Sunderland travel to Southend in League One Last time out Sunderland lost at Fleetwood and Southend lost at Rochdale. Southend United are set to play in front of their biggest home crowd for nearly two and a half years this weekend. More than 9,800 tickets have already been sold for Saturday’s crucial clash with Sunderland, and not since hosting Charlton Athletic in December 2016 have Blues welcomed more than 10,000 fans to Roots Hall. Kevin Bond’s side are likely to need a win to stay up, and fans are expected to attend in big numbers. Promotion-chasing Sunderland are also expected to bring 2,500 fans, and Bond is hoping for another good atmosphere. Sunderland will want to finish the season on a high and be in a good position for the play-offs, if there is such thing. The Black Cats could rest some of their walking wounded, Grigg, Honeyman and McGeady. The game will be shown live on Sky Sports. Jack Ross: The group of players who travel with us to Southend better be at it. We are going to have some big games coming up and if we win them, we achieve promotion. That’s the simple reality. There will be no shortage of motivation for every single one of them on Saturday.” “They have to be stronger physically. You can’t be aggressive in parts of your play or when it suits. You have to be aggressive all of the time. You can’t pick or chose your moments to be aggressive, and we didn’t do it well enough in the second half.” “We have to cope with things better and there has to be a really quick and sharp understanding of that if we want to get out of this league this season. The results over the past five or so games have cost us that opportunity to go up automatically.” “It’s not good enough. We can’t keep having spells in games and creating opportunities but not taking them. We can’t get ourselves ahead in games and not capitalise on that. I have been protective of the players all season, but we have to be stronger.” "With the exception of the two or three that we have as fitness doubts, the squad that we have will by and large be the same, so we're just treating it as a normal game in terms of the squad." "We might make some changes to the team, but that will just be for some freshness, as we've had a lot of games recently." Kevin Bond: “Stephen(Humphrys) isn’t fully fit, but he does offer us something different. We will see how he goes in training this week and whether or not he could play a part in some capacity, but we’re in desperate need of having everyone available.” "The team are in good spirit and no one’s walking round with impending doom, everyone’s fine and we will meet the game head on and try the best we can to take the game to Sunderland." "They don’t need me to tell them but they just need a bit of direction and hopefully a little bit of organisation, they know what’s at stake and that’s all the motivation that they will need and should need and I don’t expect them to be lacking on that front." Prutton predicts: home win Match Appointments: Referee: DARREN BOND Assistants: Matthew McGrath and Adrian Waters Fourth Official: Will Finnie Team Line ups Sunderland: McLaughlan, O’Nien, Dunne, Ozturk, Hume, Leadbitter, McGeouch, Grigg, Morgan, Wyke, Maguire Subs: Ruiter, Oviedo, Flanagan, Baldwin, Mumba, Gooch, Kimpioka Injured: Love, Watmore, Matthews, James Southend United Oxley, Bwomono, Hyam, Turner, Cox, Kiernan, Mantom (C), Moore, Bunn, Hendrie, White. Subs: Kightly, Dieng, McLaughlin, Bishop, Yearwood, Kelman, Hart Injured: tbc Betting Odds: Home 9/5 Away 7/5 Draw 23/10 My two pence: Congratulations to Luton and Barnsley. As a few people have said already, before the season started I would have been happy with the play-offs, especially after the state we were left in after the Short era. Not only that, we had a good day out at Wembley (apart from the penalties) and I’ve had some good times at 'old fashioned' grounds that I’ve never been to before. I can even say that I was a part of the record breaking League One attendance. All in all I’ve enjoyed this season even if it does go completely pear shaped in the next few weeks. My guess is a 1-1 draw Ha’way the Lads
Also congratulations to the two teams that have already been promoted. Fair dues the league position doesn't lie. Going for the win even though one eye has to be on injuries and the play offs. 2 - 0 to the lads. Maguire and Morgan.
Some interesting comments from Jack. He sounds pretty pissed off at how much players have slacked off, as he should be. Let's see if this has any impact on our ability to close games out, which has been lacking.
I have to confess it was me who voted who cares... I know there are some regs about resting players... but the 3 games following this we need our best team out.. Ie Maguire, McGeady, Wyke Griggs(?) Does 09 stay at RB? OR Matthew's so 09 can go in midfield and Honeyman drop to the bench Who do we pick at CB? Need Catts I think
Would be very risky to move o9 into midfield now in my opinion, he's played RB pretty much all season. "Remember that position you played a year ago? Wanna give that a shot again for the most important games of the season?"
The only player I would rest for Saturday with the play off games in mind is McGeady. Everyone else can fight for a place.
Its all about risk and reward. It could be the spark that we need. If I was Jack I would use this game to do exactly that. Play him in midfield. I dont think he will though.
oh christ, are the miserable loonies back out on twitter slamming Ross? I'd esther not ruin my Friday reading that ****e, pal.
I've gone 2-0 for the lads for our last five fixtures and I'm not changing now just get ahead and see the game out ffs.
We have a league 1 quality manager who is young with only 4 years of managing experience, with no experience of managing a relatively big club, in England. A squad full of above average league one players, who has finished in an above average league position whilst only losing 4 games all season. I would give him a B-. Nowt wrong with disagreeing with some of his decisions, but totally blaming him and wanting him replaced is just plain silly. Who would we replace him with? Now is the time to stick to a manager and give him time. Even if we finish in the league one play offs next season we should still stick with him. Anything below that and there may be something to think about.
Agree wholeheartedly with all that 55. we must stop changing managers at the rate we have been over the past 6 or so years, and give Jack a real chance to build his team. If he gets it seriously wrong I'd be the first to complain, but up til now we're probably fighting above our weight level.
we need to finish 3rd ! rest Mcgeady fair enough, but bring in Kimpioka and Sterling and give them a chance. Southend 1 win in 17, i would go for an away win but this team has faltered this year. the worry is are southend going to clatter our players.
I've been saying for months o9 should be in midfield. Although a class act I think was found out at RB at the Checkatrade final and has had some poor games since. I understand the "now is not the time" arguments but what if it is that time. With him just behind Wyke/Grigg etc he is an intelligent enough bloke to feed off them. Likewise he is a clever enough footballer to be able to pick a pass which may enable Grigg to be in the game more and play to Griggs style. It may just enable us to get more than one goal though and it may just mean we have a player who can help close a game down. I really couldnt give a flying one where we finish cos regardless we have to beat whoever is put in front of us.
Just realised this match is a 5.30pm kick off thanks to those twats from Sky. how have the EF L allowed this to happen when Southend are right in the relegation mix with five others. surely they have an unfair advantage in knowing by kick off time what they have to do result wise. this is completely bonkers, same for us in third place finish, how has this been allowed to happen.
