I Hate to think this but I can only get to the odd game. The last game I attented was Wigan at home. Was I at a game that was our only home win in 2011!!!!!!?. FFSAAKE i can't remember another one I may be wrong but i honestly can't remember another one. Always thought Brucie was useless and personally I think Bruce Forsyth would make a better manager. If quinn/ short don't act soon, it's yet another relegation i'm afraid.
The moral of this story is to get to more bloody games...All this time people have been blaming Bruce et al, and all along it's all your fault...
I admire your rallying call for supporters to get behind the team and turn up in numbers MrRAW...but how many more false dawns do a set of supporters have to deal with before we come to the conclusion that enough is enough. Think of the fans that travelled to Brighton only to see this hapless manager pick a starting eleven with no strikers. How much do you think they look forward to paying for a ticket for the next game??? I have come back from America for one game of football (we lost) and flew straight back...Sunderland fans would travel thousands of miles to watch our club....but when you think we having the piss took out of us then supporters will just think stuff it. Even the biggest Bruce fan (and I have been in his corner till recently) must realise he is passed his sell by date....the guy is way out of depth....we simply need somebody better, we have a decent squad, we have a clueless manager who can't turn them into a team.
I believe our other home win so far in 2011 was Blackburn on New Years Day. I feel quite privilieged as I too don't get to every game but was at both of these. Unfortunately I have been at both home defeats this season too so I am obviously not a lucky mascot.
My coments to the OP was meant to be tongue-in-cheek, in the fact that last time he attended a home game we won, and we havn't won since... However, regarding the point you have made, I have been attending games for over 40 years, and one thing that I have learnt in that time is that the team will almost always perform better when they have the crowd with them...What we have at the moment is a lot of new players who must be wondering what the hells going on...I'm not particularly happy with Bruce's negative tactics, particularly in our two home games, but the fact that we are getting better perfrmances away from home speaks volumes about our home support! I believe that players are **** scared to make a mistake for fear of the inevitable cries of derision, which is contributing to our results just as much as Bruce just playing one up front
RAW - you must be going to different games to me then? All I have seen, through the last TWO years of slumps and through the 8 (EIGHT) defeats in 9 (NINE) home games is unswerving loyal support and crowds that touch 40,000 every time trying to get behind a losing team. How much more support can we bring to the table without something back from the players and the manager? Do we just continue to offer blind support until we are relegated AGAIN? Of course fans nerves are being stretched now; our patience tried; we are sick of seeing the team beaten at home. For those not able to travel or indeed afford to, home games are the only chance to see the lads and what we have been fed for the past 9 months is utter ****e. Is it any wonder there are elements that don’t wish to sit there and just take it anymore? You constantly question Sunderland fans loyalty and devotion on this board mate and yet can you honestly say that Man Utd, Spurs, Arsenal, Chelsea or Liverpool fans would put up with those home stats? I can say with absolute confidence that EVERY other club in the EPL, given our past 9 months results and performances at home would be in total uproar as well. Stop having a go at the fans for once and start to direct your grievances at the people responsible for it for a change. The players and especially the manager.
Are you honestly trying to say that our support has been vocal of late? Against Chelsea it was only for the first ten and last ten minutes of the game when the fans backed the team with anything like decent noise.... All I'm saying is that for 90 minutes when there is a game on, fans should forget the politics and back the team to the hilt..Then at least we can say that we have done our bit...Our fans reputation within the national media is at present at the lowest ebb that I can ever recall.
I do respect anyone's opinion..football does offer differing opinions and in this area especially a load of passion. But I have supported this club since the late 60's and NEVER during this time have we had the chance to mix it with the top half of the table. We have a brilliant owner and a legend for a chairman, but their blind faith in Bruce will come back to haunt them if they let this continue. Can anyone think of ANY club that would allow a manager continue with the statistics Bruce has....it just wouldn't happen. I don't care if we played to full houses or empty stadiums...Bruce is out of his depth.
Statistics can be interpreted in many contexts...For example, last season, under Bruce, we had our 3rd most successful league season in over 50 years, and under his tenure we have made steady progress each season.
Nothing to be vocal about. I for one am very close to cxl ing my remaining direct debits for my season ticket. I am 45. Been going since I was 12 and watching boring football with a manager who WANTS to play boring football is just pissing me right off. I have always said give him 12 games but even that is starting to look to long. Chelsea were very average on Saturday but how easy did we make it for them. No one near their midfielders. Just passed it at will. I have more creativity in my little toe than was shown by Colback and Cattermole in midfield. FFS Gardener scored 10 goals last season. How many do you think he will score in that frigging side. The manager doesn't have a plan B. For that matter I don't think he has a plan A.
RAW - those fans you seem to want to castigate so readily just watched their beloved team beaten for the 8th time in 9 outings at home. Is it any wonder they were flat. Did ANYONE go to the game on Saturday thinking we could get something out of it? ****ing hell mate we couldn’t even best WBA, Wolves or Fulham at home we are hardly going to beat Chelsea. I didn’t think the crowd got on the players back on Saturday either. They were flat because the whole thing is totally ****ed again but they were not aggressively going for the players or the managers which considering the ****e we have been fed recently is remarkable. There isn’t another clubs fans on the face of the planet, at any level, that would put up with such dreadful results as Bruce has presided over this year and still not started to have a go at the manager. We didn’t again until a boo at the final whistle. I think you are living in cloud cuckoo land if you think it’s acceptable to keep cheering in the face of such overwhelming adversity. Even the happiest of happy clappers pumped up to the eyeballs with LSD, would find it difficult to muster any feelings of optimism and happiness with SAFC at the moment. 40 years to get it right mate and its still ****ed. The majority are just fed up with failure, after failure, after failure. If the fans reputation is at an all time low ebb, it’s not them to blame is it. They are there because they are fed up of being fed garbage decade after decade. What we are watching at the moment is no better than the Buxton, Crosby, Butcher or Wilko days. At least the Mick McCarthy low point days were of a team and manager giving 100% in extremely trying circumstances. I just feel you are constantly having a go at the wrong people all the time. You are quick to put down our fans but quicker to offer congratulations and support to the manager and players who are to blame for our demise. It’s a bizarre way of thinking. What other club could still pull 40,000 through the gates given 8 defeats on 9 games at home? Probably only our cousins up the road but you know what, they wouldn’t lie down and take it up the arse either. They would let the powers to be know that the results were ****e and that’s all we are doing too.
It pisses me off how we are being perceived by the media, Colin Murray on motd pointing out there was loads of empty seats, there was still 36,000 there bar 4 or 5 teams that's still the best turn out in the country. We are amongst the most loyal fans in football, the fact there still hasn't been any Bruce out chants/protests proves this. We have been patient, if we are losing to Stoke when the fulltime whistle goes this patience will be gone I think. I agree with cest that all the signs are there for the dreaded R word, something has to change whether that is the manager or getting that one result that kick starts the season. Time will tell.
Parker - you are 100% right mate about the lack of ANY anti Bruce chants at the SOL, despite a series of 8 defeats in 9 home games. Where else would fans remain so loyal without a call for the managers head. The only dissenting voices are on these message boards but even we (the BOB's) give the manager our vocal support at the match. I dont think this will last beyind the WBA game to be honest but its still a remarkable statistic nevertheless.
I can see both points of view. I don't think MrRAW is castigating our fans, perhaps for example just disappointed like me that the pictures on MOTD always seem to show our fans leaving with 10 minutes to go, giving a terrible impression to those watching of our support for the club. And I also believe that positive vocal support does help the team to play better, without fear of making a mistake. But I also agree it's down to the team to give us something to cheer about, and the manager is obviously a major influence on that. It is frustrating to see negative tactics at home, but we were playing Chelsea after all. Having said that the manager should have recognised that Chelsea have not got into gear yet this season really, so who knows what would have happened if we had gone after them, played 2 up front and attacked. If you don't score you don't bloody well win. See even I am being driven to swear!! Having said that then Chelsea may have woken up and scored 4. We will never know. We are all frustrated and concerned that another season of promise is slipping away from us, but it is only 4 games into the season and I don't think we need to push the panic button yet. Remember the season before last when we had such a terrible away record and last year we improved on that. We also finished in our highest position for years, despite the slump in home form. So looking at the bigger picture we could say progress is being made although I agree that is only a crumb of comfort at the moment. One thing I do know I would not want to be the manager of a football club for all the tea in China, as my old mum used to say.
I feel that my interpretation of backing the team is a bit more than not slagging them off...Is it too much to ask that for 90 minutes every couple of weeks to go to a game with the sole intention of backing the team and creating an intimidating atmosphere for the opposition: it bloody works for stoke eh!
RAW - weve been doing just that since Janary without dissent or barracking the manager and yet we are still losing these games at home. 8 in the last 9. WE have roared the lads on time after time after time but with precious little to show for that support, is it any wonder we less enthusiastic and a little flat. We can all see what you cant and thats a team and manager that are soon to part company. Is it our fault Bent left and still hasnt been replaced? Is it our fault we cant score goals and win games at home? I can tell you now that if Tony Pullis loses 8 out of the next 9 home games, 3 or 4 of their top players bugger off in acrimonious circumstances without being replaced, not only will the fans tell him they are not happy, Stoke will be in the bottom 3 and their chairman will have the same decisions to make ours does right now. Thats a total fact. Its not the fans fault we are losing these games is it? Or do you think it is?
As I've stated on many occasions, the defensive tactics of bruce hasn't helped, but I also think that the lack of vocal support at our home games has been a contributory factor for our poor results... When Quinn talked of fans getting aboard the magic carpet, I believe it was his way of expressing how important he thought that loud vocal support is to the team. However, the only time you ever see it these days is at the start of a game or if we take the lead.
If Bruce had the balls to "go for it" at home and started with an attacking formation, he just might get those nervous fans on board. But to play one up front at home ffs..he is getting what he deserves. Under Reid, we played free flowing football...didn't win every game, but at least we tried, I'm sure Quinn was refering to those days when he made he comments..under this guy, its terrible to watch and we go thinking we will get beat. As I have said..I have been on Bruces side until this season..We need a change of direction....quickly
I certainly agree that Bruce's lack of attacking ambition is a factor, and if he is to remain in his job it something that he needs to change.
I'm sure there were some dissenting voices amongst the Stoke fans last season. What id have given for a 5-0 fa cup.semi final win.and a cup final AND eurepoean football this year. What do they pull in? 20odd thousand?
