Monsieur Salut reports on responses to our poll on Sunderland’s new home kit …
Well, we asked the question as neutrally as possible and got the answer: a big thumbs-down for the new Sunderland home shirt.
Of 111 votes at the last count – not too bad a sample by opinion poll standards but no more than that, of course, when you consider our average attendances – a thumping majority (nearly 74 per cent) think it “an absolute eyesore”.
Derek McInness: photo via Aberdeen FC’s Facebook pages On days such as this, it would be wrong for Salut! Sunderland …
On days such as this, it would be wrong for Salut! Sunderland to detach itself from events in a cruel world away from football. Our sympathies and solidarity go out to all those affected or bereaved by the tragic fire in a tower block in north Kensington, London overnight
Pete Sixsmith is in the midst of a truly engaging series on all the Sunderland relegations – which means all but one – he has known. He even managed to write about the one, our first from the top flight, that occurred before he was supporting SAFC.
The series can be seen in its entirety at https://safc.blog/category/pete-sixsmith/sunderlands-10-relegations/.
Here is the fifth instalment, For those of a squeamish disposition, prepare to have to put up with a lot of Lawrie McMenemy and a very angry, all these years on, Sixer. As we’ve come to expect from the lad – much slimmed down these days thanks to a paper round and healthy eating – it’s a great read combining vast footballing knowledge, a grasp of historical detail and the fallout of a lifetime spent following Sunderland through thick, thin and thinner …
On days such as this, it would be wrong for Salut! Sunderland to detach itself from events in a cruel …
Pete Sixsmith offers his thoughts on all the Stadium of Light developments: the exit of Jermain Defoe, the strong talk of Derek McInnes being on the verge of appointment as manager – and, first as you’d expect, the likely departure of Jordan Pickford …
At last things appear to be moving at the Stadium of Inertia, both in and out.
The retained list has been announced and it looks as if some of last season’s players may be moving on now that their contracts are up.
Monsieur Salut writes: Why does Salut! Sunderland exist? What prompted its creation? What was my first game? What have been my highs and lows of supporting Sunderland? All the kind of questions we regularly ask Who are You? candidates. This time the boot was on the other foot. The newish Football Friends site wanted answers from me. Here they are – and do check out the site for chats with those responsible for other club blogs …
Monsieur Salut writes: each close-season, we see a new set of SAFC kits. Each season, they divide opinion. I am clearly in a minority in liking, at least a little, the new home top. You may well disagree with me. Read on and have your say …
What you see above is not the new Sunderland home kit, the one generating such strong protests, but a markedly similar one from the days when our team was a force in the land, the Team of All the Talents no less. Check out a great description of historic strips at http://ryehillfootball.co.uk/art/the-art-of-sunderland-afc/.
Whenever we remind brand supporters – Man U and C, Chelsea, Liverpool, Chelsea, Spurs etc – that we’ve won six top flight titles, we must remember also that half of the titles were secured in the century before last. And what you see above is how we looked back then …
Monsieur Salut writes: it seems an awful long time ago. Then, BBC Radio Newcastle’s brilliantly excitable Simon Crabtree had produced the Mother of all Goal Commentaries with his description of Carlos Edwards’s scintillating winner against Burnley to push us closer to promotion (achieved as champions with the 5-0 away win at Luton in the final game). It’s in the superb YouTube clip you see above.
But Ten Years After – OK, a little more than 10, since the Burnley match was on April 27 and the Luton game on May 6 – we all need to have our spirits lifted. Then, we were in the hands of the Drumaville consortium, a group of Irish businessmen led by Niall Quinn as chairman and Seaham-born John Hays as vice chairman. I have seen the message Niall sent Drumaville’s surviving veterans after our relegation was confirmed this season; it was a model of dignity and pride.
Can the memory of that astonishing bottom-to-top transformation inspire whoever, ultimately, accepts the job of managing Sunderland and whoever is subsequently the club’s owner(s). We shall see. But here is how we reported on promotion 10 years ago …
This is the prize-winning interview with Del Day, a Watford supporter, in Salut! Sunderland annual HAWAY awards. Del took first place – as you can read here – and has expressed a preference for the £50 voucher from Classic Football Shirts (‘I’ll get that ’89 away shirt for my wife – only kidding, it’s the kit she hates most!’) … bravo Del, and here’s your interview all over again …
The deed is done. Another series of Who are You? interviews with opposing supporters has produced winners. Read on to see who the judges chose, and why ….
The judges have spoken. This year’s winners of the HAWAYs – awards for the Highly Articulate Who are You? interviews conducted through each season with fans of Sunderland’s opposing clubs – are announced today.
And in clear top place is Watford-supporting Del Day, followed by Chelsea’s Ray Knight and Bournemouth’s Tom Latchem.
Salut! Sunderland is, as ever, enormously grateful to the prize sponsors – Classic Football Shirts, When Saturday Comeshttps://shop.wsc.co.uk and Art of Football, and the gallery shows appropriate products each offers – and will simply offer Del his choice of the three. Ray gets second choice, leaving Tom with the remaining prize.
If the mood holds until the end of this article, there will be a special award from Salut! Sunderland funds for another deserving contender. But the truth is, as Jake’s caption makes clear, that the strength of the Who are You? series – see the full season’s entries here – is the quality of the responses we receive from the supporters who agree to participate.