All Pete’s fault. His Soapboxes extolling the virtues of Euro 2008 struck a chord. Leaving work today (Abu Dhabi Saturdays are not days off for everyone), I was asked – as usual – if I’d be watching tonight’s footie.

And as usual, I replied: “No chance. I cannot find a channel showing it and don’t fancy going out to catch it.”

The colleague didn’t let go this time. Finally, here was someone who wanted to explain how easily I could set things right – if I wanted.

So, an hour or so later, I went in search of a satellite card that would give me Holland v Russia (this link takes you directly to the highlights flagged in the YouTube clip), and the games to follow. I’d helped myself to a wind-down glass of wine by then so taking the car anywhere, in a country where driving with the least trace of alcohol equals jail, was not an option.

But a helfpul man in an electrical supplies shop down the street pointed me in the right direction. Soon I was in a gold and white cab heading a mile down the main road to a cluster of shops, any of which I was told would help me out.

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Even if you did not read my Club v Country: an easy home win chapter in the ALS book More 24 Hour SAFC People, you probably know that Salut! Sunderland is rarely found devoting too much space to football at international level.
Since I am currently based in Abu Dhabi, I care more about the UAE’s prospects of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa – one point at home to Syria tomorrow night would take them to the next qualifying stage – than England’s. But I do feel I may have been missing something in the last couple of weeks. From Pete Sixsmith to the abaya-clad interns at the office, so many people have raved about Portugal (au revoir), Spain and Holland that Euro 2008 has clearly been producing some great football. Bringing me further up to date, with his a midterm review of the competition, Pete oozes appreciation of Russia, Turkey and Croatia…

So, we are more than halfway through and Keano still hasn’t signed any of the stars of the tournament. I’m sure we would all agree that Ronaldo, Toni, Henry and Cech have had outstanding tournaments and, on their performances so far, would grace the likes of Blyth Spartans and Horden CW.

The best sides have been the relatively unfancied ones. I watched the Russians beat Sweden and was transfixed by the pace of their game and the accuracy of their passing. Sweden were a little ponderous (Gary Breen and Jeff Whitley might well have felt comfortable in their line up) and they lacked any form of penetration up front. I know Ibrahamovic was injured but at times you could almost understand why Reidy favoured Flo over him. All right then, maybe not.

Both Russian goals were excellent examples of what good sides should aspire to. Guus Hiddink is a marvellous coach and it can’t be coincidental that his side plays in a similar style to Dick Advocaat’s Zenit Leningrad*. The Dutch influence is clearly at work there and here’s hoping that Roy can pick up some of it on his worldwide coaching odyssey. Mind you, what the Dutch side FC Twente hope to get from Steve McClaren is difficult to fathom. Maybe fashion tips on umbrella styles.

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Salut! Sunderland, during Euro 2008, has been a bit like the Circular, the No 5 United bus that used to – still? – slog all over Shildon on a roundabout route towards Bishop: you wait for ages for one, then two come at the same time. With the football focus switching to internationals, it has been quiet here. Then the fixtures list for next season appears and we’re both competing for space. Here, Pete Sixsmith runs the rule over the fare from Austria and Switzerland.
Some things, he finds, never change. We’re linked yet again with Jan Koller. David Pleat still has problem with basic general knowledge. I could add that the other thing that remains unchanged is Pete’s struggles to spell Kenwyne: two Ns all last season, one N but two Ys today (spotted in time). In any event, the varied splendour s of Sixer’s Soapbox are back. Read on….

Well, the fixtures are out and now we can begin the great guessing game of when we might play the actual game.

Will it be Saturday lunchtime or teatime? Might it be Sunday early or late? And what about that real novelty, a 3pm, kick off on a Saturday afternoon against any one of the self styled Big 4?

As we read. the executives of Sky and Setanta are squabbling over who does get the rights to Hull v Bolton or Wigan v Stoke – or, more to the point, who doesn’t.

The last few weeks have been very quiet, hence no Randall/Sixsmith activity on the site. Like Setanta we have been recycling stuff from last season and trying to convince the readers(s) that they are classics that need to be read again. I know that Colin has been soaking up the Mediterranean atmosphere at his home on the Cote d’Azur while I have been dodging creditors and attempting to pay for next season by marking GCSE History papers. There’s 260+ of them sat in my spare room, looking at me and demanding to be graded.

Usually I throw them down the stairs and the ones that go the farthest (the heaviest ones) get the best marks. In the past, we got to know where the papers came from so you can imagine that any Newcastle schools that were allocated to me had a 100 per cent failure rate, schools from Jarrow were 50 per cent pass and 50 per cent fail while any Sunderland centre had every student passing with a Grade A*. Only joking, Examination Board!!!!

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Salut! Sunderland‘s statistics for hits – the number of visits paid to the site – are all over the place.

It says 80,000+ somewhere on here, but that may be because some of the traffic towards one of my other sites has somehow been bolted on. From checking Statcounter, whose services I use, I believe the truer figure is 50,000 (or 50,401 as I started writing, if you want precision).

So we’ve passed the Stadium of Light capacity. That still leaves us poor relations of A Love Supreme online, Ready to Go, the club’s official site and, probably, various other corners of the web where Sunderland fans congregate. But it’s not a bad effort all the same.

What took us past the 50,000 mark, in some style, with almost 700 hits yesterday? A stream of fans eager to devour Pete Sixsmith’s perceptive good-and-bad assessment of the season? My own musings on Leeds v Doncaster? The welcome plug in the new edition of ALS?

Er, no. Step forward, instead, Tasmin Archer, “sol51” and the power of Ready to Go.

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Pete Sixsmith and I saw Leeds v Sunderland, and then Sunderland v Leeds, in very quick succession immediately after Christmas 1963, a promotion season for both clubs.

At Elland Road, I described Leeds loudly as the filthiest team I had ever seen. Pete agreed, but was a little more diplomatic because we were in the care of his Leeds-supporting relatives. Both of us were delighted when, having snatched a 1-1 draw away, we comfortably won at Roker Park with goals from George Herd and Nic Sharkey in front of a 55,000 crowd.

I hated Leeds then and, irrationally since I no longer have the excuse of youthful folly, hate them still. But they were a filthy team, and the sheer nastiness of the way they played has stuck in the mind in the hundreds of years that have since gone by.

So before the playoff final, I expected to be delighted if the upstarts of Doncaster beat their once mighty Yorkshire rivals.

At an early stage of the season, as Leeds clawed back those 15 deducted points, I wrote this:

I cannot work out why this is, because I have always disliked Leeds, but I want them to beat Orient, too.
It must have something to do with loving great football turnarounds. Ours last season wasn’t a bad example, come to think of it, and who else remembers the glorious failure of that relegation season when, after not scoring for weeks and weeks, we suddenly started walloping everyone in sight for a while? I’ll resolve this love-hate relationship by praying for Leeds to get within sight of automatic promotion only to stumble in the last few games and not quite make the playoffs.

And to my friend, Julian, a Leeds fan living in Paris, I may even have refined the prayer, to have United going all the way to Wembley and then losing, just as they did.

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If you were up and about early, you may have seen Salut! Sunderland as a work in progress as I edited Pete Sixsmith’s new Soapbox offering live

Scroll down and, if your eyesight is good and your mouse control true, you’ll see that in an article for the Irish Mail on Sunday, published the day we hammered Luton and went up as champions, I wrote: “For all Keane’s welcome promises that he is not approaching next season as a manager who would be happy with fourth bottom, plenty of Sunderland fans are setting their sights no higher.”
Pete considered all the money Keano had to spend strengthening for the season ahead, and looked for something better. In the Victor Meldrew version of his end-of-season review, he identifies what went wrong enough for us to end up in a relegation scrap which, happily, we survived – by finishing just two places above my minimalistic expectations…

After the optimism of Pollyanna, there needs to be an alternative view. The opposite of Pollyanna’s unbridled positivity is the constant stream of negativity and criticism that comes from the more Victor Meldrewish of our fans – and looking through back issues of Soapbox, there are times when I could have been well and truly included in that classification.

So, let’s see if the negatives can outweigh the positives for 2007-08. Yes, we avoided relegation but not by much and a great deal more was expected considering the outlay on players.

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Congratulations to Kenwyne Jones, who capped a terrific season for Sunderland by capturing two player of the the year awards. After easily topping the official club site poll, he was then voted the players’ own choice in a training ground ballot.

Danny Collins, who came second in both, enjoyed the huge consolation of being the supporters’ selection as player of the season. Such success for an unglamorous footballer who gives total commitment to the club is not surprising; Sunderland fans have always recognised the need for graft and passion along with the flair.

Collins is emphatically not a flair player, but he has the do-or-die spirit – at both ends of the pitch – that we associate with Charlie Hurley, Joe Bolton and Kevin Ball.

  And isn’t he glad to be in our stripes now? 
  Picture: iowsaintsfan

Kenwyne, however, won hands down in the safc.com poll, scoring 96,810 votes compared with 36,350 for Danny (20 points being awarded for each first choice recorded, 10 for each second). And for all Collins’s heroics, he was the logical victor, since he displayed both guts AND flair, covering acres of ground each game and providing matchwinning goals or assists in several.

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Most of us know the story of the curate’s egg*. Eager not to offend after being invited to breakfast by the bishop and served a bad egg, he insisted that that it was good in parts. That’s roughly as Pete Sixsmith found the season just ended. Keano and the Lads should perhaps not get too carried away by his benevolent look at the albumen; there’s still the yolk to go……

Many years ago, when the Earth was still young, I was dragged off to either the Essoldo or the Hippodrome in Shildon to see a film called Pollyanna.

I remember being distinctly underwhelmed by this experience seeing as nobody seemed to ride a horse across the plains, asked for a slug of red eye in a dirty glass or shot copious numbers of what were then known as Red Indians.

It appeared to be about a little girl (ugh!) who went round spreading sweetness and light (a little like Amy Winehouse does now) and generally being positive while all around were being gloomy.

So, let’s review the past season through the eyes of a Pollyanna Whittier and look for things to be glad about.

Well, first of all we are still in the Premier League. After the 15 point season, that’s got to be something to feel glad about. We could well be on our way to establishing ourselves as a Premier League fixture like Blackburn, Villa and Middlesbrough.

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London has only just voted in its new mayor, and already there is a broken promise. Pete Sixsmith‘s not Boris’s. Having vowed to boycott the capital if it voted for the white-haired one, famously described as “neither as nice nor as stupid as he seems”, Sixer is already making plans for a return to Craven Cottage….

And so another season comes to an end, if not with a bang or a whimper at least with a rousing farewell to this year’s team.

It seems strange going into the final game with nothing resting on it, but I would not have wanted to be like the Blues of Birmingham or Reading knowing that the whole thing was out of their own control. Been there, done that and got several T-shirts.

So, a pleasant end to the season, with both sides giving lads a run out. Arsenal were good. Their movement was exceptional, their pace at times blistering and their strength in depth impressive. It’s not every day you see the captain of Brazil having “a run out”.

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