CROWDED OUT
Sunderland will have to rise without fan power
IT IS 47 years today since Sunderland famously beat Leeds in one of the greatest FA Cup finals of them all.
From those heady heights in 1973, the Wearsiders now find themselves seventh in League One.
And if the EFL season does not finish, the fallen giants, with six top-flight titles in their history, will spend a third successive campaign in football’s third tier.
When football went into lockdown, the only club in England to have won a major honour during the reign of every monarch since the sport was invented appeared as far away as ever from reclaiming a place among the elite. If the prospect of no parachute payments next term – they received £15million this year – was not bleak enough, if football was to be played behind closed doors for an extended period, they would lose another key advantage they hold over their peers – fan power.
Only Leeds, outside the Premier League, have pulled in bigger crowds in the past two years. And the 46,039 they attracted on Boxing Day 2018 against Bradford City was the biggest outside the top flight in modern times, eclipsing Tottenham’s attendance at Wembley for their match with Bournemouth on the same day.
Before their latest relegation from the Championship in May 2018, the loyalty of their fans had done little to improve results on the pitch.
Not so long ago, Sunderland went 12 months without a win on home soil. But they have only lost two third-tier league matches at the Stadium of Light in the past 20 months.
Financially, despite bigger overheads, gate receipts have dwarfed their rival clubs.
With so much still up in the air, newly installed chief executive Jim Rodwell refuses to comment on how Covid-19 might impact on the Black Cats’ future. But former director Charlie Methven, star of the recent Netflix documentary ‘Sunderland ’Til I Die’ series two, insists the club remain in a good place financially.
Owner Stewart Donald is still looking to sell and has left the day-to-day running to Rodwell, but Methven said: “I would say they are in the strongest financial position of any club in the EFL. They are debt-free, have a break-even model and are spending only around 45 per cent of turnover on wages.”
But even if Sunderland are no longer losing money hand over fist, making the Championship again without the roar of the fans will be that much harder.