There is a prize and City fans are warmly invited to have a go, too. You judge whether it’s a great one
Another big Sunderland following will be on the road this weekend for the visit to Coventry City and the Ricoh, hardly a name with the appeal to any football fan of Highfield Road but the one demanded by the Japanese sponsors of the the sports, hotel and shopping complex where it is situated.
Will the travelling support witness the sort of Sunderland display that dismissed Rochdale with some ease or the one that stuttered and stumbled at Burton? We’ll see.
Monsieur Salut writes: we are honoured to have some lovely Who are You? interviews with opposing fans. This is up there with the best in my view. John Beckett*, a former Manchester police emergency dispatcher and now a driving instructor, has been hooked on his local team – not United, not City but good old Rochdale – since early childhood. He’ll be among the away fans on Saturday …
Salut! Sunderland: small club in the shadow of giants but you have a strong community identity and probably feel superior to them on that basis alone! Explain Rochdale AFC for those who remember only that you beat us on penalties in a Checkatrade game.
John Beckett: Rochdale AFC (or The Dale) were formed in 1907. We were accepted into the Football League in 1921 and have remained in the 3rd and 4th tiers ever since.
Thankfully after 36 consecutive seasons in the old Division 4/League 2 we finally won promotion in 2010.
This alone is one of the main reasons we have a great support. No one can ever say we are gloryhunters but we are true die hard fans!
For those Sunderland supporters who take the trouble to visit these pages regularly, it will come as no surprise that we are currently running a series called Branch Lines.
Its purpose is to introduce readers to the many branches of the Sunderland AFC Supporters’ Association (SAFCSA) that have been created, but also – where applicable – to the more informal groups of SAFC fans that may also exist.
And our chosen way of approaching the task has been to ask individuals concerned with those branches to do the introductions rather than just have them written about by Monsieur Salut or his colleagues at Salut! Sunderland.
Hail the return of Guess the Score in prize format – Monsieur Salut is in a slightly better mood this week despite the defeat at Burton Albion – and all readers, Rochdale fans included, are invited to take part.
A Sunderland-supporting winner, that is to say a SAFC fan correctly predicting the result of Saturday’s game, will receive a mug that looks a little like this …
Monsieur Salut writes: Dave Child*, an expert on football stadium pies as well as doing his bit for local radio, is a fine ambassador for his club, Burton Albion, the town itself and its celebrated beer. Last season, he rose twice to the ‘Who are You?’ occasion, attending both games (we won there; they sent us down by taking revenge at the Stadium of Light) but also giving seriously good pre-match interviews to Salut! Sunderland. So it felt no hardship to return to Dave after he was proved right in his prediction that we’d go down together …
Charlatan or downtrodden victim: what, asks Monsieur Salut, are we to make of Papy Djilobodji, effectively sacked today by SAFC?
As a supporter of Sunderland AFC for more than half a century, I have reacted to a stream of under-performing players with a weary sense of resignation, blaming the club for acquiring them more than the players for being so useless. Provided, that is, that the player/s in question at least tried as best they could to justify inclusion in the squad.
If a player is not only way below par but also demonstrates an attitude betraying greed, unprofessionalism and stupidity, my finger of blame starts to pop in the other direction.
Jake back in action, willing the Lads on from Spain
UPDATE: the good news for readers waiting for prize mugs is that all those known to Monsieur Salut, and having provided delivery addresses and the names of players they wish to appear on the dressing room image, have had theirs ordered today. They should arrive soon. Anyone feeling left out, having been promised a mug and not received it, should let me know, using the contact form or simply by leaving a comment.
First things first, says Monsieur Salut. I have a backlog of mugs to send out to winning Guess the Score entrants and am struggling to persuade a wretched advertiser to pay for a sponsored post published almost two months ago. He faces a significant risk of being “outed” on these pages, as a warning to others, if the money does not show up sharpish.
We get the odd proper advertisement, and businesses from the North East, like the one you see to the right of the page, are warmly welcome.
Some of the content supplied by way of sponsored posts is of a reasonable quality and I do my best to make the others at least presentable. Out and out stinkers are rejected.
But it’s a process that may be seen as a necessary evil that helps such a site as Salut! Sunderland pay its way. And that includes the cost of competition prizes, for which we no longer have a sponsor.
So for this week at least, we revert to a just-for-fun edition of Guess the Score for the first time this season.
It may seem fanciful to suppose a team that beat us twice last season, and comfortably each time, and plays in a higher division should feel any need to envy Sunderland and Jack Ross. But look at Ipswich’s current plight – winless and second bottom of the Championship while two disappointing home draws have failed to push SAFC out of the League One top four – and you begin to see why William Sundin, the Tractor Boy (and Sunderland University graduate) writing this piece, is wondering which club is better off …
Ipswich Town fans started this summer in a situation familiar to Sunderland supporters, having taken the plunge and finally said goodbye to Mick McCarthy.
Fortunately, Ipswich didn’t do as Sunderland once did and turn to Roy Keane, as they’d made that mistake a few years previously instead [though taking Sunderland from bottom to top may be seen by some as less than a mistake – Ed].
Instead, Ipswich’s owner Marcus Evans sought an exciting young replacement not yet entrenched on the managerial merry-go-round. Evans was keen to wait for Paul Hurst to complete his playoff adventure with Shrewsbury, but the other standout candidate Jack Ross was not so keen to wait around.
Jake asks the question … see how others so far this season have replied by clicking on the image
John McCormick writes: Ben Knapman writes a fan column for the Fleetwood Weekly News and Blackpool Gazette. He did a two hour run earlier this year to raise funds for the Bradley Lowery Foundation. If that’s not enough he produces a You tube blog about Fleetwood Town. And he does it all on top of his studies, which I reckon are just about to begin once again.
Yet, when M Salut was about to give up the search for a Cod Army volunteer for this week’s “Who are You?”, Ben found the time, stepped into the breach and did an excellent job of giving us an introduction to a club few of us would have expected to be meeting in the football league.
There is a prize. You judge whether it’s a great one
Monsieur Salut explains why there may or may not be a Fleetwood Town ‘Who are You?’. At least Guess the Score continues unaffected … (stop press – we now have a willing volunteer – see comment.)
Looking at the sheer number of fixtures in League One, I did wonder whether we’d be able to maintain “Who are You?” on a regular basis this season.
So far, so good. But Fleetwood Town – their stadium may be called Highbury but it houses only 5,327 fans – has proved a tough nut to crack.
