The roar which shook Wembley after Fabio Borini glided past Vincent Kompany and smashed home beyond Joe Hart still rings in my ears during every cup weekend. This weekend was no different, yet other teams marching on closer to their own ever-lasting memories left me nursing a beer and only the potential demise of North East football.
A Premier League without Sunderland or Newcastle is unthinkable. Despite a recent history saturated mostly by failure, only Liverpool, Manchester City, Arsenal and Manchester United rival the North East clubs in terms of attendances. There has never been a Premier League season without at least one representative of the North East.
Then again, there has never been a Premier League season without Aston Villa, who are all but destined for the drop.
The ramifications of relegation are far more concerning than what both clubs experienced in their most recent relegations. The ever-increasing rewards of participating in the Premier League mean that the distance between the Championship and the top flight will only increase. Teams who have been exiled into the lower divisions and finally make it back will find it harder to stay up and even harder to maintain long-term Premier League status given the superior infrastructures of their rivals.
We are already seeing the effects of this with two of the three newly promoted clubs being relegated in the last two seasons, and all the evidence suggests the gap will only get bigger. Whoever goes down this season, if they do not come straight back up, could be left behind for good.
Perhaps some solace can be found in that neither Sunderland nor Newcastle are likely to crumble in the face of relegation, not like Wigan did, for example. Both are massive clubs in their own right and they represent an area of the country where football is very much part of everyday life. Both have owners with superb business acumen, with Mike Ashley already successfully overhauling a massive wage bill to fund an immediate return to top flight football after their relegation in 2009.
The most pressing question – will either go down?
For Sunderland it would be an extremely frustrating time to be relegated. Ever since Steve Bruce was sacked in 2011, the Black Cats have managed to get everything wrong. The appointments of Martin O’Neill, Paolo Di Canio, Gus Poyet and Dick Advocaat were nothing more than adrenaline shots.
No Sunderland manager since Bruce has managed the Black Cats for a full season. To put that into perspective, John O’Shea is currently playing under his sixth manager, eighth if you want to include caretaker managers Ricky Sbragia and Kevin Ball, this being only the Irishman’s fifth season on Wearside.
The disastrous switch to a Director of Football transfer model did not help, bringing almost exclusively under-performers on high wages such as Jack Rodwell, Emanuele Giaccherini and Jozy Altidore amongst others.
Sam Allardyce’s arrival has brought hope for survival and the future, it seems like Ellis Short has finally made the right decision. Sunderland experienced their first truly successful transfer window for a long time bringing in Lamine Kone and Wahbi Khazri, who have both made significant impacts already, and moving on players who were simply draining the wage bill. Allardyce also boasts an impeccable record of transforming clubs into competitive Premier League sides and manages probably the most talented Sunderland side since the likes of Asamoah Gyan, Darren Bent, Danny Welbeck, Jordan Henderson and Bolo Zenden fired them into 10th place in the 2010/11 campaign.
All of that would suggest Sunderland have a better chance of staying up than in each of the last four seasons during which the Black Cats left it incredibly late to achieve safety.
Newcastle are entitled to be a little more worried. Despite having spent a staggering £80 million since the summer, their goal difference is worsened only by Aston Villa. The 5-1 surrender to Chelsea added more weight to the claim that money would have been better spent at the other end of the pitch. Steve McClaren is a man under pressure, something he has found himself in throughout his career since he left Middlesbrough in 2006 – pressure which he has managed with little success.
It all feels a little less simple for Newcastle, despite a squad full of quality attacking players such as Georgino Wijnaldum, Ayoze Perez and Andros Townsend.
Both sides should be confident of their ability to survive as they both have talented squads. However, time is running out and at this stage of the season there is little room for error. A poor month in March could mean something remarkable would be required to see the Wear-Tyne Derby feature in the Premier League next season.
Speaking of the Wear-Tyne derby, note down 20 March 2016 – it could well be the biggest one yet.
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