Monsieur Salut writes: Big Sam sends on a midfielder in place of a forward to save a point at home against strugglers. Thousands of SAFC fans see the writing on the wall. So let’s dwell briefly on real Sunderland heroes, heroes of other ages …
Sunderland A.F.C
SAFC v Bournemouth Who are You?: ‘you’re going down, you deserve better’
Just in the nick of time before Monsieur Salut beetles off to Krakow for a long weekend, Steve Jenkins* from the Bournemouth fan site Tales From the South End comes up with the goods for our regular Who Are You feature. He’d take Jermain Defoe back to Bournemouth in a heartbeat and worries about the threat he could pose in Saturday’s game. And he is a strong admirer of Big Sam. Sadly, he believes only one of ours teams will survive this season and that it won’t be Sunderland …
Sixer’s farewell to Pantilimon and Graham hails effort over achievement
The transfer window is an opportunity for some players to move on and restart their careers. And so it is that, while saying welcome to Jan Kirchhoff and Dame N’Doye we also say goodbye to Costel Pantilimon and Danny Graham.
Neither will be rated as amongst the finest signings the club has made. They will not be spoken of in the same awed terms that are reserved for the likes of Chris Turner or Marco Gabbiadini (48 today).
SAFC v Bournemouth Guess the Score: give us a winter warmer, Sam
Just for fun, if following incessant SAFC relegation battles can truly be considered fun, have a go at guessing Saturday’s score.
As Sunderland begin 2016 with Costel Pantilimon off to Watford and Danny Graham bound for Blackburn, there may be chances for Big Sam’s new men to shine in this massive home game.
Bournemouth will probably feel a lot more relaxed than us. They have more points, less weight of expectation on their shoulders and some decent players.
Beauties and Beasts: (7) Jermain Defoe and the shirt I want to buy
Beauties and Beasts: that’s the name of this series – see it here – of supporters’ recollections of different Sunderland shirts from years and even decades past. It was inspired by an idea from Classic Football Shirts, very welcome here as occasional competition sponsors. Their range of historic SAFC tops is a great internet outing in itself – but it is not complete, as John McCormick is about to explain …
I effectively left the North East in 1970, when I went to live down south in Yorkshire. I did return from time to time, most notably for the home games in our 1973 cup run (I also made the away ones, as it happens), but from Yorkshire I moved to London, and then to Liverpool, where I arrived in the summer of 1975 …
Cheer up Jan Kirchhoff: even Charlie Hurley had a debut to forget
The Hoff needn’t get The Huff. We’ve all had rotten days at work and sometimes, for some of us, on the first day of a new job. Before he knows it, the fans will be singing, ‘Who’s the greatest centre half the world has even seen … Jan Kirchhoff is his name’. Anyone with the sense of history shown in Iain Foster’s comment knows Charlie Hurley also made a wretched start to life with Sunderland. Iain wonders whether we might follow King Charlie with Kaiser Kirchhoff and Pete Sixsmith takes up the story …
Beauties and beasts: (6) the loneliness of the long distance Sunderland supporter
See the whole Beauty and Beasts series, presenting supporters’ thoughts on the succession of SAFC shirts over the years, at https://safc.blog/category/beauties-and-beasts/. And if you fancy a browse through the Classic Football Shirts Sunderland range, take a look at http://bit.ly/1ZNPCJA#sthash.P10KFjhR.dpuf. Our deal is that anything readers buy also helps the site with running costs …
Sixer’s Tottenham Hotspur Soapbox: one debut to remember, one to haunt
Pete Sixsmith is there more often that not, saving the occasional delights and absorbing the much more common disappointments of being a Sunderland supporter. Not on Saturday, which found him on the Sixsmith Towers sofa …
Beauties and beasts: (5) a defence of the pin-striped indefensible
Is it not almost a prerequisite of Sunderland AFC support to regard the shirt you see above as a hideous aberration, a shameless departure from proud tradition to make the passing of the steam locomotive seem a mere detail of transport history? It is not. The shirt has, or had, its champions, as Monsieur Salut has been discovering. We hear all too little from the wise and witty folk who inhabit the Blackcats e-mail list. Here, in the latest from our Beauties and Beasts series, Andy Potts*, a Mackem in Moscow exile, puts that right with a valiant defence of the pin-striped SAFC home top from 1981-83 …
SA’s Essay: Sunderland self destruct at Spurs
Malcolm Dawson writes…….two wins on the bounce had put a bit of colour back into the cheeks of an ailing …