It was a strange week in the build up to the typical cliché of “six-pointer”, “must win” comments that we now begin to hear before every home game but the reality of these comments for the 1st time this was in my eyes a must win game. Kenwyne Jones was traveling back from the Caribbean first class in a plane with a bed to ensure his fitness before this crucial game, Edwards was spending up to three hours in a magical oxygen down London in a tent but Daryl Murphy, of all people, proved E.T was correct in his statement: “There is no place like home!”. 12 points out of 12 for the lads at the SoL and this two week break could not have came after a better result or at a better time for the injured stars who missed out on this victory.
If we had lost there would have been no excuses for our league position but however, if we won, we could pull clear of everyone if the results went our way…. thankfully it was a brilliant week for Sunderland AFC as we won, kept a clean sheet, and pulled three points ahead of everyone involved except Birmingham who could only draw at Upton Park. Maybe things are going to go our way for once? Let’s not get carried away though as we all know things can change ever so quickly, but let’s rejoice in this win while we can eh?
Keane had little choice but to change things in midfield as a cluster bomb of injuries wiped out most of our key players in the middle of the park. Miller, Edwards, Richardson all out and Leadbitter and Reid could only make the bench, maybe as we had no-one else to field for the game? Thankfully Nigeria were crap in the African Nations and Etuhu walked straight back into the starting eleven to add some stability and presence alongside the under performing captain Deano. Our only other striker come right sided player came in the shape of Roy O’Donovan but the injury bug continued as he lasted twenty forgettable minutes due to a stomach injury.
Gordon
Collins Noz Evans Bardo
Murphy Whitehead Etuhu O’Donovan
Chopra Jones
The first half was awful, scrappy and evidence that the two teams involved were going to be involved at the bottom all season as no-one could control the ball and test the keeper as often as the 43,600 fans would have liked. Wigan looked the more likely to score with a few decent long range efforts and seemed to look more likely to score when going forward. The very impressive Palacious ran the centre of the park and looks quite useful if Wigan were to suffer relegation come May.
The major talking point for the dire first half was how badly the turf at the Stadium has cut up making the game difficult to play on the floor. A few more woeful minutes of scrappy passes and untidy football followed before the first real sniff at goal came from the unlikely source of Phil Bardsley. He decided to continue forward under no pressure from the Wigan back four and let rip with a great strike that unfortunately did not get to test Chris Kirkland.
This chance began to spark some belief amongst the fans and this led to Bardo again storming down the right before he was blocked by two of their players to set up a nicely placed free kick 30 yards out from goal. Dean Whitehead floated a lovely ball into the box for the charging Nigerian to repay his £1.5m price tag and open the scoring with a neat header past the England hopeful. This was the best move of the half and a crucial goal just before half time to set up a much needed win.
Prica who came on for O’Donovan could have made it two before the break as the ball fell kindly to Jones who was dispossessed by a tackle and the ball broke to Prica who just needed to smash it into the open net. However, he decided to become the new Dancing On Ice contender by touching the ball and then simply falling flat on his arse! It would have been a nice gap to have going into the second half, especially with the way Wigan started the 2nd half!
As soon as the game started Sunderland were under immense pressure as the ball came in King had his shot saved by the impressive Gordon who blocked the rebound. The ball still spinning was heading into the gaping net only for Whitehead to sprint to our rescue and hook the ball clear, but the danger was not over yet…
Kilbane, who was excellent as a make shift left back, got the ball outside of the area and drilled it straight against Gordon’s post and away to safety. The half time team talk from Keano was ignored as Wigan should have grabbed an equaliser in the first 120 seconds. Luckily, for once, Sunderland hung on and started to play with a bit more confidence. It was going to be a long half if we continued to defend and play like this.
The one thing I could not believe was how Bruce decided not to play Koumas from the start as he is a creator in midfield but decided to only play him for 45 minutes. His trickery and craft led to Wigan hitting the upright again in the 52nd minute. Heskey got the wrong side of Evans and Nosworthy only to see his flick on hit the wrong side of the bar. These were nervous times in such an important game but we managed to ride our luck and start to create our own chances.
Enter Andy Reid, all 43,600 fans could see he was coming on as soon as he left the subs bench, not being harsh on the new lad but he is carrying some excess Championship weight and needs to be trimmed down in the next few weeks but who could care after his introduction to the SoL turf. Within four touches of his debut he sprayed what can only be described as a gem of a pass to the left towards the rushing Murphy. Then it felt like Burnley all over again as the Irishman struck the ball into the top right hand corner, in off the bar! The fans went wild – they went wild for the great goal after a magnificent pass, but they also went wild because we managed another three points against a team in and around our lowly position. Not a better feeling that a winning goal being of such a high calibre.
The game was over as far as the fans were concerned but the players applied their character and continued to the end to ensure the three points went in our direction. Gordon who possibly had his best game for Sunderland pulled out a class save from King to tip wide from another Koumas cross onto Kings head. Another clean sheet is due to Gordon being excellent, but Evans and Noz have also tidied up our once leaky defence to make our home record almost invincible.
MOM – Danny Collins – Done everything a left back needs to do and done it with ease, only thing lacking is his desire to get forward but he showed great commitment and belief to earn another clean sheet and three points.
Clancey_Wiggum
Gary Johnson