Delusional fans with unrealistic ambitions who revel in unwarranted criticism?
Is that who were are?
Seems the media angle right now is something along those lines, stoked, it must be said, by a manager who is under pressure and looks increasingly lost.
Well it is, simply, utter bullshit.
Yes, Sunderland fans are demanding. But they turn up in droves home and away and have supported a team which, apart from one glorious moment in 1973, hasn’t won a thing since Adolf Hitler was casting envious glances at Poland.
We are Sunderland. We are not Wigan.
We once, a long, long time ago, were the best team in the world. My grandad told me that before he died.
And we once had Raich Carter, the best player on the planet. My dad who told me that before he went as well.
We didn’t play rugby, we didn’t play cricket. We played football and we watched football.
The game has changed but the lineage lives on, passed through the generations, which is why, with a successful, exciting team, the SOL would be packed to the rafters and the opposition would be scared to run onto the field.
We’ve no right to win anything of course. But we have a birthright to hope.
And when our manager constantly seeks solace in a tenth place finish he is, inadvertently, making matters worse.
We will not accept that tenth is the best we can achieve. To do so is the death knell for the club we love. We become Wigan, or Swansea, or the like. Good clubs , no doubt, who sometimes punch above their weight.
But we are Sunderland. We live and suffer in hope that one day, some day, we will get back to where we belong. If the media, or Steve Bruce for that matter, believe such thoughts are delusional then let them. They simply do not understand.
Lose that hope and it might make any present or future Sunderland manager’s life a little more comforting. But it won’t be the club we love any longer.
Sharkey’s Shadow
(Our Canadian Correspondent)