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SAFC vs PNE Guess the Score: the Coleman factor and keeping faith

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Monsieur Salut writes: here’s another Guess the Score. Pete Sixsmith may or may not enter but is already fearful of another home defeat, sensing that Preston North End are simply too well organised for us. As each matchday passes, the exercise of predicting results looks more academic. The point may soon come at which not even blind faith and predictions of SAFC-winning scorelines can any longer make a difference to the way things will end up in May …

Salut! Sunderland is not about to wash its hands of Sunderland AFC, or even to wash its hands of the labour of love running this site entails.

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The Chapman Report from QPR: Out Demons Out deserves a Sunderland verse

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Checking unfamiliar away grounds for next season

A harsh reader would say Bob Chapman brings it on himself. A drive up from the Home Counties for the Villa game weould have been enough to put off most people but four days later, he was enduring more dross from the worst Sunderland team he has seen in 54 years of following the club home and away. If only the team could play football as well as the likes of Bob and Pete Sixsmith write, we’d be out of sight at the top of the Championship. But how both of them would love to be able to report on a day out with old friends, supping good ale and recalling bands from the 1960s and 70s, without having to describe how it was all spoilt by SAFC …

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Sixer’s Sevens: QPR get one against 10 men as we unbolt the trapdoor ourselves

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Jake: ‘it’s not always pretty’

Could we have got something from this game? I thought so, but Bob Chapman’s report will give a more accurate picture than the SAFC website and that won’t arrive until tomorrow.

Bob will be reporting in the Place of  Pete Sixsmith, who decided against a trip to Loftus Road. Even so, it was Pete who forwarded the seven-word text that summed up a dismal day.

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The First Time Ever I Saw Your Ground: QPR and Loftus Road

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 Cool then, Cooler now

John McCormick writes: I had to check with the Statcat when this one came up – why did I not see us play at QPR when I lived in London? It transpires they were promoted in 1973. I was busy that year and didn’t notice them going up, just before I moved to London, and by the time we joined them in Division One I was on my way to Liverpool.

Did I miss something special by not going to see QPR when  I had the chance? In the early 1970s they were quite a team, with the likes of Stan Bowles, Gerry Francis and Rodney Marsh exciting the crowds. However, Rodney Marsh moved on in 1972 and there are those who argue QPR were never the same without him so I probably didn’t.

What about Pete Sixsmith?  I rather get the feeling he visited Loftus Road too early and missed QPR at their peak, even though they had recently lifted neutral hearts. It’s possible, though, that more pressing things required attention at the time and the wider world of football had to take a back seat for a while:

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QPR vs SAFC Who are You?: ‘money wasted on wrong players and managers’

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Ian McCullough, with his little hooped ones

Monsieur Salut writes: Ian McCullough* is a seasoned sportswriter and a friend of a friend (John Crowley, who has also occupied this hot seat). He supports QPR but has a soft spot for Sunderland and will be at Saturday’s match with a Mackem pal. His assessment of QPR’s decline could as easily apply to us.

Ian’s team has hardly had a great season but, on 40 points against our rock-bottom 28, can be fairly sure they will not finish last. Our relegation rivals are doing their best to give us a chance but it is not, so far, a chance our team seems able to grasp. Can Saturday provide enough respite from the unfortunate atmosphere when home games go wrong to enable them to play with rare assurance and pick up three points? John O’Shea talks of there still being 30 points to play for but the supporters desperately need some encouragement from Chris Coleman and whoever he can turn out.

Welcome Ian (@IanMac08 at Twitter), even it feels like intruding into private grief …

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QPR vs Sunderland prize Guess the Score: rising above the gloom

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Have a go. There’s nothing much to lose

In the depths of our despair, it seems beyond belief that interest in one small corner of Sunderland AFC’s world should suddenly perk up.

But in the wake of Tuesday night’s surrender to Aston Villa, Salut! Sunderland’s Facebook group gained three new members. Not spammers, hookers or chancers – we get applictaions from them, too – but from self-evidently genuine Sunderland supporters. We’re now nudging 750 and none, as far as we know, are hookers.

Maybe Chris Coleman should print this out, fold it with something harder curled inside and rap it over the heads of our players and, if he happens to be passing in the corridor, Martin Bain.

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Sunderland’s headlong descent and the destruction of hopes, dreams and passion

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Abigail with Barry and Martin at PN; she saw us avoid defeat there

Let it be made clear that grandparents cannot be held responsible for what happens, provided lawful, between their sons and daughters and their grandchildren.

So Barry Emmerson must not feel personally culpable because his son, Martin, took 10-year-old Abigail, known to Salut! Sunderland readers, to her first Sunderland game after a recent dip in enthusiasm. The game Abigail chose was Villa at home … she describes the experience here while walking home with her dad after the score went to 0-3. And now Barry, responding to Pete Sixsmith’s eloquent portrayal of death barely warmed up, tells of the anguish it left him feeling

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A View from the Avenue: SAFC a scuttled ship and we’re drowning with it

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Paul Summerside: not past caring – just yet

Monsieur Salut writes: Paul Summerside tends to post his thoughts at the Salut! Sunderland Facebook page (and how I wish all of its 740 members came here at least once a day or even once a week). Sometimes, I pick on them and reproduce here, with scant editing. Sometimes, I’m a bit pushed and add them as a comment. And sometimes, I’m so pushed I do nothing. But this seems the perfect accompaniment to the sheer if despairing brilliance of Pete Sixsmith’s report of the meek acceptance of a Villa stroll. As you’ll see, Paul is one of those already voting ith his feet …

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