Could we ask for more than a 1-0 win at Aston Villa, a place where we often struggle? The latest post-match missive from Steve Bruce explains why the obvious answer, sadly, is yes …
For Match of the Day viewers, there was a miss, a goal, a couple of sendings off and not much else.
For Sunderland supporters, it was an important win on the road with a massive double downside.
Sunderland 3 Blackburn Rovers 0: a thoroughly satisfactory scoreline as Pete Sixsmith sits in on lessons in finishing from our strikers (somewhat necessary after the zillion misses against Blackpool). Pete lauds a classy performance from Jordan Henderson and warns Rovers of danger ahead before delivering a lesson of his own to SAFC which he earnestly hopes Niall Quinn will see is heeded …
Another year has dawned and with it the realisation that my time on this planet is now approaching its own diamond jubilee. So, a good way to start Year 60 is a win at home against traditionally difficult opponents.
Except they weren’t particularly difficult. They were missing a good goalkeeper, a dominant centre half and anyone with any idea of how to put the ball in the net.
So what if Sir Alex comes knocking on Steve Bruce’s door to request and require the signature of Jordan Henderson? Our United friend Andrew* may be a shrinking violet – no photo/no surname though he does run the Stretford End Arising site, with which Salut! Sunderland has excellenrt relations – suspects we could hold out for Welbeck plus cash, though he would really rather have him back. Ditto Andrew: we’d sooner keep both at the Stadium of Light.
Plenty of other interesting thoughts – avert your eyes, Darron Gibson, and Newcastle fans, too (“above their station”) – ahead of our big Old Trafford clash …
Salut! Sunderland: Top of the Premier, doing OK in the Champions League but it doesn’t somehow seem a vintage United year. Fair point or nonsense?
Pete Sixsmith is getting used to Manchester United fan sites asking about Danny Welbeck. For this latest form report, for the Stretford End Arising, he added the words: “You can’t have him back, you know. He’s ours now.” That won’t work, Pete: tell them he’s hopeless …
I like to think that I know a bit about football.
As a literal and metaphorical greybeard, I go back a long way and I can convince gullible folk that I am something of an expert. So, when I said Danny Welbeck was a bit of a disappointment in the October review, I would imagine many of you nodded your heads sagely and said: “He knows what’s what.”
Well, of course I don’t because Danny has shown the likes of me and 36,000 other regulars at the Stadium of Light, that he is a very, very good footballer and that he is totally undeserving of the criticism that some have made of him.
Pete Sixsmith offers his measured assessment of a game that Sunderland might have won, but will feel satisfied not to have lost – and also remembers a true Stadium of Light character, one year on from his untimely death …
The 18th century American polymath Ben Franklin is widely accepted as being the man who said that there are “only two things certain in life and that’s death and taxes”. Were Mr Franklin still on this mortal coil, he could add: “And Tim Cahill will score against Sunderland.”
When he headed home in the sixth minute of this frenetic but not particularly skillful game, I feared the worst. Fortunately, Everton had an attack that was even more toothless than Old Mother Riley after a visit to the dentist, with Louis Saha doing a very passable impersonation of Jonathan Stead.
Even before his two-goal exploits against Everton last night – and how frustrating that he couldn’t quite make it three and secure the win – Danny Welbeck was transforming himself from underperforming, out-of-position passenger into exciting, goalhungry potential matchwinner.
Scott the Red, our pal at the Republik of Mancunia site*, had asked a few days before the game how we thought Welbeck, on loan from Scott’s beloved Manchester United, was getting on with us. Rather better, was the gist of Pete Sixsmith‘s reply, given without knowing Danny would grab another two goals last night, than some of us were willing to give him credit for. What a tragedy, then, that his exceptional recent displays, at Spurs and Chelsea and against Everton, may make it all the less likely that Sir Alex will let him come permanently – or that he may even demand Welbeck’s recall to Old Trafford.
Or will the player, as has already been suggested here, become part of the haggling if/when SAF comes calling for Jordan Henderson? This was Pete’s view, as expressed pre-Everton, to the United fan site. …
A Stoke City fan’s view here yesterday that Danny Welbeck would be a welcome recruit at the Britannia brought wry grins to the faces of one or two Mackems who responded along the lines of “take him, please”. Is that unfair? Has Welbeck actually been used in a way that would allow him to express his best footballing qualities, the sort seen in the clip? Perhaps not …
Danny Welbeck arrived from Manchester United carrying a lot of goodwill from United fans who see him as potential Premier star, whether at Old Trafford or elsewhere.
For us, it was an exciting acquisition and it is fair to say we harboured great expectations about what he might do for us.
We know our away from has to change. Steve Bruce knows it. Tomorrow, on his old Wigan stamping ground, would be an excellent time to start, with or without our new £13m star …
Which Sunderland team will turn out at Wigan tomorrow?
The question has less to do with the names that appear in the starting line-up, and on the bench, than with the way the players approach the game and perform once out on the DW pitch.
Darren Bent, Danny Welbeck and Jordan Henderson are basking in international glory tonight after playing crucial parts in England victories …
Darren Bent off the mark for England and would have scored twice had Shaun Wright-Phillips not made a mess of an easy pass in front of goal. Not bad for a substitute, securing the 3-1 win in Switzerland after the home country had halved the lead established by Rooney and Johnson.
But it doesn’t end there.
Peadar O’Sullivan
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