Derby win fails to hide our limitations

AS the third minute of stoppage time descended on the Stadium of Light last Saturday, the mood in the ground was fairly negative.

As I mentioned last time, a draw would have been no use. Fortunately, with only seconds left on the clock, Anthony Stokes — a former Irish Examiner National Junior Sports Star — scored the latest of our last gasp winners and the whole place erupted. Supporters staged a mini pitch invasion in mass scenes of hysteria, and whilst it can’t be condoned, it proved just how much this result meant to the supporters of Sunderland Football Club.

Fortunately, as fickle as football fans are, we’re not getting carried away on Wearside just yet. This wasn’t a great performance and we struggled to look superior to a Derby side that hadn’t scored in over 10 hours of football prior to kick off. However, on so many occasions this season we’ve played well and not got results, so it’s nice for the roles to be reversed for once. Whilst the players deserve a thumbs up for once again pushing till the very last minute to try and get a winner, much of the credit for the win will be pointed at the door of Roy Keane. The gaffer had come in for some understandable criticism during the build up, after last weekend’s humiliation at Goodison Park, but he showed why he’s being so highly rated with his team selection on Saturday.

I’ve said several times that Craig Gordon has yet to live up to his €13m price tag, and with Darren Ward doing very little wrong between the sticks last season, it was nice to see him reinstated into the starting 11. Ward justified the decision with an excellent reaction save from Kenny Miller in the 40th minute which was arguably the turning point of the game. It should be enough for Ward to keep his place at Stamford Bridge, if nothing else it’ll prove to Gordon that no player is bigger than the club, make him work a lot harder to get back into the team and return in better form.

Having berated our central midfield last week as well, Keane thankfully dropped Etuhu and Yorke, and didn’t try and pass off their absence due to injury, just simply poor form. Whilst Leadbitter and Whitehead struggled to get a grip on the game in their absence, they were still more effective than the previous weekend’s central pairing. Liam Miller eventually came on in place of Leadbitter, and it was from his cross that we scored. The Corkman must be wondering what he has to do to work his way into the first team from the start.

Perhaps the most worrying thing from Saturday is just how vulnerable our central defence looks. If we’re to survive, the spine of the side needs to be more solid. Unfortunately, Higginbotham and McShane look error prone based on the last couple of performances. Any striker who is either strong or quick will have a field day against them, as Andy Johnson and Yakubu proved last week at Goodison. Dare I say it; it’s only against strikers that aren’t on top of their game that we’ve looked fairly comfortable against. Even Derby’s lacklustre pairing of Steve Howard and Kenny Miller had us on the back foot.

Still, it’d be wrong to sound too negative after such an important result for us. Andy Cole might not be the long term answer up front, but his experience showed and if we’re going to have a little man to partner Kenwyne Jones in attack, then Cole’s class is a possibly better alternative to Chopra’s work rate. Also, after several poor performances, Greg Halford put in the sort of show at right back that will hopefully get the boo boys off his back. Hopefully he could still have a big part to play in the rest of the season.

Once again on Saturday, we were backed by the highest attendance in England, more evidence of how huge our club is. Despite Sunderland having not won a game in two and a half months and playing the least attractive side in the league, more than 42,000 people still turned up at the Stadium of Light. It makes you wonder just what could happen if Drumaville’s dream of establishing Sunderland as a decent top flight side ever becomes a reality. Bring on Chelsea!