Sunderland

Abigail writes: ‘at last I’ve seen Sunderland win at home’

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Abigail, en route to her first home win

Abigail Emmerson is a special girl. How many other nine-year-olds – OK, only a few days to go before she hits 10 – willingly turn up to watch SAFC home and often enough away, make videos about it and write for Salut! Sunderland? You met her here after the Burton away win, she was mentioned again in Monsieur Salut’s account of his winning trip to the SoL and now she offers her own thoughts on that breakthrough …

I can’t believe I have eventually seen my first home win. I thought it would never happen. But then again I picked the worst time to start watching them last season. We had been doing OK before I turned up, but then to go a year without a win? Wow.

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For days like this, we follow Sunderland? Not quite but beating Fulham gladdened the heart

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Half time, with Barnes and Benno at the commentary box up in the West stand gods

 

Monsieur Salut, only an occasional presence at games, offers some thoughts on a satisfying first pilgrimage to the Stadium of Light since, well, we were a Premier League side ….

With apologies to all the people I would also have liked to meet but couldn’t, let it be recorded that even a punishing drive south in rotten conditions failed to dampen the spirits after a weekend back in the north, capped by that heartening first home win for a horrifying period, just one day short of a year.

“I must have aged 10 years in the last five minutes,” someone said in the concourse as people left the Stadium of Light with rare smiles on their faces.

One of the most exuberant of those smiles belonged to nine-year-old Abigail Emmerson, who recently wrote a charming account of her early experiences as a Sunderland supporter.

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SAFC vs Fulham Who are You?: ‘our possession football can be devastating’

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Russ:’no one touches Danny Murphy as a Fulham star of recent years’

Monsieur Salut writes: I had a dream; Sunderland beat Fulham 2-0 before my eyes to end the home hoodoo. A likely outcome? Russ Goldman*, a USA-based Fulham fan who hosts the Cottage Talk podcast (as well as a New England Patriots podcast, disagrees as you would expect. He is not too downbeat about his club’s failure to live up to expectations so far and believes they will end up in the top six. He also expects them to beat us on Saturday …

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Bearing gifts, Sixer as not seen before (since this time last year)

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And what he said next was ‘……’


The Last Time Ever I Looked, the star of Salut! Sunderland’s gripping series, The First Time Ever I Saw Your Team/Ground, had attracted 101 “likes” with this image posted at Facebook.

Steadfast dieting has whittled away Pete Sixsmith, for it is again he in the guise of County Durham’s busiest descendant of Saint Nicholas. But he still looks the part, as he describes it, as “Santa in his grotto at As You Like It in Jesmond”.

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The Sunderland v Fulham Guess the Score with classy Niall/SuperKev prize

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Niall and SuperKev: click the image for more details

Out with the mugs and in with the print or t-shirt. For the next two games, Guess the Score has the ear of those excellent people at Art of Football, occasional sponsors of Salut! Sunderland competitions and run by Nottingham Forest fans among whom we found a Who are You? candidate earlier in the season.

So guess the score in Sunderland vs Fulham, be first with the right scoreline and you will win one of the two Niall Quinn/Kevin Phillips items shown: a fine print or a t-shirt depicting two heroes of Sunderland’s relatively recent past.

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Wolves vs SAFC prize Guess the Score: a mountain to climb

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Jake: ‘As long as you’re prepared for a wait until Monsieur Salut gets his finger out, there will indeed by a prize for the winner’

The way hope was brushed aside as if no more than a slow, low-flying insect hardly inspires great confidence as Sunderland travel to Molineux, where Wolves are top, 10 points ahead of third place and winning games for fun, the last five of them on the trot.

Come back tomorrow and you’ll see why our Wolves “Who are You?” interviewee predicts an emphatic home win despite having a soft spot for Sunderland, having once lived on Wearside and been a Roker Park regular.

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Through a child’s eyes: end Sunderland gloom to make Abigail’s party swing

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Abigail with Martin at Boro

Ten years ago this Christmas, Salut! Sunderland welcomed into the world little Abigail Emmerson, the daughter of Monsieur Salut’s confrère and consoeur, the BBC’s Martin Emmerson and his wife, Julia from Tyne Tees.

All was going well, two lovely sisters coming along to join the family, until Abigail, bless her soul, started going to see the team supported by successive Emmerson generations. For some weeks, the pain of Sunderland’s decline has been eased a little for some of us by a series of entertaining little Facebook clips showing Abigail and her dad chatting on matchdays. It’s been enough to make Barnes and Benno sharpen up their act.

Memo to Chris Coleman and the team: Abigail is 10 on Christmas Eve. We bet she’ll have a great birthday party anyway but think how much more fun it might if Sunderland had won a couple of games, three even, by then (quick, handy definition of ‘win’ in football terms: score at least one more goal than the other lot).

NB: do not report Martin to the social services department. Abigail’s ordeal is of her own making. Let her take up the story …

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SAFC vs Reading Who are You?: Vito’s ‘incredible professionalism’, McShane’s steel

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Anthony Smith: a boy from the Welsh Valleys with a soft spot for Reading. Photo: Chris Forsey

Monsieur Salut writes: what’s the betting on Chris Coleman making his home debut as Sunderland manager with a win against Reading (and football accumulator pages may well be the place to find the answer)? After the relief of the win last Saturday – our first league victory since mid-August and only the second of the season – there is pressure to make it two-in-a-row but also a degree of momentum and the confidence winning brings to any team. To Newcastle fans, that translates as thinking beating Burton is roughly the same as winning the World Cup.

 

Our Reading Who are You? interviewee, Anthony Smith, warmly recommended by Terry Pattinson, a New*as*le supporter who has previously done the honours and may well do so again unless we go up or down), covers Reading for Berkshire newspapers. He’s grown to like the Royals despite roots in South Wales – his club is Swansea – and an inexlicable fondness for Spurs. He overcame a formidable workload to find time to answer our questions. I couldn’t have taken it solely on the word of Terry, a Mag let’s face it, but Anthony comes across as the top bloke he said he was – and he clearly knows his stuff …

 

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Burton Albion Who are You?: Brewers’ ‘Pieman’ says we can both beat relegation

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Dave Child: ‘sorry – don’t you go using this photo as a dartboard’

 

 

Dave Child* is a fan of the old school. Burton Albion through and through – ‘who are Derby County?’, he asks when pressed on the competing attractions of other local teams – he was among the 11,000 travelling fans who made Old Trafford less of a library than usual for a cup replay. And he’s an epxert on the pies served at football grounds and hostelries that welcome away fans (if you;’re going, scroll down to see which one Dave thinks you’d enjoy). 

And what was he doing with Paolo Di Canio? Interviewing him for local radio when PDC was Swindon manager and they played Burton…

Salut! Sunderland:  stuck with us in the relegation zone, Burton would probably be expected to struggle even if neutrals would love them to survive. How is it looking for you?

Dave Child: yes we are in our usual position and not really surprised, the aim as we head towards the festive fixtures is to stay out of the bottom three, then come January Cloughie can work his miracles in the loan market bringing in Gareth Bale and Zlatan Ibrahimovic and make a late charge for the play offs!

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