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We were unlikely to remain silent for long on the shambles that was yesterday’s game against Wigan. Did I read somewhere that Dean Whitehead was blaming the fans and the pitch (the pitch presumably being the same one Wigan had to play on)? Pete Sixsmith, in deeply troubled mood, finds other issues to address, but few answers…

So, it wasn’t just the team who messed up on Saturday, my counting skills were found to be deficient – but not as much as their alleged footballing skills.

I texted my seven-word verdict (or six as it turned out) as I watched the last five minutes of the game run down, feeling that the chances of an equaliser were about as remote as me laughing at a sketch on the BBC’s Comic Relief marathon.

As the whistle went to bring the proceedings to a close, I was fuming. As I walked back to the car I was fuming. As I drove away I was fuming. I have rarely fumed as much.

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Until nearly midnight (albeit UAE time, four hours ahead of the East Stand), Salut! Sunderland was shortchanging its readers. Sixer’s Sevens stretched to only six words, the first four in the headline plus “equals relegation”. I added “pitiful”. But enough of the fence-sitting; here’s what we actually thought of Sunderland’s performance….

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Bernard Ramsdale*. The name deserves to be chanted, with approval, from every part of the Stadium of Light. Just when it seemed Wigan had “done a Stoke” and failed to produce a fan to preview Saturday’s game, Bernard stepped up once more. This is the same Bernard Ramsdale who has already given Salut! Sunderland one of the best opposition fans’ previews – maybe the best – all season. Thanks to a top man and true fan – and check out the Latics site he helps to run, Ye Olde Tree and Crown – even if he does think Cisse may be bound for the JJB before too long…

Since we met at the JJB, your season has gone slightly better than ours. Is Steve Bruce right to complain about lack of recognition???

He is definitely right, but on the plus side people have been ignoring us since we became the last ever team voted into the Football League in July 1978! It hasn’t done us any harm though has it? No other club in the Premier League can claim to have come from non league football to being top of the best league on the planet in less than 30 years, can they? ??Many people confuse Latics’ lack of recognition as being caused by the local rugby league team, but they are not the problem. They actually have many thousands less fans than the football club and the last time they won anything black and white photography was just beginning to take the world by storm! The real problem was pointed out by Sunderland fans having a pre match pint in and around Wigan town centre prior to our game earlier this season. ??They just could not believe the number of people walking around the town on match day in the colours of rival Premier League teams. That, as they saw first hand, is the real problem with our lack of recognition, or support.??

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Desperately disappointing as it was to surrender a lead so late, and desperately bad as Phil Dowd’s refereeing was, we were probably the cause of our own misfortune against Spurs. We failed in so many respects that ‘Arry was doubtless correct to say it would be been beyond belief for them to leave the SoL pointless. Pete Sixsmith‘s analysis of the game covers all these points and draws gloomy historical comparisons, without quite echoing the Ricky Sbragia verdict: “I didn’t bollock them. I just state the facts. We were f****** s***. I told Steed Malbranque to take that late corner short and he said, ‘Yes.’ Then didn’t. Our left-back George McCartney’s in the box for it too. Why, I don’t know.”…

Forty eight years ago, Tottenham Hotspur came to Sunderland en route to the first double of the 20th century.

They came with a team made up of quality footballers and quality men like Danny Blanchflower, Dave Mackay and John White and were managed by a manager in Bill Nicholson who let his team do the talking on the field and who never had to bother with the gentlemen of the press. He created a team that won with style and showed respect towards opponents and referees.

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Pete Sixsmith gave Anfield a wide berth. He therefore missed Kenwyne Jones’s impression of a young boy trying one-on-one shooting practice for the first time, a first half of decent passing and movement and a deeply disappointing second-half surrender. There were harsher assessments at the Blackcats forum: Andy wrote: “Were you to conduct a straw poll of United and Liverpool fans, they’d probably vote us the worst side they’d hosted this season.” And Gordon pointed out that not many teams had lost at Anfield recently, adding: “And few have offered such a pathetic challenge. We were absolutely awful.” Pete makes what he can of it …

I have to admit that I am writing this Soapbox as a fan who was not at Anfield, did not watch it on TV and, apart from 10 minutes in the car which culminated in Fulop dropping a Kelvin Davies-like clanger, didn’t listen to it. So I am in a perfect position to comment on the disappointing result that came out of the home of the plastic Scousers.

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When The National in Abu Dhabi launched its weekend edition back in November, my colleagues on the sports desk asked people to contribute articles about the teams they supported and the sporting arenas that meant most to them. Easy stuff for the average Sunderland fan. Regulars at Salut! Sunderland will have seen the article, reproduced here, about being a supporter of SAFC. Here is what I had to say about my favourite stadium…

If I pick my way around a collection of nondescript modern houses called Midfield Drive, I can locate the spot where, year after year, I spent Saturday afternoons or weekday evenings cheering a Sunderland AFC victory or, as likely, reduced to misery by defeat.

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Glory at the Santiago Bernabéu, shame at the Riverside. That was Liverpool’s week. Now they face us at Anfield on Tuesday night. Avoiding defeat in successive away games against top clubs is a lot to ask, but Sunderland fans are entitled to expect Ricky Sbragia and his squad to make at least as good a shot of it as they did at the Emirates.
Chris Pyke*, who works with me as a page editor on The National in Abu Dhabi, is a Liverpool fan who traces the Reds’ relative decline in recent years to the 1992 FA cup final. Sadly, for us, he expects much more of a Real Madrid than a Boro performance, and a Liverpool win by the same margin as at Wembley 17 years ago….

When Liverpool play Sunderland I am drawn back to the 1992 cup final and what now could now be referred to as the beginning of the end for the Anfield side.

I was born in 1978 and was immediately indoctrinated into the family’s Liverpool supporters’ programme.

By 1992, my 14th season as a fan, Liverpool had won eight league titles (runners up five times), the FA cup twice (runners up twice), the League Cup four times (runners up twice), and the European cup three times (runners up once). Looking back, I was rather spoilt.

But by 1992, my main recollection of a Liverpool v Sunderland clash, things were clearly on the wane for the Red Men.

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