There’s been plenty to keep us busy in the build-up to Sunday’s derby.
The framed photographs you see are the alternative prizes offered to Sunderland and Newcastle supporters entering the Guess the Score competition at https://safc.blog/category/salut-competition/guess-the-score-salut-competition/
Our prize sponsor, Personalisedfootballgifts.com, is Weardale-based and in sound Sunderland-supporting ownership but the man we deal with there is Alan Bennison, otherwise an all-round good bloke but, sad to relate, a Mag. I have disallowed his prediction of 2-1 to Newcastle with Cattermole sent off.
If you want to post an entry do so at the correct link – once again, https://safc.blog/category/salut-competition/guess-the-score-salut-competition/ – not here.
Then, we had another good “Who are You?”. See it in full at
https://safc.blog/2015/04/sunderland-vs-newcastle-who-are-you-not-quite-ready-to-forgive-colback/
Extract:
Salut! Sunderland: At least NUFC got one thing right: which midfield Jack to sign last summer. Yours for a free and done well, ours £10m and a flop. I take it Colback’s goal against you at SJP, and the celebration, must have been completely forgiven now…
Anthony Petit, Newcastle supporter:
Well, you can’t call yourself a Newcastle supporter and celebrate against your own. To me he is just a local lad who played for Sunderland and now moved to Newcastle because they offered him more money (I have left a previous company when I found a better job better paid, so I understand the move) but I don’t get his celebration. If he really is a Mag he shouldn’t have done it. And this can’t be forgiven easily. Maybe time will heal those scars.
And Monsieur Salut did his customary preview over at the ESPNFC website.
It started a little like this:
To anyone unfamiliar with, or unmoved by, the intense passion of Sunderland and Newcastle United’s rivalry, Sunday’s game at the Stadium of Light may seem no more than a meeting of two poor Premier League sides.
For one of them, Sunderland, hovering precariously one place above the relegation zone, the result will obviously be of crucial importance. But even if their opponents, 10 points above third-bottom, can hardly be considered in serious danger, they enter the fray with precisely the same desire to claim regional bragging rights.
It matters little that both clubs these days field players who, for the most part, have no north-eastern English roots, often enough no British ones either. It is impossible to move to either city, or the much broader catchment areas, without quickly becoming aware of what is at stake when Mackems and Magpies, even of the adopted variety, face one another on the pitch.
And it concluded:
For his part, Advocaat wants no more than to emulate the achievements of Di Canio and Poyet, winning against Newcastle in his second game in charge as they did. Yet only a gambler of supreme confidence, utter recklessness or unlimited resources would stake serious money on the outcome of a clash that will be raw in emotion and, in all probability, short on quality.
See the full article at http://www.espnfc.com/club/sunderland/366/blog/post/2377237/more-than-pride-at-stake-vs-newcastle.
And go to the home page of Salut! Sunderland to see what else we hve been doing and saying about the derby. Ha’way the Lads.
