Pete Sixsmith reflects on a highly satisfactory weekend and what it means for Sunderland’s games to come ….
Forty eight hours after that momentous lunchtime at The Sports Direct. I was still buzzing.
The ladies in the Post Office, both of whom are from the Red and White side, enquired after my mental state and the 12 year old dentist even smiled when I said that I had had a good weekend and explained why.
The press coverage has concentrated on the problems at Newcastle but most of what I have read has been very complimentary about our owner, our manager and our players. Garth Crooks had Bardsley, O’Shea, Colback and Johnson in his BBC team of the week, while The Guardian put Johnson in alongside its usual selection of top four and London players.
My local paper, The Northern Echo, awarded every player at least 7/10, with Colback getting star man with 9, while none of our opponents got any more than 5.That sums up the distance by which we won the game.
However, those who write for NUFC websites were less than complimentary. Sunderland were “deeply mediocre” said one, while another described us as an “absolutely rank side”. Presumably passing the ball to your own players, making tackles and putting the ball into the net qualifies a team for this description.
One writer said we were “thoroughly average” while Brian Neil, who contributed an eloquent and entertaining “Who Are You?” used “very average” when comparing Sunderland with his beloved Newcastle United.
He went on to say that “Poyet is light years ahead of Pardew” tactically and rounded his lengthy text off with the now traditional attack on beleaguered owner Mike Ashley, suggesting that he “is sucking the heart out of our great club” and that he should get out “and take your f******* puppets with you.” I assume this is a reference to Alan Pardew and Joe Kinnear and does not suggest that Mike has taken over the mantle once held by the celebrated Mr Harry Corbett, friend of Sooty, Sweep and Ramsbottom the snake.
The next few weeks are interesting for both clubs. We have a must win home game against Hull City on Saturday, followed by two it would be nice to take two points from away games at Manchester City and Arsenal, with an FA Cup game against Southampton sandwiched in between.
Four points from the next nine would go a long way to keeping us out of the brown stuff from which we have just emerged, but most of us would be happy with a win on Saturday and damage limitation in the other two.
The way we are playing, there is a chance that we could shock either or both of the title contenders and move into the becalmed waters of mid table – although I am not betting on it. One of our fans had wagered a fiver on us to win 3-0 on Saturday and walked out of the ground £380.00 better off. Now there’s a day to savour.
A couple of points to make about the weekend in general; I thought Phil Dowd had a great game in the middle, and that, coming hard on the heels of Lee Mason’s excellent performance at Old Trafford, shows that when refs let the game flow, there is a much better chance of seeing something decent.
Compare that with Howard Webb’s ridiculous sending off of Kevin Kyle Mark II at West Ham. Dowd and Mason refereed as if they are on a park pitch on a Sunday morning with players who would make mistakes but not deliberately – although Dowd could have sent off Dummet for a nasty foul on Phil Bardsley and should have sent off Taylor for being a git. The age of Webb is over, thank goodness.
Finally, some news on former Sunderland heroes. It was great to see Kevin Phillips get the winner at Bournemouth for Leicester City. He is 40 and a fine example of how to look after oneself. Another promotion beckons for him.
Andy Melville is now Assistant Manager at Oxford United after Chris Wilder left for Northampton. And Jody Craddock was in the crowd on Saturday. There are some good pics of him, Martin Smith and Darren Holloway on RTG.
Oh, and no work needed at the dentist. Things can only get better!!!!
Campo Retro, sponsors of our win-a shirt competition – see https://safc.blog/2014/01/countdown-to-wembley-win-a-shirt-in-our-cup-final-competition/ – say there’s 20 per cent off their Sunderland retro tops until midnight tonight (Monday). Click the image to visit their site.
Join the Salut! Sunderland Facebook group – click anywhere along this line
And follow us on Twitter: @salutsunderland … click along this line
- Jake flags the new feature allowing you to have your say on topic or off
Fancy leaving a comment? Not sure what you have to say fits this post? Go to the new feature – https://safc.blog/2013/07/s
Fancy leaving a comment? Not sure what you have to say fits this post? Go to the new feature – https://safc.blog/2013/07/salut-sunderland-the-way-it-is/ – and say it there.
It does seem that a good working relationship is developing between Short & Poyet, and hopefully there’s a unity in the club running from the owner / board down through the coach and his staff and onto the pitch; bringing in Bridcutt who is fully educated in the Poyet way can only enhance that. The supporters can do their bit by backing the lads on the pitch and not getting too edgy if sometimes things don’t work. I expect Hull City to give us a harder time than Newcastle did so they need the crowd to be on their side.
What’s happening at the O3 is a cautionary tale of disunity. I almost feel sorry for Alan Pardew …
I don’t think anyone is going to get complacent until everyone knows for certain which league we’ll be in next year. Since the turn of the year there has been too much inconsistency in terms of performance but despite that results have been so much better. The games at Everton and the ASDA O3 (love that) show what this team is capable of. Unfortunately so did Villa (H) Norwich and Stoke (H) which we can view as 5 points dropped.
In terms of the League table we would have been better drawing with the Mags and losing at Everton whilst beating Villa and Norwich. Same points for us but fewer for two of the teams near the bottom. Saturday is no different and Poyet, his staff and the players will be prepared. What we really need is for the crowd to relax and get behind the team, not transmit any anxieties to the players.
One area of concern that I have is how many of our key players are on loan. Alonso, Borini and Ki are all players I would like to see remain at the club but as with Danny Rose they are playing themselves into a place where a) their host clubs might well want them back or b) they will price themselves out of Sunderland’s budget.
Sadly the legendary Joke Innear has departed “the worlds biggest clerb”. A vacancy exists, I hope N03C2103e fans get the replacement they deserve and Dennis Wise makes a glorious return to the 03 Arena!
Well said Chris. Ellis Short is a shrewd man but he is still learning how to run a football club. He makes mistakes but doesn’t hesitate to do everything he can to put them right.
When Short fired MON, he could have done what almost every other chairman in the premier league would have done, and just picked up the next cab off the rank. You know, the usual “oh, he’s out of work (just been fired), he’ll do a job.” but he didn’t, he had the balls to take a punt and do something different. Granted, he got it horrendously wrong, but again, he had the balls to admit it and put it right. And whisper it, but he might have got it even more right than he could have imagined. We’ll go places with Short at the helm: the ballsiest chairman we’ve had.
We shouldn’t lose sight of the contribution of Ellis Short in all of this. Some fans have been critical of him recently but the difference between him and Mike Ashley is vast. At the weekend, when Gus was asked about the Cattermole to Stoke situation he said “the chairman asked me if I needed him [Cattermole], he said if you need him he is going nowhere” That typifies the difference between us and Sports Direct AFC.
We must not get too carried away.Still some very hard games coming up and we are only 2 points away from the drop zone and everyone bar Fulham seeming to have life left in them yet.
We have more games than our rivals coming up too,and we all know what happened to Wigan last year,it could be a cup game too far.
Though we have every right to us savour the moment, I would still swap it all for NUFC’s position.
Should the worst still happen(but let’s not dwell on it),Poyet has shown more enough to ensure we stay loyal to him.