Sixer’s Sevens is Pete Sixsmith’s pithy summing up of each Sunderland game. Sixer does not mince his words; his seven-word verdict has not always made for pretty reading. Let’s hope for a run of upbeat Sevens inspired by Steve Bruce’s much strengthened squad. The verdict is posted as soon as possible, but be tolerant of any delay. An asterisk denotes a “holding” preview/verdict pending arrival of Sixer’s own or one from a supersub (Colin Randall or Malcolm Dawson). …

Mar 20 2010 Sunderland (2) 3 Birmingham City (0) 1 Magnificent Gordon’s heroics ensure three vital points

Mar 14 2010 Sunderland (1) 1 Man City (0) 1 Very frustrating: this performance deserved a win

Mar 9 2010 Sunderland 4 (1) Bolton 0 (0) Comfortable in the end – what a relief

Feb 28 2010 Sunderland (0) 0 Fulham (0) 0 Well, at least we got a point

Feb 20 2010 Arsenal (1) 2 Sunderland (0) 0 Seen worse, but the slide goes on
 
Feb 09 2010 Portsmouth (0) 1 Sunderland (1) 1 Self destructive challenges mean still no win*

Feb 06 2010 Sunderland (0) 1 Wigan Athletic (1) 1  More endeavour still fails to conjure win*

Feb 01 2010 Sunderland (0) 0 Stoke City (0) 0  A game that defines the word ‘turgid’

Jan 27 2010 Everton (2) 2 Sunderland (0) 0 Hard to find the good in Goodison

Jan 23 2010 FA Cup 4th round: Portsmouth (1) 2 Sunderland (1) 1 Defensive clangers set off the Pompey chimes

Jan 16 2010 Chelsea 7 (4) Sunderland (2 (0) Embarrassing? Not quite as good as that*

Jan 02 2010  Sunderland (1) 3  Barrow (0) 0  A competent performance but lacking clinical finishing  

Dec 28 2009 Blackburn Rovers (0) 2 Sunderland (0) 2 Brilliant Bent should be furious with defenders

Dec 26 2009 Sunderland (1) 1 Everton (0) 1 Incapable – again – of closing a game down

Dec 19 2009 Man City (3) 4 Sunderland (2) 3 Third rate defending leads to dismal defeat

Dec 15 2009 Sunderland (0) 0 Aston Villa (1) 2 Competed, but well beaten by superior opponents

Dec 12 2009 Sunderland (1) 1 Portsmouth (0) 1 A horrible game that exposed our weaknesses

Dec 6 2009 Fulham 1 (0) Sunderland 0 (0) Blustering fightback insufficient after wretched first half

Nov 28 2009 Wigan 1 (0) Sunderland (0) 0 Complete failure to show last week’s qualities

Nov 21 2009 Sunderland 1 (0) Arsenal 0 (0) A compelling, absorbing and absolutely wonderful win

Nov 7 2009 Tottenham Hotspur v Sunderland Ref’s inability to apply rules costs dear

Oct 31 2009 Sunderland (1) 2 West Ham (2) 2 Fabulous fightback foils Hammers and rotten ref

Oct 27 2009 Carling Cup: Penalty shootout: Sunderland (0) 1 Aston Villa (0) 3 Two glorious chances spurned equals penalty misery

Oct 24 2009 Birmingham (1) 2 Sunderland (0) 1 Not even beachballs would have helped today

Oct 17 2009 Sunderland v Liverpool :Fabulous team performance personified by superb Cana

Oct 3 2009 Manchester United (0) 2 v Sunderland (1) 2 Take your pick:Feels like a defeat but it shouldn’t or Jammy, jammy Manchester United in injury time

Sept 27 2009 Sunderland 5 (1) v Wolverhampton Wanderers 2 (0)Not as easy as the scoreline suggests

Sept 22 2009 Carling Cup: Sunderland (2) 2 Birmingham City (0) Ninety minutes for once free of stress

Sept 19 2009 Burnley (1) 3 v Sunderland (1) 1 Outfought and out-thought in dismal second half
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After Stoke,we welcome another footballing giant in Wigan Athletic. Pete Sixsmith may well give that one a miss for a ride on a potential Wembley bandwagon..

The ground at St Ives. Picture courtesy of St Ives Town FC

 

After the display we were  forced to sit through on Monday night, only the most devoted followers of the Marquis de Sade can be looking forward to the visit of the Wigan pie eaters with any enthusiasm or expectation.

Wigan had an even worse result than we did, losing at home to serial bankrupts Notts County in an FA Cup replay, which prised 4,000 Latics out of their armchairs and into the DW stadium to watch open-mouthed as their team were dumped on.

That should reduce the Wigan following from the tiny to the miniscule, and should lead to a huge number of empty seats in the South Stand. Add to that the fact that there may well be an empty seat in the East Stand (Row 34, Seat 404) as I am caught on the horns of a footballing dilemma.

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The Observer has been milking us dry again. Today’s edition has a half-term report from a fan of each Premier side.

Here is Pete Sxsmith’s verdict (and click here for his thoughts on the draw against Everton):

Sunderland, 10th, Pete Sixsmith, SalutSunderland.com

August, September, October – really encouraging, good football, good results and a misty dream of breaking into the top six. November and December – the ghosts of McCarthy and Sbragia start to appear, as we begin our annual slide down the table.

Star man and biggest underperformer? Bent, Cana and Cattermole have impressed, Gordon has begun to look like a top-class keeper, and Reid’s weight loss has made him a regular. On the other hand, Campbell has yet to look a top-flight player and McCartney has proved the old maxim: “never go back”.

Happy with the gaffer? Steve Bruce will be a success, but there are times when he’s a little one-dimensional.

Who should he sign? We need two full-backs who can tackle, pass, support the wide midfielders and not get caught out of position.

Latest links: Graham Dorrans (West Brom, winger); Maynor Figueroa (Wigan, defender); Victor Moses (C Palace, winger).

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It’s perhaps too early to panic, but there is no mistaking the gloom that has descended on the Stadium of Light. If losing 2-0 to a buoyant Aston Villa side was not in itself disastrous, the defeat followed all too many dismal Sunderland performances. Pete Sixsmith explains why a decent display last night was not good enough …

We were well beaten. Villa were a better side. We have some problems. Three statements that, to my mind, are non-controversial, but I hope those who read them (more…)

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I’m very pleased that I have had 18 hours or so to mull over this , as if I had written it straight after the game, Bill Taylor would have been even more worried about my pessimistic bent, while Jon would have been much happier with the use of short, pithy words like “c***”, “s****” and “r*******”.

Eighteen hours later, after a most enjoyable evening spent in the company of England’s finest folk singer and guitarist Martin Simpson at The Davy Lamp Folk Club in Washington, things look bleak, but not as bleak as they did at 6pm on Saturday.

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Hard as nails. That’s Salut! Sunderland’s star writer Pete Sixsmith. Viewed from afar, the North East looked as if cut off from the rest of the world by snow drifts. That must have been a picture of Tow Law. But it was cold enough as Pete saw Sunderland Reserves take on Wigan. Hadn’t we seen as much of Wigan as we’d want for a while? …

Tuesday night and outside it’s cold and the wind is blowing. Inside, the heating is on, the gas fire warms the room, there’s a welcoming bottle of Macallan open and a good book on the coffee table. So, what do you do but dig out the thermals and woolly socks, put on a warm coat and head for a reserve game at Hetton?

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Many Salut! Sunderland readers have seen Pete Sixsmith’s warm tribute to Dave Lish, the SAFC fan who died suddenly on Nov 22.

Dave and Pete were chatting as usual at the Arsenal game the day before, when there was nothing to suggest Dave was other than in good shape and excellent spirits.

Following our obituary, a lot of other people have now added their own thoughts on Dave and these deserve to be repeated.

In particular, mention at Ready to Go of what Pete wrote has prompted a few more to offer sympathy and homage.
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What does Arsene Wenger do when the Gunners have a Saturday blank? If he was listening to James Alexander Gordon at 5pm, he would have risked a wry smile as he heard the dour Scotsman intone “Wigan Athletic 1 Sunderland 0”.

In his summing up last week, he said that Sunderland needed to do better against the lesser sides in the League. It was relatively easy to work on and carry out a game plan against the top sides, but that had to be modified when the opponents were not as exalted as his club, said the Sage of North London.
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Just before Saturday’s rousing win over Arsenal, I spotted Pete Sixsmith in his usual 20-minutes-before-kickoff spot in the East Stand concourse, chatting animatedly to another Sunderland fan. That other fan was about to see the last game of his life. Only in his early 50s, he died next day. Pete pays tribute to Dave Lish …

We all agree, I think, that Saturday was as good a game as we have seen at the Stadium for a long time. At half time, on my return from the toilet, I spoke with Dave Lish and we both agreed that we had a good chance of winning this one. As we returned to our seats, we agreed to meet at Sunderland RCA for their game with Shildon on Wednesday night.

Alas, this is not to be, as Dave suddenly and tragically passed away on Sunday. I had known him for a number of years, bumping into him on the non league circuit. As the relationship changed from acquaintance to friend, I always looked for his Corsa (R99 KER), knowing that his presence would always mean an entertaining and enjoyable evening even if the football was dire.
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