Sunderland, nicknamed the Black Cats but more like Bear Grylls, are increasingly confident that their much-practised survival skills give them a critical edge over their rivals in this season’s relegation fight, although Norwich City’s manager, Alex Neil, reckons “that is a lot of rubbish”.
Sunderland have diced with relegation in the past three campaigns but scrambled their way to safety and Sam Allardyce, who joined them this season and has a record of rescuing sides, says many of his players know a redemptive turning point when they see one – and believe this victory at Carrow Road may be it. “They’ve said one result has changed the whole last few games of the season – one result – so I only hope that’s the same this time round,” Allardyce said. “It’s the biggest performance and win of the season for us.”
Allardyce believes eight points from the final five matches will ensure Sunderland finish above Norwich and Newcastle and save themselves. Before Saturday’s game he consulted with his midfielder Lee Cattermole, who has been at the club since 2009, to learn the key to previous survivals. “He said players have performed the best they have all season at that stage, to get out of trouble. They have given that little bit more, had a bit more quality and had a bit more luck. ”
Sunderland had more luck than Norwich – most debatable refereeing decisions went in their favour, including the one that enabled Fabio Borini to open the scoring from a penalty and the non-punishment for Jan Kirschoff’s challenge on Sébastien Bassong before Jermain Defoe’s goal, which made it 2-0. Duncan Watmore completed the scoring. But Allardyce said his team showed greater nous and composure. “We handled the pressure better than them,” he said.
Neil, whose squad includes many players who were relegated two years ago, ridiculed that suggestion. “I think that’s a lot of rubbish,” he said. “They got a penalty against the run of play, which they scored, then they got a breakaway goal, arguably after a free-kick or arguably after we should’ve moved the ball a bit quicker. That was the difference in the game. I don’t think Sunderland looked more threatening. We had more opportunities, we had 14 corners, they had zero. We had more of the ball.”
However, he acknowledged that Sunderland took their chances better. And that could be key. Defoe has 13 league goals, whereas no one at Norwich has more than five. Steven Naismith, bought in January to boost firepower, has not made the desired impact. Neil knows there is no magical way to improve his strikers’ finishing so the instruction for his team as they attempt to score enough to stay up is simple: “Pretty much create as many chances as we can.”
Norwich have two weeks before their next match, away to Arsenal. “We need to go there and make sure we take something,” Neil said. “Then we have another two games at home [Manchester United and Watford], we need to target them for wins basically. Then we’ve got Everton at Everton and thankfully their home record is not particularly good so we need to target that as well.”
Sunderland’s next game is also against Arsenal, next Sunday. And experience tells them they can get what they require from it. “Last year we stayed up against Arsenal by getting a 0-0 draw,” said the striker Borini. “So we can do it.”
Man of the match Fabio Borini (Sunderland)
