Match Day Thread Stoke City v Sunderland AFC – Saturday 21st October 2023 - KO 15:00

Sunderland visit the Bet365 Stadium to play Stoke City in the Championship.
Last time out Sunderland lost to Middlesbrough and Stoke lost at Leicester.
Sunderland went into the international break after losing 4-0 to near neighbours Middlesbrough.
Tony Mowbay is expected to have a few of his injured players back in contention for the Stoke game however there is a slight doubt over Dan Ballard who returned from international duty with a niggling thigh injury. Bennette is probably recovering from jet-lag. Dan Neil is suspended.
Stoke's sixth defeat in eight games - a run that includes just one win - saw them slip to 21st in the table heading into the international break. Before the break Alex Neil had 8 first teamers out of action but expects 5 of those to be ready for a return on Saturday.
Tony Mowbray:
"In the referees' meeting before the game that the managers have to go to these days, the referee was talking about empathetically managing the game. Wow.
"A derby, over 40,000 people, and he gives a red card for gesticulating at him. That seems pretty harsh to me.
"Then, when you play against a football team with a man down, it's really difficult, as they pick the right pass. I see it as a learning curve for us."
Alex Neil:
"Our game plan was to come here, frustrate and try keep Leicester at arms length really. "We wanted to get to the late embers of the game and see if we could have a little bit of a go”
"The first goal changed the dynamic of the game. We then kept it going until the 60th minute, then when we decided to have a go. We discussed that, it was always going to be the game plan.
"You can see why teams come here and don't do that, because they have very quick players, they are good, they are technical, they move the ball. You have to go one-for-one across the whole pitch and at that stage we became a little stretched and they managed to get a goal.
"We gave it everything we have got."

Match Appointments:
Referee: GRAHAM SCOTT
Assistant Referees: Edward Smart and Derek Eaton
Fourth Official: Will Finnie

Team Lineups:
Sunderland AFC: (4-2-3-1) Patterson, Taylor, Ballard, O’Nien, Hume, Ekwah, Jobe, Clarke, Dack, Roberts, Rusyn.

Subs: Bishop, Triantis, Seelt, Rigg, Ba, Auchiche, Burstow, Hemir, Pritchard.
Injured: Evans, Alese, Matete, Mayenda, Cirkin, Pembele, Huggins.
Suspended: Dan Neil

Stoke (4-4-2) Travers, Tchamadeu, McNally, Laurent, Thompson, Léris, Pearson, Burger, Johnson, Bae, Lowe.
Subs: Cunha Vidigal, Gayle, Bonham, Wesley, Haksabanovic, Jojic, Sidibe, Fielding, Dixon
Injured: Gooch, Rose, Wilmot, Campbell, Mmaee, Stevens, Baker, Tezgel.


Betting Odds:
Sunderland 15/8 Stoke 12/5 Draw 11/4

Prutton Predicts: 2-2

My two pence:
According to Alex Neil, Stoke gave it all they’ve got against Leicester, hmm 25% possession 3 shots, 1 on target however as we all know he somehow gets them fired up for games against us.
Hopefully Ballard is OK and we have Ekwah and Dack back in the squad, we tend to play better away from home but we will miss Dan Neil in midfield.

I’m going for a 2-2 draw

Live Stream:
This game is available to overseas fans.
https://safc.com/news/team-news/live-video

Ha’way the Lads

 

Woo hoo, the match thread

 

I saw footage today of Huggins walking into training looking fine mate.
I reckon Ballard will be saved for Leicester midweek and Seelt will play CB next to Onien.

 

Big game and I really hope we bounce back. Looking forward to going down. Car full leaving around 9am.

 

Back to business. Hope Ballard is fit but assume Seelt will come in if not, Ekwah got to be back in there by now as well.

We are heading down from the SoL at 8am, never been to this ground before so looking forward to it. HTL

 

I was there 2012 in the snow. Great win just absolutely freezing

 

We were away at Alton Towers earlier in the year and then went to a monkey world type place not far from the ground so I've seen it but it looked out of town/industrial estate type of area. I assume there is nowhere to get a pint other than inside the ground?

 

I was living in Nice and had to fly back for my younger sister's funeral in Belfast. The game was sold out but, as usual, people helped me and my son with tickets. An RTG lad, Rev Mysterio, met us at the ground and wouldn't take a penny when he saw us in black suits and overcoats.

We were almost stranded in the snow afterwards but a minibus load of lads jumped out and pushed the hire car off the verge ...

... great memories of a sad occasion.

 

Burslem I think it's called ...

 

Yeah - hopefully he will start

 

Had to Google that but yes, it had that vibe about it

 

Defo not injured is he. He looks no older than my 11 year old lads ffs

 

I couldn’t really say mate. I’ve only really stopped miles out with a branch when heading there.

 

Champion. If we do that I'll take appropriate action. It didn't look like there would be many boozers around it, at least not for aways anyway.

 

Mayenda possibly on the bench for this one? If not, surely he’ll feature on Friday night for the U21’s…

 

Great thread as ever RTB... 2-1 win to the lads

Hhhaaawwwwaaaaayyyyyyy the lads

 

Not really sure what to expect from Stoke. Their squad has changed massively since last season but they’ve struggled of late. An early goal for us and their fans might just turn on Neil…

 

If you've listened to the What the Falk podcast on the other thread previewing the Stoke game, the Stoke podcast is not a bad listen - they're not a fan of Neil and are not really looking forward to facing us on Saturday

 

Hes a unit for 18 years old so he can easily be fast tracked.
It was interesting to see Rusyk called up to their full national team. Hes obviously a box of tricks that they know about and we are yet to experience

 

Curious to see how we cope without Neil