Dick Advocaat’s experience persuaded Sunderland to hire him. It has also lent a little perspective. The enormous sums involved in Premier League participation mean it can seem all-important. Advocaat is shaping up to be Sunderland’s short-term saviour but he is not getting distracted by the size of the prize. This is a coda to his career, not a spell that will define it. Sunderland’s top-flight status is not yet secure but the former Holland, Russia and Belgium manager feels his reputation is.
Survival could be guaranteed as soon as Saturday. It would not rank as his greatest feat. “My achievements?” said Advocaat rhetorically. “I have won 15 prizes, been a European champion … ” That may be a grandiose way of describing Zenit St Petersburg’s 2008 Uefa Cup triumph but his point was expressed eloquently. Perhaps Advocaat is entitled to be immodest.
He has had a transformative effect at Sunderland. He inherited a team who had taken six points from their previous 10 games; he has procured 10 from six. It is the sort of turnaround that prompts questions about if he wants to extend his stay at the Stadium of Light. A shotgun wedding, he said, he will not prompt a long-term union. “No, no, no. I get a divorce!”
Unless Advocaat is bluffing Sunderland will soon be looking for a fifth manager in little over two years. Their relationships with Martin O’Neill, Paolo Di Canio and Gus Poyet began promisingly and ended unhappily. Advocaat may buck the trend. A happy ending beckons, along with retirement.
The 67-year-old was reluctant to discuss prolonging his time in England but he did elaborate on why a manager who had never been relegated was unafraid to come to Sunderland. “I tell you why – this is my last job,” he said. “I have had a great career and have won a lot of prizes and I am really enjoying what I am doing now. Hopefully we stay up. If not, I have still enjoyed my time at Sunderland.”
It may be an exaggeration to call Advocaat demob-happy but he spoke with the air of man with nothing left to prove. Perhaps he is liberated by his probable departure. Certainly there is no pretence his is a long-term formula. Victory at Goodison Park came courtesy of two deflected goals and owed much to luck as Advocaat, showing his sense of detachment, admitted. His pragmatic appraisal of the players at his disposal helped too. Lacking enviable options he bolted together a winning team.
Sebastián Coates has endured an undistinguished spell on loan from Liverpool but excelled at the heart of the defence. Danny Graham belatedly opened his Sunderland account, 28 games and 28 months after his £5m move from Swansea, but was chosen primarily to offer an outlet in attack. Jermain Defoe scored the second but spent much of his afternoon tracking back so far that, like Samuel Eto’o in Internazionale’s 2010 Champions League-winning team, he appeared a second right-back. The poacher doubled up as the gamekeeper.
Defoe was the unlikely epitome of a willingness to toil in a common cause. “If you work hard you can get results,” Advocaat added. “It is not his favourite position but we are in a position where we have to do everything for the club to stay up.” Perhaps no position in his 4-3-3 framework really suits Defoe but if the system is not sustainable with the current personnel that is unlikely to be Advocaat’s problem in two weeks’ time. While Sunderland could secure a ninth successive season in the top flight, there were few suggestions of permanence.
Staying up has considerable consequences though, apart from his survival bonus, perhaps not for him. “It is huge for the club and hopefully they can make a good set-up for next season,” he said, referring to Sunderland in the third person. Advocaat may be an inspired interim, a high-class caretaker, but a Sunderland spring looks like proving an Indian summer to his career.
Man of the match Costel Pantilimon (Sunderland)
