Leeds United

Cardiff beaten, Leeds next. Sunderland’s champion women make winning seem easy

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All photos courtesy Sunderland Women's Football Club

Remember the time when the men could be expected to go out and do the business? Not that long ago. Now, they are under heavy pressure – largely of their own making – to finish the season with a belated flourish, at Craven Cottage on Sunday and at home to the confirmed or would-be champions Manchester United a week after that.

With the Lasses, it’s different, or seems to be. Give them a task and out they go to accomplish it. Bravo!, Chapeau! to Sunderland Women’s Football Club for bouncing back from shocking exclusion from the Super League to retain the Premier League title by beating Cardiff City 2-1 away yesterday. That is some achievement and there’s a cup final still to come on Sunday.

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Arsène Wenger, Gareth Bale and the cheating legacy of Don Revie’s Leeds

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(Image: Timothy Boyd)


When Salut! Sunderland hammers on about cheating in football, and declares that any diving and feigning of injury is beyond the pale and not just when committed by opponents, the world is silent. When Arsène Wenger says something similar, everyone sits up and pays attention.

That is naturally as it should be. Not only is Wenger a top voice in football, deserving of a serious hearing when he makes a serious point; his call, reported with big headlines today, for an end to the conning of referees also sounds a little like a Damascene conversion.

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Time gentlemen please to forget humbling Leeds and Newcastle

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This is not intended as a breach of Salut! Sunderland‘s new commitment to get-behind-the-lads positivism in the run-up to the match (on the grounds that hostilities can always be resumed at 5pm). More of a general view on where we are as a club, what we actually want and whether it is time to stop harping on about past triumphs. And then, loyal readers and gloating visitors, it is over to you …

Much of Thursday passed without me realising the significance of the date: May 5. Then I remembered. And once reminded, I knew like everyone else what had happened on the same date 38 years ago. Did I say everyone else? Who else, apart from us, Leeds and a few football anoraks, actually feels any need to recall the 1973 FA Cup Final?

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The star’s apology to Arsenal and Leeds that changed cheating debate

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Theo WalcottImage: Wonker

It was while I was away on holiday and we were being dumped out of the FA Cup by mighty Notts County that Theo Walcott made a statement I have since been unable to shake from my mind.

Arsenal nearly had their own cup day stinker, leaving it desperately late to snatch a draw at home to Leeds. This proved crucial as the Gunners went on to win the Elland Road replay comfortably.

But what made a real impact on me was the subsequent statement from Walcott, posted to the official Arsenal site.

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Another team I like: Histon, conquerors of once-mighty Leeds

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As I cleared the spam box of drivel about colon cleansing, quack weight loss treatments and fake designer handbags, it dawned on me that our own Pete Sixsmith isn’t the only Sunderland fan with a strong, occasionally stronger (like last night, when he gave Colchester a miss) attachment to non-league footie. Stephen “FTM” Thompson*, the latest contributor to our occasional “Another Team” series, accepted my invitation to share his love of Histon with fellow SAFC supporters …

“Look at that twat in the Sunderland top. I bet he’s never been to a Histon or Sunderland match in his life.”

That was one of the comments I read on an online message forum following Histon’s famous FA Cup victory over Leeds United** two years ago.

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Sunderland/Leeds remembered: it’s those magic numbers 7 and 3 again

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Leeds United fans hate us mentioning it, just as Newcastle United supporters mock us for referring to Dec 5 1908. But since Leeds still have a good chance of following the Toon example in gaining promotion from a lower division, we’re sure they won’t mind another gentle reminder of the day every football fan (apart from them) smiled …

Sunderland fans, especially those who go back a bit, never tire of remembering, on May 5 of each year, a certain event that occurred at Wembley stadium on that date in 1973.

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Salut! History (2): Leeds, ludicrous perms and mad 1970s flares

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monty (plus Hughes and Tueart)

In the second part of our look at Colin Irwin’s visit to the Stadium of Light – in the depths of the 2005/2006 relegation season – for Sing When You’re Winning, his book on journeys into the “soul of soccer” (good alliteration, but he meant football), we hear a potted history of our club’s ups and more plentiful downs …


Sunderland were actually founded in Glasgow by an Ayrshire man, James Allan, in 1879 and their current travails are nothing new in the long and winding road that’s brought them to the Stadium of Light.

One of the giants of the early years, they hit the rocks after the Second World War. Blighted by an illegal payments scandal, they slithtered down the league and in 1958 were relegated from the top flight for the first time in their history.

They restored some pride, of course, in 1973, with one of the most startling FA Cup finals ever.

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SAFC 1 Leeds 0: words can describe it

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Health warning: to be avoided by persons of a sensitive disposition who also support Leeds United.

mackemlasses

But think back to the first Saturday of May, 37 years ago. Every street deserted, people glued to their TV sets if not actually at Wembley. All the devotion, fervour and pride captured in the selection of photos we have reproduced with kind permission of the Sunderland Echo – and the renowned Tyne Tees documentary, clips of which appear here from YouTube (complete with the Mackem lass showing off those knickers). Leeds fans who stray into these parts will be pleased to hear this is our last look at the fascinating new book by a Sunderland-supporting BBC journalist, Lance Hardy, on the epic 1973 FA Cup Final. Interview by Colin Randall …

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