Catts out, gooch out,mcgeoch out of his depth, ditto nien, honeyman out of form.
Malcolm Dawson, deputy editor, compares and contrasts Sunderland AFC’s encouraging progress on and off the field with some less positive thoughts remembered from one contributor to Comments at Salut! Sunderland earlier in the season …
How the French turned ‘Sunderland, the play’ into ‘Saint-Etienne, the film’
As Sunderland rceord a first pre-season win, 1-0 at Grimsby, we also say farewell – or another one since he’s long gone any way, if previously on loan – to Wahbi Khazri.
Malcolm Dawson writes……….Pete Sixsmith made the trip across the Pennines to Brunton Park last night and saw us win our way through to the next round of the competition which I still call the League Cup. We got through but was it a comfortable victory or a fortunate one? Here’s what Pete thinks.
Carlisle United (away) Caraboa Cup
Tomorrow is the day when the English Football League draws the next round of this competition that has been ticking over since the 1960-61 season.
Our first game in it was at Griffin Park, Brentford on the 26th October. We lost 4-3 after having been 3-1 up at half time thanks to goals from Ian Lawther, Willie McPheat and Amby Fogarty. Later that week, the draw for the next round was made at the Football League headquarters in Lytham St Annes, at the posh end of Blackpool and I presume that the Football League panjandrums who drew it included Alan Hardaker, the formidable secretary of the League and Barnsley Chairman Joe Richards who was the President of the League at the time.
John McCormick writes: Patrick’s impending departure leaves me quite unmoved. It’s just on a year since I saw him score the opener at Spurs, after which he disappeared as they swept past us. And that seems to epitomise his play since. What does move me is not only how will we replace him but how will David Moyes rebuild a squad that is depleted, underskilled and getting older by the minute? Pete Sixsmith may have some of the answers in his report on events at Hetton:
John McCormick writes. Pete’s sevens were pessimistic but I thought we did OK in the second half and will be fine once we sort out our defence, midfield and attack.
What does our manager think, however? Well, to let you know, here’s a look at the letter he sent to M Salut, and maybe one or two others, immediately after the game:
John McCormick writes. Our Web wizard has scheduled some site maintenance and you may find the site is down for a short while some time today, so please bear with us.
And while we’re on the subject of bearing we need to move beyond the Lynden and Graham Gooch situation. Luckily, we have Pete Sixsmith to help us. Pete doesn’t just appear on TV (who else saw him on MOTD?) He doesn’t just deliver erudite summaries to the papers (and nor does he just deliver the papers). He’s also a bit of a historian, as he demonstrates in this wander through the genealogical archives of the North East:
Catts out, gooch out, mcgeoch out of his depth, ditto nien, honeyman out of form.
