Officials for Preston match announced

Details have been released of the officials for our forthcoming match against Preston North End:

SAFC v Preston North End: Sunderland Stadium of Light, Wednesday 10 March

REFEREE: Phil Prosser (West Yorkshire)
ASSISTANTS: Andrew Smith (West Yorkshire), Barry Sygmuta (North Yorkshire)

Mr Prosser has reffed 26 matches so far this season (6 Div 1, 8 Div 2, 7 Div 3, 1 FAC, 2 LC, 2 LDV); he has given a massive 104 yellow cards and 15 red cards for the season so far - compared with his totals for last whole season of 102 yellows and 4 reds! The most yellow cards he's given out in one match this season so far was nine, when Millwall beat Walsall 2-1 at the New Den last September - he booked four Millwall players and five Walsall players. In his first three div 1 matches alone he gave out 21 yellow cards!

He hasn't reffed a game involving either us or Preston so far this season but had been due to referee the original date for this match, but the game was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch.

He said, "I’ve been looking forward to this match since the fixtures came out. This is a really big game for me, both these teams are right up there.

His "day job" is an engineer in the RAF - when the match was postponed, he revealed that he didn't know if he'd still be able to referee the rescheduled game, as he was due to spend four months in Baghdad

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Sheffield match live in the USA

One of the best things about being a sunderland supporter is that, when we are on (which admittedly isn't often), I don't continuously have to get up at 7:am week in week out (appologies for all NY mackems who made it last weekend to find the match was cancelled) at least as Man United always seem to have to do (they seem to want to kill off all foreign support by making matches as early as possible).

However after a gruling week in the psyche center... like Cherry Knowle, except ten times larger, even down to the abandoned buildings... I'm looking forward to seeing the lads on the tele this weekend, on sunday morning at eleven. Now this has already been posted on the message board but I recon that it's worth posting again so I've snuck out of work to put this on the RTG site.

For those in NYC we're going to be in Nevada Smiths (11th st and 3rd ave) in NYC at 11 am and anyone visiting the city is welcome to come in and have a pint with us, we had a great time the last occasion we were on (and were not cancelled) and even had the chance to meet some Uk based supporters from the message board! Having so many SAFC supporters in one place was an amazing experience for all.

Good news for everyone in the States who paid to be a member of SAFCSA USA is that I finally have the membership cards. Also, for those with really *really* good memories, months and months ago I promised to do a paid PET scan in aid of the USA branch. ... Well call me stupid (and now radioactive too) but I did it (as my avatar will show in the message board). And I want to put the procceeds towards buying a huge six foot SAFC flag for Smiths in NYC.

The rest of the money will go towards buying some replica shirts for the members, so any supporters in the states should get in contact with me if you are interested in getting a discount. I'll send them over with the membership cards.

As for those in New York/New jersey... I'll see you there on sunday!

Ha'way the lads

-Adam
ajrobson@aol.com

Three good points just off the M6 - 3-1 win over Walsall

Every club at times has to look deep inside itself and ask itself “do we have a Julio Arca?”. For some clubs collective grit and determination never to say die is their Julio Arca; for others their Julio Arca is the ability to produce a moment of inspiration when least expected. For us, he’s a small Argentinean who plays on the left side. In a first half of quite remarkable turgidity, he decided to jink down the left wing past several players towards the opposite goal from us. In my mind he then played a couple of one-twos with Tommy Smith. When I got home and watched Sky Sports News, they had some false pictures of Smith scuffing a shot and it rather luckily coming back to Arca. Do not believe the cathode ray tube – my mind’s eye never lies. In both Arca then had space inside the left side of the box and rifled in the shot. We asked “can you do anything else Julio?” and he replied “yes, watch this” as, a minute or so later, a ball came in from the Walsall left into the far side of the goal right in front of where we were sitting - he appeared from nowhere and headed the ball out from underneath the bar. “Ole” indeed. Other than that the first half was pretty forgettable but you won’t hear me complaining about being ahead.

We were happily sitting in the King George V supping Guinness and eating pies from the chip shop next door (football supporters’ heaven) when the team news cam through. Poom in goal obviously but then a back four of Original Dazza (nee Wright – injured I heard later), Babb (nee Breen – injured; or Jockie – compassionate leave), Ringo (back in the centre of the back four – good) and Arca at left back (hurray!). Three left footed players in the back four – as they were defending in front of us in the first half I felt myself leaning to the left to compensate – strange. In midfield Oster was moved back to the left wing and Macateer held up the other side with Thirwell and Whitely doing their usual job – a somewhat narrow midfield and not the most creative for a game we all agreed we were going for a win and not a draw. Kyle partnered Smith up front with Stew on the bench. No place on the bench for Piper – we’d half been expecting he might get there as he’d travelled with the squad and we need to start getting him match fit.

So the second half we were hoping the game would liven up a bit but more importantly we would stay ahead. It certainly never hit great heights but the second half was quite a bit better than the first in entertainment terms – helped by the fact perhaps that we were attacking our end. Unfortunately we didn’t stay ahead. Walsall were hardly very threatening but managed to equalise early in the second half (apparently Poom was fouled but I saw nowt). Fortunately we went back in front very quickly. Kyle, as he so often does, was making the life of the Walsall back four miserable and opening up a lot of room for others. However, earlier in the second half he had also had two great goal chances. The first, the ball came to him in space in the left side of the box but he hit a left foot shot that frankly really didn’t get very close at all. Something remarkable happened however, instead of a collective groan, the SAFC supporters shouted encouragement to him – Kylie in winning over supporter’s sensation? He then sent in a powerful header that the goalie did well to knock on to the bar. So we were all delighted for him when he got on the end of an Oster corner to knock in a clean, powerful header. Kyle was clearly delighted (I know it’s hard to tell but I think he is sincere – we see enough fake “joy” from players on the telly) and ran over to the Sunderland fans – like Tommy Smith the previous week (who admittedly jumped over some hoardings – Kylie didn’t) he got booked for his troubles – well done ref, got to clamp down on players disgracefully acknowledging the people who pay to keep them in a living.

We continued to play a controlled passing game. While in the first half, this had come across as unimaginative now it seemed like a mature sensible game plan – perspective is everything. Oster went off with quarter of an hour or so to go and Stew came on. Pretty quickly we had another one – a corner came over and that man Kyle got a nice flick that came down handily for Stew to stab in from my favourite spot for strikers – within a leg’s length of the penalty spot. Got to hand it to Stew – he seems to be developing the Pop Robson/Stan Cummins knack of hanging around in good “stabby in” places – something I was very critical of him not doing earlier on this season.

To be fair, Walsall might have pulled one back late on but I think they and we knew the chances of them pulling two back were very slim indeed. Near the end Mick Mac added a nice touch by allowing Kyle to come off to get his own ovation. He knows that sections of the crowd seem determined not to be won over to supporting him so it must be nice for the young lad to hear the crowd cheering him and him alone as he walked off – well done Mick. Byefield came on to his old ground but the Walsall supporters were understandably depressed so seemed unable to either clap or boo him.

The whistle went with all the team down our end, which was nice as it meant that we could all celebrate 3 good points together (if that’s OK with you ref). A word about the travelling support – how the hell did you all get off work you lazy gits? I had been on my way home on Tuesday to pick up the car to go and get the wife when I’d heard the match was cancelled. I’d turned round, gone back to work and rearranged my stuff for Wednesday afternoon. I had imagined that few would be able to do that at such short notice. The end we had holds almost 2,000 and, except for a small block on the right hand side was pretty much full. How so many managed to get off with just 24 hours notice of the rearranged match is amazing. I know we have a fair few midlands-based supporters but that’s not going to count for more than a couple of hundred at most. Well however you did it, hats off lads and lasses – it was great to see so many there.

Pretty good preparation for the FA Cup quarter final methinks. There is a sense of optimism creeping into SAFC supporters – but the pessimists needn’t be too concerned – I’m sure something will come along to worry us all again soon.