Sunderland v Manchester City
Sunday 10th November 2013
2:05pm (GMT)
Referee: Mike Dean
Sunderland, famous for being not Newcastle and arguably home to one of the coldest football grounds in the country after Boundary Park. The locals would have you believe that the name of the ground is a tribute to the miners, who are commemorated by the constantly lit, larger than life, Davy Lamp which marks the entrance to the ground. The rest might argue they just nicked the name the Stadium of Light from Benfica. With a recent history bereft of much in the way of silverwear, victories over local rivals Newcastle and Middlesbrough have kept fans warm on cold North East nights and to keep themselves on an even keel Mackems will happily self flagellate themselves by watching copies of Premier Passions, featuring ex-City manager Peter ‘expletive’ Reid.
For those up early on Wearside, (don’t call them Geordies as it’ll end in tears!) there’s the impressive Glass Centre with its glass floor (not one for ladies in skirts) and the Aquatic Centre next to the Stadium of Light, which boasts the only Olympic-sized swimming pool in the whole of the North East. However, enough of the tourist board information session….
Football has been less than generous for the Black Cats. For City fans they will always be fondly remembered for their ‘Poznan’ as a defeat against Un*t*d was suddenly for nought as Agueroooo bit the back of the net for the 2011-12 Premiership title. After being pre-warned by Swindon fans about what they were letting themselves in for in appointing Paulo Di Canio and the subsequent exit of board member David Milliband over a disagreement with PDC’s political beliefs, were all somewhat forgotten in the glory of a derby (in a loose sense of the world seeing as how they aren’t in the same City) victory over the Toon. In hindsight it glossed over some big cracks and despite a summer rebuilding programme which saw the arrival of 12 players, the team sat rock bottom of the Premiership. After a 3-0 defeat against West Brom, Di Canio faced the irate away fans by confronting them on the pitch and by the next evening he was picking up his P45. New manager Gus Poyet started his reign unspectacularly, although a 2-1 win against Newcastle gave fans hope as the team left the bottom of the league. This success was swiftly scuppered as a 1-0 defeat against Hull City also saw Cattermole (serial offender) and Dossena (a pretty horrific challenge) receive marching orders.
A midweek victory in the Capital One Cup against Southampton has given Sunderland fans a spring in their step, but the form that City are on is something to be wary of. Whilst all the focus has been on other strikeforces that make nice acronyms, Sergio Aguero and Alvaro ‘Beast’ Negredo have been extremely prolific and seen the former pick up the Barclay’s Premier League Player of the Month for October.
It seems the only crumb of comfort for Sunderland fans is that City haven’t had much success on Wearside of late, with the last three visit to the Stadium of Light ending in 1-0 victories for the home side. However, with 21 goals in their last six games as opposed to Sunderland’s 6, surely City will have too much firepower for the home side to continue this run of results. Although without the talismanic David Silva, the home side might just wake up on Sunday morning with a little more hope in their hearts.
After the success of recent weeks, anything but a victory over Sunderland would be seen as a disappointing and damaging result, but with a defence still somewhat creaky it could be a lot closer than recent matches against CSKA and Norwich, however, I’ll stab in the dark at a 1-3 scoreline and suffer the ribbing on work on Monday morning if I get it wrong.
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