Sunderland welcome Coventry City to the Stadium of Light in the Championship. Last time out Sunderland lost at Bristol and Coventry drew with Leeds The Black Cats dropped to 7th and are 3 points off the play-off places. Michael Beale was announced as head coach replacing Tony Mowbray, caretaker Mike Dodds took 6 points from his 3 games in charge. Pembele, Alese and Matete all played on Monday for the under 21s and maybe included in the squad that travelled to Bristol. Mike Beale is expected to stick with a similar team lineup for this game. Coventry City dropped to 15th place after their 1-1 draw at Leeds. The Sky blues have recovered from a poor run of form which saw Mark Robins team lose 4 games in a row. Coventry made it to the play-off final last season and will be hoping to match that feat this season without the services of Viktor Gyorkeres and Gustavo Hamer. Ex Black Cat loanee Ellis Simms is expected to lead the attack for the Sky Blues. Mike Beale: “The club’s got a vision and processes I really believe in to get to where we all want to go, which is back to the Premier League. "That’s what the fans want, and the fans drive the club in terms of expectations. That’s really important. Every single player in our dressing room wants to go to the Premier League. It’s a young dressing room, and that’s where we think the potential of our players is. “Our fans should demand that, and we should demand that internally. We have to demand those standards. We want to set ourselves up so that, after the March international break, we’re in a position to push and go there. “Last season, playing with a slightly different style and a slightly different make-up of the group – maybe a slightly older group – we managed to get there. So, why wouldn’t we dream and push and go for that again?” "Whoever is in charge of Sunderland is expected to win games of football, Mark Robins: "I'm really proud of everybody. I think that when you come to a place like Leeds, in any normal circumstance, it is a difficult game. They are a Premier League team, they have Premier League quality. "On the back of that, we played on Wednesday, they played on Tuesday. They've got unbelievable depth and unbelievable quality so for us not to just hold them but carry a threat, everybody should be really proud. "We were backed fantastically by the support and the fact we have drawn 1-1, it feels like a win. We've scored a really well-worked goal and had other opportunities to score as well. "We know how good these teams are and the way they (Leeds) have performed here this season, they are unbeaten here, so to have that opportunity to go and maybe nick a win was brilliant and credit to the players. It should give them plenty of confidence moving forward." Match Appointments: Referee: MATTHEW DONOHUE Assistant Referees: Paul Hodskinson and Robert Hyde Fourth Official: Simon Mather Team Lineups: Sunderland AFC: (4-2-3-1) Patterson, Huggins, Ballard, O’Nien, Hume, Neil, Ekwah, Clarke, Jobe, Roberts, Rusyn. Subs: Bishop, Triantis, Hemir, Mayenda, Ba, Pritchard, Aouchiche, Rigg, Seelt. Injured: Evans, Cirkin, Embleton. Coventry City (4-4-2) Collins, van Ewijk, Thomas, Kitching, Bidwell, Latibeaudiere, O'Hare, Eccles, Sheaf, Dasilva, Simms. Subs: Binks, McFadzean, Allen, Sakamoto, Wright, Wilson, Godden, Ayari, Palmer Injured: Tavares, Kelly Betting Odds: Sunderland evens Coventry 13/5 Draw 13/5 Prutton Predicts: 1-1 My two pence: Mike Beale’s first game in charge against a Coventry side without their two best players from last season. O’Hare is their man to keep quiet and then we can let Roberts and Clarke tear them apart. A tough opening game but I’m going for a 2-1 home win. Live Stream: Available to overseas fans: https://safc.com/news/team-news/live-video Ha’way the Lads
Here we go, thank you again @RTB Let's get after them from the off and show everyone what we are all about
Initially had this down as a 0-2 win for Coventry after last week’s plodding display. Think we will get a new manager bounce and a 3-2 win (even tho MB was nowhere near a 1st choice for me). HAWAY Bart
I hope we have a forward thinking and attack minded coach who will encourage the team to play through the lines at pace and with confidence, get balls in the box and dominate second balls. 2-0 for me and the road to promotion starts here
With respect I don’t want to go through all that again. It’s more that I saw MBs failings at Rangers, and thought there must be better out there. I’m not alone in those thoughts. But he’s here, so good luck to the bloke. Bart
Going to be interesting to see how Beale lines them up, He was (in)famous at Rangers for playing without wingers. Surely he will see that our best outlets are our wide players Got a daft feeling we'll see a 4-3-3 with O9 in midfield Patterson Huggins Seelt Ballard Hume Neil O'Nien Ekwah Roberts Jobe Clarke
Can’t call this one hate playing Coventry. Hoping the lad gets off to a good start to many out there just waiting for him to fail I’ll go 3-0 shut the F***ers up
I don’t think we’ll see a drastic change in personnel from Dodds teams (Famous last words). Hes only had a couple of days hoping to see some positive tweaks in style. Long term Will be interesting to see what he does at the back Seelt looks like he’s finding his feet and Alese is fit again as is Pembele.
Great thread as usual, only typo was 'Sunderland welcome Coventry' With respect I don't think you had a list of choices.
Seeing a lot of people on here hoping Beale starts well. Look at twitter and Facebook he’s already a failure!! I know zero about him, literally. Hadn’t even heard of him when he was linked. So no matter what, I will be fully behind him and the team. On another note, my Missus booked a “spa day” for me and her on Saturday…. But then booked to have her hair done, so she postponed the spa day… get in I go to the match!! No so there thus week as he’s working so I’ll be on my own!
Well after going for broke and predicting a win last week, I'm going back to predicting a draw and hoping for a win. Coventry is going to be a tough game but I think we'll get something out of it
Tough game and due a win against these, one we should be looking to win if we want to get into the playoffs, hawayyyyyy
