Sunderland

Arsenal Soapbox: same old Arsène, always moaning

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Pete Sixsmith was right at half time to text about Sunderland being well on top despite the fluke Fabregas goal. But maintaining our good cop/bad cop routine, he is less understanding than a certain other Salut! Sunderland writer of Arsène Wenger’s autowhinge mode …


The Wenger Whingometer usually goes to the top of the scale when the Metropolitan darlings have to visit the frozen north. Bolton, Blackburn, Stoke, Sunderland – Wenger hates them, with their gritty approach to football, their baying crowds and their pragmatic managers.

His post match interviews are a mixture of apoplexy and that superior look he can adopt, making him look like an incredibly snobbish llama.

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When Arsenal own up: cheers to Highbury House

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In the past 18 hours or so, I have heard Gooners admit they were second best for large chunks of yesterday’s game, that Arsenal players were more physical than ours, that Song’s serial offending brought him stern but hardly unfair punishment and that Marouane Chamakh dived shamelessly for a penalty (though not the one that was given; Collymore has confused everyone – see comments).

Great minds thinking alike, a regular Salut! Sunderland reader
Yiannis Skindilias draws our attention to a decent, reasonable account of the game from a Gooner with a platform just as prepare to reproduce it here with admiration:

It’s from Highbury House, one Gooners’ blog I hadn’t encountered before, And I join Yiannis in saluting the author.

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Sunderland v Arsenal: beauty and the beasts?

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Image: addick-tedKevin


Saturday morning and several hours to go before the later kickoff.

The papers are full of how wonderful Jack Wilshere is, how best he and the rest of Arsenal’s cultured but fragile elite should be protected from Premier League thugs (today’s equivalent of Keown, Adams, Bould, Winterburn, Dixon, Petit and Vieira? ‘appy ‘arry didn’t put it quite like that, but got pretty close).

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Prejudice and all that: coming to Lee Cattermole’s defence

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Image (from Munster v SAFC): L09C


Salut! Sunderland makes no apology for rebuking Lee Cattermole for his failure, for a second time in only three games this season, to stay on the pitch for all of one half. But we like a good argument. As if in quick response to my appeal for help when a forthcoming operation restricts my ability to post, Geoff Bethell pops up from New Zealand with a refreshingly different analysis …


I haven’t lived in Sunderland since 1961. I haven’t been there since 1968. I haven’t lived in the UK since 1970.

But out here in the glorious rugby-playing nation of NZ it’s still the case that to be a whole human being you can no more give up your love of Sunderland AFC than you can your brain.

Since the advent of the internet, keeping in touch has become so much easier. So it was on Sunday morning (we’re 11 hours ahead of UK) that I went on to SportingLife.com as usual for the results.

One-one away to Wigan. I’d hoped for better, feared for worse, but appreciated that 1-1 was acceptable. Was it a point well won or two points thrown away? The match reports and comments were the next things to check up on. It was then I lost it.

“Oh for eff’s sake.”

“What a complete and utter cretin.”

“Why do we persist with this twerp?”

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Arsenal: ‘go on – would you rather watch us, or Stoke?’

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Our second Gooner to preview SAFC v Arsenal, Jon Ryan*, had an enviable journalistic career, mixing business and pleasure by becoming sports editor of the Mail on Sunday and The Sunday Telegraph. A racing man, too, he rounded it off by cantering into a top job at the British Horseracing Authority, which oddly enough brought him into contact with Niall Quinn. No hardship for a big Quinny fan. Jon is pictured with his daughter Jemma “on a disastrous night in Munich – we lost 3-1 in a snowstorm but at least witnessed the world’s biggest snowball fight in the Olympic stadium and had a mean knuckle of ham”. Bet he was happier last night …

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The Arsenal ‘Who Are You?’: rooting for Blackpool, recalling another Sunderland

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Click here for a top sports editor’s view from the Emirates …

Sunderland v Arsenal: leave aside next week’s Carling Cup game and it’s the start of three really tough tests, and Mackems would settle now for a repeat of last season’s fixture. Perhaps Braga will tire them out tonight. Pat McLaughlin* runs the wildly successful JustArsenal.com fan site (million hits a month) from an armchair somewhere in Yorkshire. He expects the Gunners to thump us – but, then, he thought us dark horses for a sixth-top finish a year ago …

Salut! Sunderland: Solid enough start for the Gunners. What is your expectation for the season?

I have high hopes. I know Arsenal fans like to moan a lot, but I seriously believe the team is a lot stronger than last season, and we weren’t that far away. Squillaci and Koscielny will tighten things up at the back, and if Arsenal can avoid the ridiculous amount of injuries they sustained last year, I see no reason why we can’t finish at the top of the pile this time around.

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Peter O’Toole and a lost Sunderland passion

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Eight years ago, I thought I’d cracked it for my series of Celebrity Supporter interviews for Wear Down South. Missing out on Gina McKee, Dave Stewart and – bizarrely given his initial enthusiasm – Glenn Hugill had been disappointing, but an exclusive interview with Peter O’Toole beckoned …

Peter O’Toole‘s connection with Sunderland AFC was, for a very long time, a mystery to me.

I’d heard the rumours, been told of the chatshow asides and wondered about the truth. Couldn’t recall seeing him in the away end anywhere, and didn’t bump into him on rare forays into executive dining areas.

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Money, money, money: playing the transfer market

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The transfer market is closed until the New Year window, but Andrew Curry* draws on his knowledge of finance and football to mull over the process that saw Kenwyne Jones and Martyn Waghorn leave Sunderland and Asamoah Gyan arrive …

I like Kenwyne Jones.

I like his languor, his goal celebration, the way he could – on his good days – really worry opposing centre halves.

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The Birflatt Boy: he’s no Cool Catt this one

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Didn’t (doesn’t) the Sunday Sun have a column by one Mr Angry? Well, it seemed time Salut! Sunderland had one, too. Ours will take a different name – see above – but the spluttering anger will be undiluted. Where better to start than with our recalcitrant card-loving midfielder? The stage belongs to Birflatt Boy ….

Cattermole!, Cattermole! Cattermole! Why do you keep kicking people up in the air, Cattermole?

Depending on your point of view, this lad’s either a little bit over enthusiastic, or he’s a complete nutter.

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