The last time I reported in, Leeds were the only club from our readers’ pre-season choices to be in the top six positions. The other five – Cardiff, Wolves, Sheffield United, Bristol City and Preston, in that order – had together accumulated only 617 votes, about 7.5% of the total cast, and Wolves had had over half of them.
Four of our choices, it must be said, were queuing up on the boundary, ready to pounce on any slips from the leaders, and only one was languishing (with great languor) in the doldrums. That was just over a month ago, in which time there have been five games, potentially fifteen points, to contest.
With the arrival of another international weekend we have a chance to review the situation and see if the natural order (as defined by our readership) has been restored in those five games.
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Sunderland, West Ham and Moyes. Sixer takes on Marco
It might be an exaggeration to say that pouring over the misfortunes of Sunderland AFC, and its sod-the-press-I-only-do-tame-inhouse-interviews owner, has become an international sport. But it’s certainly keeping the media busy.
BBC Radio Newcastle’s Total Sport programme had the benefit of our Pete Sixsmith’s wisdom last night. He spoke gloomily about our immediate prospects – he fears another relegation – and holds David Moyes to no small extent culpable for our present malaise.
Wolves star wins player of the month. Grabban far behind BUT …
They do not come much easier than Leo Bonatini’s first goal of the season, a mighty Sunderland-style defensive blunder by the Boro defender Daniel Ayala setting up his chance, well as he then took it.
But the Wolves striker has been on fire since, his total of nine including five goals in October and that is what made him the PFA Bristol Street Motors Championship player of the month as voted by fans.
Sunderland’s Lewis Grabban was one of five other nominees but came last in the shortlist with just three per cent of the votes cast. In fact, Bonatini polled more than all five rivals combined.
But hang on a second. Bonatini plays for the club currently topping the table and we all know which position Sunderland occupy. If we think about it for, say, half a second, we can probably hazard a guess as to which of them enjoys the more creative, thoughtful and effective service. So Grabban’s eight goals can be seen as an achievement no less than creditable than Bonatini’s nine – and he, too, scored five of them in October.
West Ham and David Moyes: not the warmest of welcomes from Irons supporters
There has been a lot of anger and a fair amount of gallows humour among West Ham fans at the choice of our old friend David Moyes to replace the sacked Slaven Bilic as manager.As far as Monsieur Salut can tell, Moyes has not yet announced that the Hammers are in a relegation scrap. Nor has he said the players he needs in January won’t be available to him. Why, he hasn’t even told anyone from LBC Radio she deserves a slap or apologised – yet – for being self-defeatingly dour, honest and ever-so-sure of his ability.And with supreme faith in their new man, the West Ham board has made the appointment for all of six months, ie to the end of the season. That’s the stuff!Earlier this week, the West Ham United fan site asked for reciprocal links with Salut! Sunderland, now established. I invited my contact there, Ade, to share anything his site did by way of covering Moyes. And here it is, with some mischief-making along the way drawn from other sources …
Vote Grabban: bottom of the league, player-of-month shortlist
It feels almost surreal. But when you check that sliding green link you see at the foot of each page of Salut! Sunderland, the PFA player-of-the-month awards really do have a Sunderland player among the nominees.
Maybe it is a step too far to contemplate an award for someone playing for a crisis club rooted at the foot of the Championship table.
Sixer’s Middlesbrough Soapbox: a ‘recipe for disaster’ as Sunderland flop again
Time is running out for Sunderland. The latest defeat, coupled with wins for Burton and Bolton, exposes the club horribly at the foot of the table. Time is also running out for Pete Sixsmith‘s attendance at SAFC games – he will soon be pulling on Santa clothes to entertain the children of the North East – and he’s delighted he won’t have to sit through more of this dross.
Sixer’s Sunday took him to the Riverside stadium, more in hope than anticipation he said at Facebook as the Durham SAFCSA branch bus approached Teesside. Short as the journey may have been, those making it were not watching a derby according to Sixer (“of course not, it’s in Yorkshire”) and Bill Harris (who had the bright idea of a Salut! Sunderland poll on the issue). The readers have decided in their favour by a whopping majority* and the poll is now as closed as are Sixer’s ears to excuses for the shambles he witnessed.
Here is his damning report on another wasted afternoon …
Sixer’s Sevens: Middlesbrough 1-0 Sunderland. Valiant defeat or deservedly bottom?
Monsieur Salut writes: Pete Sixsmith should have been sitting next to me today, I had to cry off – wife unwell – but watched on the TV what I thought was far from a bottom-of-the-table performance. It just wasn’t quite good enough and we lost anyway. Grabban should have scored minutes before we inevitably succumbed to a smart Boro move, aided by the usual slack defending. On BBC Radio Newcastle, Benno said the timing of substitutions was again questionable: ‘where are we going to get a win from? I don’t know’. Nick Barnes: ‘Fantastic Grabban chance … [then] huffed and puffed but really didn’t cause Boro any problems second half.’ Sixer’s verdict is the one that counts and he has seen enough wretched play this season, and for the past 50, to be entitled to his even harsher judgement …
Is Middlesbrough vs SAFC a derby? Last chance to vote
[polldaddy poll=9867201]
Managerless and bottom of the league, we need distraction. The poll provided one. Monsieur Salut brings news of the results so far …
‘I remember thinking how curious it was to see all these ancient buses full of supporters from Tow Law or Spennymoor or Crook. They seemed such far off places, somehow separate from Sunderland.’
That matchday memory of a Sunderland childhood was shared with me many years ago by Kate Adie, the top BBC reporter, in an interview for Wear Down South, the magazine of the London and SE branch of the Sunderland AFC Supporters’ Association.
The great debate: Newcastle-SAFC is a derby, Middlesbrough’s not’. You decide
[polldaddy poll=9867201]
Is Middlesbrough vs Sunderland a derby or just a match between teams not that far apart geographically?
Monsieur Salut writes: it is a simple enough if inconsequential issue. I think it is a derby, Bill Harris – an SAFC stalwart, Salut! Sunderland reader and occasional Guess the Score winner – is adamant it is not.
Sunderland in crisis: Ellis some way Short of convincing
The Northern Echo publishes the full transcript of an interview with Sunderland owner Ellis Short at the official club site. You can see and hear it at safc.com and decide for yourselves how searching the questions were.
Salut! Sunderland will just pick out a few key points, all of which you’ll find amplified at the links above: