially as it was played in May, but Pete’s account includes a player who, like the game, stirs nothing in what’s left of my memory. Luckily, that’s not the case with Mr Sixsmith:

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If Millwall’s visit isn’t worrying enough, Steve Bruce’s Aston Villa are up next

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An ominous reunion with our former boss looms. Portrait of Steve Bruce by Owen Lennox, an acclaimed Sunderland artist

Sunderland’s shameful home record will become officially the worst in English football history on Saturday if Millwall are not beaten at the Stadium of Light. Nineteen games – 18 in the Premier League and Championship and one in the FA Cup – have passed since a scrappy 1-0 defeat of Watford in December last year. That is a winless home run shared by Dagenham and Redbridge, Derby County and Nottingham Forest. Are we really about to make the record our own? Stand by for a bleak assessment of our club’s present crisis …


Perhaps the best that can be said about the visit to Aston Villa next Tuesday is that at least Sunderland won’t be at home. The match comes four days after the managerless club must beat Millwall to avoid setting that wholly unwanted record for failing to win at home.

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Choose Sunderland’s next manager: at least one O’Neill in the frame

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Jake: ‘you don’t talk to the likes of us, Ellis, so how can we be blamed if we get something wrong?’

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

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