Latest news with #RokerEnd
Times
2 days ago
- Sport
- Times
Sunderland run riot on Premier League return against toothless West ham
Returns to the Premier League do not come much better than this. Those eight years away for Sunderland, half of which were spent in League One, felt almost forgotten in the sunshine of the Stadium of Light. Red-and-white and the blue of a new away kit bounced in unity at full-time. No one had left the ground. If there had been any prayers about the perfect day, then they were answered. It feels like this club is a million miles from the one whose last game at this level, on this ground, was a 2-0 defeat to Swansea in 2017. They are getting used to celebration, and headed goals at the Roker End of the stadium. It was from there that this footballing comeback really started, with the most dramatic of stoppage-time goals in the semi-final of the Championship play-off against Coventry from Dan Ballard in May. The stadium shook in celebration then, and he scored again, with his head, like last time (almost) to make it 2-0, with 17 minutes remaining. The ball dropped in the same part of the Roker End goal. The celebrations were not quite as wild, but there was still disbelief amongst the joy. Sunderland had scored their first goal back in the Premier League 12 minutes earlier, just past the hour mark. That was from another header, into the same part of the same goal. It will become sacred ground. The deep cross from the left was provided by the debutant defender Omar Alderete, who had played eight minutes of football in England at that point. It was met by Eliezer Mayenda, who out jumped Nayef Aguerd and sent a downward header back across the West Ham penalty area. Mads Hermansen in the West Ham goal seemed to follow the flight of the ball and then threw out a despairing right hand as the realisation came it was heading into the far corner. His disbelief was matched in the stands of this ground, but then came the celebration. Day one, goal one, and Sunderland were, as their supporters sing, on their way. Ballard would add that second with a much cleaner header than his stoppage-time goal against Coventry. He was excellent once more. There was more to come, when the Sunderland substitute Wilson Isidor broke down the West Ham right, in the first minute of stoppage time. It looked as if he was afforded the freedom of Wearside, before checking inside onto his right foot and shooting. Hermansen flicked out a lazy left hand and the ball went under his body. It needed a double take that Hermansen cost £20million from Leicester this summer. He put his head in his hands after the goal, which he at least did not drop. Nobody in red and white cared. They played Bob Marley's Three Little Birds at full-time. Every little thing was all right. Seven new players had started for Sunderland. After a summer spending spree that has cost £120million, all three goals came from players who had helped Sunderland out of the Championship. Somewhere amidst the joy will come an analysis of just how bad and how toothless West Ham were, and where exactly they are heading under Graham Potter. They got worse as it went on — Ballard cleared an effort off the line from El Hadji Malick Diouf in the first half — and by the time Sunderland's third went in, their 3000 supporters had seen enough and were heading south.
Times
14-05-2025
- Sport
- Times
Last-minute header seals Wembley spot for Sunderland over Coventry
' 'Til the End.' It is the Sunderland play-off slogan, slapped all over the team bus, and oh my goodness, Sunderland did that all right. It had been announced that two minutes of stoppage time were to be played at the end of extra time, and the giant electronic clock in the Roker End at the Stadium of Light was at 31min 59sec when an Enzo Le Fée corner came flying into the Coventry City penalty area. It struck 32:00 just as Dan Ballard crashed his header off the crossbar and beyond the Coventry goalkeeper Ben Wilson, a Sunderland fan, and into the Coventry goal, and at that moment everything in Sunderland descended into wild chaos. All around were 43,000 Sunderland fans going crazy. The ground almost shook. In the Sunderland technical area they had charged on to the pitch. Ballard struggled but eventually managed to tear off his shirt before swinging it around his head as he ran towards the supporters like a man possessed. He was not alone in the look. Everywhere was pandemonium. All football was right there. Régis Le Bris, the Sunderland head coach, wore a look of bewilderment. Coventry players stood still, too stunned to move. Some put their shirts to their faces. It seemed to take an age to restart the game, and when it did, it was pointless. There was no time left. Within a further second the referee, Andrew Madley, had blown his whistle and at that point Le Bris was mobbed, his players rejoiced and those in sky blue fell to the turf or covered their faces once more with their shirts. Ecstasy and agony right there. Play-off football had once more conjured up something so extraordinary that it was difficult to comprehend the varying scale of emotions. Some Sunderland fans ran on to the pitch. There was a scuffle between a Sunderland fan without a top and Frank Lampard, the Coventry head coach who dragged a team who were 17th in the Championship in November to one who dominated most of the 212 minutes of this semi-final, only to be done in its final second. Lampard was diplomatic on the incident when he slapped the phone out of the shirtless fan who tried to take a celebration selfie with him on the pitch. 'There were a few silly fans that came over, a minority,' he said. 'It's disappointing.' Even Lampard had not seen anything like it. Nor did he deserve to be confronted by Sunderland supporters. There will be questions about why that was allowed to happen. It was perhaps a couple of hundred fans who made their way on to the pitch, and they were jeered, briefly, for those in the stands of the Stadium of Light were lost in the joy of celebration. They had named the main stand at the ground the Jimmy Montgomery Stand before kick-off, and that merely heightened what was a frenzied atmosphere. Perhaps it was some Monty magic that inspired such a dramatic conclusion. That moment from Ballard will live as long in the memory as Montgomery's save in 1973 that helped Second Division Sunderland beat First Division Leeds United in the FA Cup final at Wembley. More than half a century later and they are still fighting to get out of the second tier of English football. They have not been in the Premier League since 2017, relegated under David Moyes. That feels like a lifetime ago, but they are potentially only 90 minutes from a return. A squad assembled for £18.4 million must now get past Sheffield United to return to the big time. They will believe anything is possible after a night of such incredible drama. Lampard had stood, incapable of movement, when the game finished. He was alone then, on the corner of the Coventry technical area. The finish was cruel for its method but also cruel because Coventry were the better team. 'Football is cruel at times. I'm proud of what we have delivered and the way we have played from where we came from,' Lampard said. 'I hope our fans are proud of the team. It is not a nice drive home for any of us tonight.' Coventry had more possession, more control, more efforts, more corners. They had an equaliser in the tie when only 15 minutes remained. Milan van Ewijk crossed deep from the right, Ephron Mason-Clark stole in ahead of Trai Hume and cleverly placed a right-footed finish beyond Anthony Patterson into the corner of the Sunderland goal. There were the best part of 3,000 fans from Coventry, way up behind a goal, and they went wild in celebration. How that emotion would alter, how the game would change, how quickly they would want to leave when Ballard struck with the final second of a play-off game and Sunderland became an epicentre of absolute delight. 'Today the atmosphere was crazy,' Le Bris said. 'We went through difficult moments. The energy was contagious. We played with 12 men. To score this late and to win the opportunity to play at Wembley was absolutely fantastic. You play football for these emotions.' Sunderland (4-4-2): A Patterson 7 — T Hume 6, D Ballard 7, L O'Nien 7 — P Roberts 6 (R Mundle 95), D Neil 67, J Bellingham 6, E Le Fée 6 — W Isidor 6 (C Rigg 83), E Mayenda Isidor, Roberts, Bellingham, Le Fée. Coventry (4-2-3-1): B Wilson 6 — M van Ewijk 7, B Thomas 7, L Kitching 7, J Dasilva 7 —M Grimes 8, B Sheaf 7 (J Eccles 73, 5) — T Sakamoto 7, J Rudoni 8, H Wright — E Mason-Clark 8 (B Thomas-Asante).Booked Sheaf, Wilson, Thomas. Referee A Madley.
