That wasn't a strong team . . . . a 'makeshift' defence with only Onions a regular, a terrible midfield of Matete, Embo, slow-motion Jobe and Bennette, and Rusyn upfront (who also has never played for a good few months and is not a centre forward). The only decent players were Patta, Onions & Jack . . . . the team for the 'Sheels match were much better balanced and they played as a team, whereas this one didn't know each other Most importantly . . . . Reggie will have learned things from both games
Neither result means a thing. Straight fitness, or else we wouldn’t have split the teams. Not even intended to form tactics etc else it’s first team one game and young lads the other.
I see a lot of our fans have shrugged off us winning at shields 5-0 as pre season games mean nothing, but have gone way overboard about us losing at Gateshead with a team of players some which haven’t played for around 5-6 months. It was a rusty performance and one not to be worried about and looked into. The same goes for the win at Shields, although we won very easily, we shouldn’t get carried away. Clarke touched on the point the players are still learning their roles under RLB and once this has been fully understood we will thrive. It’s very early days. Our fanbase at times drives me mad.
He was never really given a chance. Started well but then got bullied a bit and became a bit part player never really given a chance to get used to the physicality of the game TM stuck with him and let him express himself and he thrived on it
You can’t get match fit by going for a run, you have to play matches. that is the whole point of pre-season
Don't look too much into it. We're Sunderland fans and we only ever want to see us win, and why should we not speak up about concerns if we dont. It is a forum afterall where opinions are meant to be vented
Ok my bad. Not getting involved with it now though mate. Not worth it. Too many people on here that want to shoot you down so im I'm done with commenting now
Did I say no one should speak up about it? I just find it bizarre some in our fanbase are saying one thing about preseason games when we won and then saying the complete opposite because we’ve lost. I just don’t think we should go overboard because we lost a game with a make shift team and we shouldn’t go overboard because we won 5-0. Pre season results don’t tell you much, we could win every game 5-0 but could lose our first 3 games in the league. Because we beat South Shields 5-0 does that mean we’ll win the league? Or because we lost with a less than match fit team to Gateshead we’ll be relegated?
I've seen too many times that we've had a stellar preseason, but played like strangers who took an instant dislike to each other when things kicked off for real to put any stock at all in preseason results or performances. Logically you'd think there'd be some correlation between the two but history has repeatedly shown us it's not the case.
Pre-season is primarily for regaining match fitness ready for the new season, trialing new tactics and getting players adapted to new modes of play. The results are important but much less than the aforementioned. We looked excellent against Shields, especially in that first half, not so good against Gateshead. Interestingly the team against Gateshead was arguably closer to resembling our starting lineups last season, the Shields team seemed to have more fringe players in it. This is good because RLB is coming in with brand new eyes and likely with less judgement, so you'd assume he'd be willing to name a wildly different starting lineup on the opening day if some of these fringe lads do the business.
Yeah oķ mate just trying to give my take on things and i still feel there's no excuse in any way Gateshead should beat us pre season or not but hey ho not gonna argue about it
Whilst disappointing, it's just a pre season friendly mate. I'm sure we lost some pre season matches to lowly teams under Reid'y when we were flying.
Hopefully we start putting the best XI on the pitch from here, that split friendly thing is good for the manager to get a look at the squad but it would be good to start getting them meshing now. Surprised Matete and Embleton got anywhere near either team. How did they get on?
Enjoyed the Shields game, apart from the rain. Positives for me were mainly the performances of Mayenda, Mundle, and Aouchiche and good to see Compton back from injury he did well too. Good to get to a match (even if it was a mis-match) before heading back to the States. I never read too much into preseason games, unless we get battered of course.
