Joey Barton

Ross In. A dignified but incisive valedictory: ‘I leave with head held high’

by
‘I reflect on two Wembley finals, one home league defeat, victories over Premier League opposition and overall progression’


A lot of Salut! Sunderland readers go nowhere near Twitter and as one who spends far too much time there, Monsieur Salut can but say: “Bear with me. I am hopeful of finding a cure.”

But I must admit I have been flabbergasted by the names that have been more or less officially linked with the search for a successor to Jack Ross – and what those names say about our status and ambition.

First we hear in effect that Ross was not good enough. “.. with three quarters of the season remaining, we did not feel things were going as well as they should be,” our executive director and my own former colleague Charlie Methven tells The Daily Telegraph.

Read more

Fleetwood Town Who are You? Going to the Stadium of Light ‘wasn’t like going to Clitheroe’

by

Monsieur Salut writes: John McKenna*, our interviewee for the penultimate league game of the season (and if only it could be our season’s penultimate game of any kind), comes to us via Pete Sixsmith and the interest they share in groundhopping.

John proves to be a master of restraint and balance when asked about a certain Joey Barton – he says elsewhere he is acquainted with the laws of libel and nothing in his reply would be of interest to Messrs Sue, Grabbitt and Runne – and provides an informative guide to the recent history of his club, pointing out that it plays in a town with a smaller population than the crowd that turned up at the Stadium of Light for the first game between us …

Read more

SAFC vs QPR Who are You?: ‘we’ve had some lovely players – and Joey Barton’

by
Clive Whittingham, aka @LoftForWords at Twitter

Monsieur Salut says: stand by for a sharp, literate analysis of all that is wrong and the bits that are right about Saturday’s opponents, QPR, and what has gone awry for Sunderland. At least half a dozen headline-worthy phrases leap from Clive Whittingham‘s* answers. Clive, a business and sports journalist, is the editor of a QPR fan site, Loft For Words. I loved his one-line assessment of his club: ‘not big, or that good, but we’ve had some lovely players’.

Of players linked to both clubs, he admires the current but injured captain, Nedum Onuaha – remembered fondly for his wonder goal vs Chelsea for us but not, apparently, a favourite of all Hoops fans – but came close to adding Anton Ferdinand to his ‘worst players’ answer. As for us, he likes Simon Grayson but suspects we’ll end up firing him as the season progresses. Perhaps the kindest way of interpreting his remarks is that he thinks we’re a basket case …

Read more

French Fancies: Nice work, Le Mans race downwards, PSG au revoir to Becks

by

rct

Our last look of the season at French football takes in ups and downs and (tenuous) Sunderland links at both ends of the table …


The poster for Jonny Wilkinson’s Toulon rugby club at the nearby Toulon-Hyères airport gives you an idea of which shape of ball matters most in the area Monsieur Salut calls home. Winners of the Heineken cup in Dublin (against Clermont) and this coming weekend in the French championship cup final against Castres. Wilkinson, who just keeps on scoring match after match, has become a local hero.

But another thirtysomething English sportsman in France has been prominent in the French press. As everyone knows, David Beckham was warmly received for his short sojourn at Paris Saint-Germain and, after neither disgracing himself nor covering himself in glory in his relatively limited playing time, has now retired. Le Journal du Dimanche wished him well but could not resist mentioning that he’d made “only two decisive passes” in his PSG career.

Read more

Memo to Joey Barton: remember how scores are settled in Marseille

by
Jake brightens up the site again

This started out as a contribution to Salut! Sunderland‘s new presence on the FC Network corner of the ESPN site. Click here to see what has already appeared. A few hours passed without the piece appearing and Joey Barton himself then let it be known the loan deal with Marseille was now unlikely to go ahead. Now it looks back on again (he is in Marseilles this afternoon, Wednesday) so let us look at what he and this vibrant French city have to offer each other …

Read more

Liverpool, Newcastle … and the rest of Salut! Sunderland’s eventful week

by

Monsieur Salut

Salut! Sunderland‘s look back on the week just gone may not appear every single Saturday – it is a useful guide for the busy reader but also time-consuming – but resumes with links to much of what has been written here about the Liverpool opener, Joey Barton’s antics at St James’ Park and today’s Derby …

Time for all posturing and pre-match boasting to end. Kickoff is only a few hours away and some of us may be ecstatic, others despondent, come 2pm.

The derby has made it a busy week at Salut! Sunderland. But the flurry of activity here began with the ultimately satisfactory draw at Anfield.

Read more

Thuggery to eloquence: is Joey Barton still a ‘complete plonker’?

by

That description came not from a blinkered Sunderland fan but, or so it is said, the Newcastle United dressing room. Salut! Sunderland applauds a straining-to-be-fair-but-honest appraisal of Joey Barton …

No one living outside the strangely mixed mind of the Newcastle United midfielder truly knows the answer to the question posed in the headline.

Read more

Newcastle’s Barton brushes aside Arsenal’s Gervinho in cheating stakes

by

Red & White in Black & WhiteMrs Logic in whimsical mood

Yesterday’s harmless piece of fun had our neighbours foaming at the mouths, most of them spectacularly missing the point that the writer, Pete Sixsmith, was quoting words written by someone else (though amid all the charges of “drivel”, “boring”, “gash” and “*****”, one lad did nobly own up to knowing who Sandy Denny was). But derby week being what it is, the banter must go on …

Even the leader of Newcastle’s care-in-the-community brigade now admits he was wrong to call Gervinho a cheat, however much the Arsenal player made of the contact he received in the United penalty box.

Read more