Premier League, Sunday 22nd February
A rare premier league outing for me but it was that time of year again where I make the annual pilgrimage to The Stadium Of Light to watch my late fathers beloved Sunderland, and they were taking on Fulham on Sunday afternoon with both sides going through a rather tough run of form in the last week or two.
Sunderland have surprised many this season, including myself, at how well they have adapted to their first Premier League campaign for a decade, a lot has happened since they were last here but the Black Cats are certainly giving their long suffering fans something to cheer about this season, although they were going through what was probably their first sticking patch of the season.
Three defeats in their last four outings had seen them slip into the bottom half of the table, but despite this they were well clear of the bottom three and were looking to try and bounce back into the top ten with victory against a Fulham side who were trying to stop a run of three successive losses by grabbing victory in Wearside, the two sides met in November and it was Fulham who netted a narrow 1-0 win, it was bound to be another tight contest here too.
The first half however was a rather drab affair with a lot of stop start action, rather in keeping with two sides who were not having their best run of form lately, Fulham did carve out two openings in the first half but both were off target, Sunderland had the only shot on target in the entire opening forty five minutes but it was a routine save from Bernd Leno, and it was no surprise that the game entered the half time break goalless.
The second half however would bring much more goal mouth action, and Sunderland should really have taken the lead early in the second half, Romaine Mundle was played in by Lutsharel Geetruida, but he could only slice wide of the target with only Leno to beat, and in the 53rd minute, Fulham would be the ones to get their noses in front, an Alex Iwobi corner found Raul Jimenez totally unmarked to head home and hand The Cottagers the advantage.
And it was Jimenez who was to double Fulham's lead from the spot after VAR asked referee Craig Pawson to go to the screen after Brian Brobbey had pulled back Calvin Bassey inside the box, and suddenly Fulham had a two goal cushion just past the hour mark and the hosts had it all to do in this one.
Sunderland made some changes and one of those was the return of skipper Granit Xhaka who had been absent from the side for the last few weeks due to injury, and with around fifth teen minutes remaining The Black Cats were given a lifeline when determined play from Dab Ballard saw him pulled down by Ryan Sessegnon, and Enzo le Fee duly thumped the spot kick into the top corner and you really felt Sunderland could go on and grab something from the contest.
However, there was to be no comeback as Fulham netted a superb third on the break, the superb Harry Wilson received the ball just outside his penalty box, and he broke at pace and charged almost to the edge of the opposite box before playing in Iwobi with a wonderful pass and the forward duly clipped a lovely finish beyond Robin Roefs into the far corner and seal a very welcome win for the visitors.
A disappointing afternoon for Sunderland then, that's four defeats in five now, but they are still in touching distance of the top ten and eleven points clear of the drop zone, so that really shouldn't be in question, a couple more wins should guarantee their PL status for next season which in all honestly is all they need to achieve this season.
For Fulham that's three points that takes them into tenth and above today's opponents too so maybe now they can begin a decent run of form and a possible top seven finish which is possible for both these sides and a whole host of others in a congested mid table of the PL, this was Fulham's day though, sadly for me and others who were hoping Sunderland could grab a win here.
Sorry Dad, I could not bring your Black Cats any luck in this one, but it was still an enjoyable visit to a wonderful arena.....
Full time Sunderland 1 Fulham 3
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