Stelling backing Black
BUT RIGHT MANAGER HAS TO BE IN PLACE SOON
JEFF Stelling met plenty of football fans as he walked between 40 football clubs in 15 days for Prostate Cancer – and Sunderland’s were gloomier than most.
But even at the end of a tough week for the Black Cats, the presenter with an encyclopaedic knowledge of the game is adamant a second successive relegation will not happen next season.
The Sky Sports presenter stopped off at the Stadium of Light on the last leg of his March for Men – 15 marathon walks in as many days. They took him from St James’ Park in Exeter to its Newcastle namesake to raise money and awareness for Prostate Cancer UK.
He was joined along the way by Sunderland’s greatest goalkeeper, Jimmy Montgomery. The hero of the 1973 FA Cup final was one of many celebrities who joined Stelling to help him along his exhausting 400-mile route.
But according to Stelling, Monty needed lifting more than he did.
“It’s been grim, hasn’t it?” he said. “We walked with one of the great Sunderland legends of all time, Jimmy Montgomery, and he’s scratching his head about what’s going on at the club as much as I am.”
Thursday saw Sunderland sell arguably their best goalkeeper since Montgomery – Jordan Pickford – to Everton for a record £30m. Top-scorer Jermain Defoe is set to join Bournemouth on a free transfer.
Shortly after Pickford’s move was announced, Derek McInnes rejected the chance to become the club’s new manager.
Three-and-a-half weeks after the resignation of David Moyes, the Black Cats had only agreed compensation with Aberdeen for McInnes and his assistant Tony Docherty the previous afternoon. The fact coach Paul Bracewell had already been allowed to leave suggested they were very confident McInnes would come.
Shortly after Stelling left the Stadium of Light on Friday to head for Newcastle United via Gateshead’s International Stadium, Sunderland issued a statement which appeared to try to give potential buyers of the club the hurry-up, saying owner Ellis Short would take it off the market if a deal was not agreed within an unspecified time frame.
They also warned fans it was hampering their search for Moyes successor, and not to expect anything imminently. Stelling thinks they need to get a move on.
Thirteen Premier League teams have dropped into League One, including former champions Blackburn Rovers this summer.
But while he was not hiding from the difficulty of Sunderland’s situation, Stelling is not so gloomy he thinks they will go down that route next May.
“It’s a difficult situation,” he said. “They simply have to get a manager in place but of course it’s got to be the right man so it’s a very, very difficult time for them.
“Time is ticking away so it’s really difficult times for them and the gloom-mongers amongst the Sunderland fans are saying, ‘Goodness me, we might go straight through into the next division’.
“I don’t believe that for a second, to be honest, but they’ve got to get someone in place soon.” HARTLEPOOL United’s most famous fan says they must win promotion back to the Football League next season – and he is confident they can. Jeff Stelling cut a frustrated figure at the end of last season, trapped in Sky TV’s Soccer Saturday studio as his beloved football club dropped out of the league for the first time since joining in 1921. Things got so bad that after the penultimate game of the campaign, Stelling quit as the club’s president live on air in an attempt to get manager Dave Jones to do the same. The veteran boss handed in his resignation days later, along with chairman Gary Coxall, but it was not enough to save the Teesside club from the Conference. It is a notoriously tough division with 12 of their rivals also having Football League pedigree, plenty of new money in the others and only one automatic promotion spot.
“In the National League, let’s be honest, you need to get out first time because it’s mighty difficult thereafter but I think we’re equipped to get out first time so I’m feeling really hopeful,” said Stelling, who dropped in on Victoria Park during his March for Men. There he was joined by Craig Harrison, who replaced Jones in May as the new manager.
Harrison has been busy already, signing former Newcastle United trainee Ryan Donaldson, Luke George, Jack Munns, Jake Cassidy and one-time England call-up Scott Loach.
“I am optimistic we can go up,” said Stelling. “I know Craig Harrison.
“He did part of the walk on Thursday and he’s a very positive man.”