by WORK GAMES
Facing the first Wear-Tyne derby in eight years, Sunderland fans had every reason to be optimistic about their chances of knocking bitter rivals Newcastle United out of the FA Cup. While their neighbors at St James’ Park play in the division above them, their record in the competition over the last two decades has been quite atrocious and has not improved in recent seasons under the new ownership regime. While Newcastle may have risen in the Premier League since the arrival of their Saudi owners, their FA Cup woes have continued and even under the transformative hand of Eddie Howe, they have twice been embarrassed in the third round by league rivals lower. Given their long list of skills and their dismal away form, there is every chance that streak of early exits will continue on Saturday when Sunderland welcome them to the Stadium of Light.
And what a warm welcome it was going to be. A welcome so extraordinarily hospitable and unprecedented that even if (and it is a gigantic Hollywood sign with flashing neon lights) Sunderland beat their visitors on the field, any temporary humiliation suffered by Newcastle would pale into almost total insignificance in comparison with the ignominy to which the long-suffering Mackems has just been subjected by the club’s own hierarchy. Anyone who has watched the excellent Sunderland documentary series Til I Die will know that the club’s fans have had to endure a host of terrible board decisions, but that was all supposed to have changed with the most recent takeover two years ago. Alas, he hasn’t and now, whoever the tin-eared fool was who approved the completely crazy idea of redecorating a corporate bar and dining room at one end of the Stadium of Light in Newcastle’s colors and slogans surely deserves a lucrative Netflix comedy special. .
Confirmed on Thursday, after having been circulating as a baseless rumor on the internet for more than a fortnight, the news that Sunderland were preparing to fawn over their neighbors in such a way has caused understandable joy on Tyneside, leading to the jubilant Mags to celebrate the most generous gift. that has been granted to them since a wealthy nation state took over their club. If they can stop laughing long enough to climb onto the coaches that will take them to the derby, an army of 6,000 will continue to sew up their split sides when they come down close to the ground. Given the events of the last few days, it is realistic to expect that they will be greeted on arrival with a complimentary bottle of Brown Ale, all the better to help them enjoy the sight of their team racing towards an exciting rendition of the Blaydon Races before of the party. echoing through the stadium’s public address system.
In stark contrast, Sunderland fans have reacted with such white-hot apoplectic fury to this embarrassing misstep that their young billionaire owner, Kyril Louis-Dreyfus, quickly shelved his plans to temporarily turn their ground into a Newcastle theme park and broadcast a cowardly apology. “Like our followers, I was disgusted and pained by the images circulating online of inappropriate signs that had been torn down,” he complained in an Instachat post that then tacitly suggested the search for a scapegoat. any scapegoat – is very fashionable. Whoever ends up taking the blame for this fiasco, the blame falls squarely on the presumably black-and-white-striped welcome mat in front of Louis-Dreyfus’s door. If he really wasn’t aware, as he suggested, of plans to cover a certain part of the Stadium of Light with markings that left local fanzine A Love Supreme “truly speechless”, it’s a damning criticism of the way he runs the club, that not a single person among the many locals who work for it felt comfortable enough to declare that it was a shockingly stupid idea.
“Crazy,” posted Joanne Youngson, a member of the Sunderland supporters’ liaison committee and just one of many fans to express their displeasure. “Fair enough, remove all the red and white to minimize the damage. But you don’t need to decorate the place for them. It’s a real shame, his fans are going to love it, we would love it. That’s why I wonder if Kyril knows what it means to us. He does not understand us or the region at all.” When asked about the controversy, Howe played a typically straight bat on Friday, even if there were visible traces of a smile lurking on his cheeks. “These things can happen,” he said. “It depends on Sunderland what they do with their stadium, it has nothing to do with us.” Although understandably less successful and wealthy than their rivals, Sunderland have now achieved the near impossible by somehow losing what passes for their moral authority.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
“My only regret is that he is not here now to see this. It was something he told me before he died: ‘Make sure you go and try.’ I said, ‘I’ll do it, Dad, when the time is right.’ I think he would be proud and I just hope he is looking down somewhere now” – memories of the great Ray Clemence are shared with Ben Fisher as his son Stephen prepares his Gillingham team for the visit of Sheffield United .
LETTERS FROM THE FOOTBALL DIARY
Credit where credit is due to Sean Dyche. Having made clear his opposition to the winter break, he now avoided it by having an FA Cup replay in the middle of it. I think that makes him an innovator, generally speaking” – Phil Russell.
Re: the Undertones and Subbuteo (letters from yesterday’s Football Daily). Towards the end of last year, McTear’s, an auction house in Glasgow, hosted an auction of a significant amount of football memorabilia from the family of the late, great Bertie Auld. This included several signed shirts, both Celtic and opponents, that he had acquired. A very attractive lot was the shirt worn by one of Bertie’s opponents in the second leg of the 1967 European Cup semi-finals played at Celtic Park. It gave the successful bidder the opportunity to own an authentic Dukla Prague away kit. Unfortunately, despite my letter to Santa, no one gave it to me for Christmas. Half a man, completely dejected” – Ken Muir.
Like Jürgen Klopp and 1,057 other people, I also lost my wedding ring (yesterday’s letters). I inadvertently sacrificed him to Njord, the Norse god of water, to ensure safe passage down a treacherous river (well, sounds more interesting than ‘he fell while rafting in Iceland’, right? James Vortkamp-Tong.
Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s winner of our non-prize card of the day is… Phil Russell.
