 |
TRANSFER TALK: Who do you think should be Sunderland's first choice targets in the
summer? Which positions do you feel the club need to strengthen?
• Share your views here |
Cats safe but Boro anxious
Sunderland 3 Middlesbrough 2
WHENEVER Roy Keane has been asked about the fight against relegation this season, his stance has always been to insist that the battle will go down to the very last weekend of fixtures - and he could well be right.
But it will be Middlesbrough, rather than Keane's Sunderland, who may have some final day nerves to deal with in 13 days time. The Black Cats are staying up and that is official.
Despite a campaign in which Gareth Southgate has been regularly lauded as a future England manager, he has led Boro to just one win from their last ten Premier League matches. Form, understandably, which has left them hovering too close to the bottom three for comfort.
And while a four point cushion still separates Southgate's team from the unthinkable, it is worth noting that those in with a fighting chance of survival - Bolton, Reading, Birmingham and Fulham - are all making a fist of it.
For the second week in a row, the result of a North-East derby helped to safeguard the home team's place among the elite for another year. And, like Newcastle United fans six days earlier, Sunderland's supporters sang in satisfaction.
But while Messrs Keegan and Keane are now frantically working with the money men to discuss transfer targets and budgets for the close-season, Southgate's only focus is on two home dates with Portsmouth and Manchester City.
Keane's situation is different. After enjoying a rare drink in the boardroom with chairman Niall Quinn after the final whistle, he is likely to have fixed up a further meeting with Quinn and chief executive Peter Walker for early this week.
"I will need £60-70 million. It's going up every week!" said Keane, who recently claimed he needed £50m to attract the players he wants to this summer. "By next week it'll be £80m. I'll be looking for Niall and Peter in the next half an hour. They're hiding.
"We can start pressing ahead with our transfer targets without a shadow of a doubt. We've been talking, I've got a meeting with Mick Brown (chief scout) and I talked to Niall. Everything has been on a hold. It's full steam ahead now.
"It's a vital summer for the club. I could understand last summer when people were a bit tentative, investors, chief execs, I could understand that, people are tentative to go mad because history tells you Sunderland have a good chance of going straight back down."
Since enjoying four successive years in the top-flight after Peter Reid guided Sunderland to promotion in 1999, there has been difficult times at the Stadium of Light.
Howard Wilkinson, Mick McCarthy and even Quinn tried to transform Sunderland into a force to be reckoned with in the English game.
None of those, however, were able to orchestrate a run of four wins from six Premier League matches like Keane has - and now all eyes are on how he spends this summer.
Daryl Murphy's injury-time winner against Middlesbrough means Southgate cannot afford the same luxury. His players must try to conjure up one last victory to ensure their fate is in their own hands.
"Everybody tells you 'you have enough' and that 'you will be OK', but until you're actually safe, you don't stop and you can't ever switch off," said Southgate. "We're in that situation, but we have to make it happen.
"We were very close to making it happen at Sunderland. We haven't and so we've used up some of the cushion we've had over the last couple of weeks. It's about calm heads now.
"Roy and Niall, the way they've done it this season, they deserve to be in the division. Their players have given everything, and their fans have given them quite a few points along the way as well. They've earned their place and they deserve to celebrate."
With the fifth highest average attendance in the division, the support on Wearside has been a telling factor in Sunderland's eight home wins.
But, despite another crowd well in excess of 40,000, things could have gone awry for the hosts when Tuncay Sanli coasted clear inside four minutes to put Middlesbrough ahead.
The Turkey international, played onside by Danny Higginbotham, was sent clear from a clever pass from Afonso Alves before calmly slotting low into Craig Gordon's bottom left.
Having conceded at a similar stage in the 2-0 defeat to Newcastle on the previous weekend, Sunderland fans must have feared the worst. Instead, though, the response from Sunderland was emphatic. After Andrew Taylor made a crucial block to deny Michael Chopra from eight yards, Aussie goalkeeper Brad Jones - making his first league appearance of the season - weakly punched away an Andy Reid centre after a short corner.
Possession fell to Liam Miller and he quickly played out wide to Danny Collins. The full-back, in acres of space, delivered a terrific back post cross towards Higginbotham and the defender leapt behind Julio Arca to head inside Jones' far upright.
It was less than two minutes after Tuncay's opener and that brought belief back into the Sunderland crowd.
But a scrappy opening period that failed to live up to its early promise ended on a high note for Keane, who must have been left wondering why he has not played Michael Chopra as a striker more often this season.
After Miller's clever pass into the corner, Chopra had no-one in support so he played through the legs of David Wheater before applying an unstoppable finish in off Jones' crossbar.
Despite Middlesbrough's promising start, Sunderland deserved their advantage. It could have been three moments after the interval as well had Brad Jones not saved from namesake Kenwyne after the striker barged his way through the defence.
Rarely have Wheater and Emanuel Pogatetz been ruffled like they were by Jones, although Middlesbrough still looked to have claimed a point when Alves grabbed his third for the club.
The Brazilian, appearing to occupy an offside position when Arca's deflected shot worked its way to his feet, slotted past Gordon to equalise 17 minutes from time. Just moments after two quick-fire shots from Downing had been thwarted by Higginbotham and Gordon.
Sunderland, like so often this season, were not to be outdone. Five minutes after replacing Chopra, the dropped Murphy worked his way ahead of the flapping Jones and Pogatetz to glance the winner in off the underside of the bar.
"I felt this season was one of the biggest in club's history," said Keane. "I'm glad we did it (stayed up) at home. Last year we got promoted when I was walking the dog and we didn't get the trophy at Luton on the final day either. Now we're all here together. It's important for the football club and the fans to share it, it's been a very good day."
Perhaps that is Southgate's thinking too. After watching Newcastle and Sunderland celebrate survival in front of their own fans, he is now charged with having to replicate that at the Riverside.
3:03am Monday 28th April 2008
Print 
Email this 
Comment
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
