ROWELL: CLUB IS EMBARRASSMENT TO LOYAL FANS
For the second successive season Sunderland suffer the humiliation of relegation, and while I thought last year’s was bad, the feeling on Saturday night when it finally sunk in was 10 times worse.
It was fitting Sunderland were relegated on home soil because that is where the damage has been done with a barely believable two wins on Wearside all season.
It is one thing to go down from the Premier League, but a whole lot worse to be relegated from the Championship to the third tier and for a club the size of Sunderland it is devastating, demoralising and an embarrassment to a loyal fanbase that are reeling from blow after blow driving thousands away.
Sunderland couldn’t even stretch it out until the end of the season.
We are down and out with two games still to play, although on reflection maybe that is a blessing, it is done now, Sunderland’s fate is sealed - no more false hope.
Saturday’s defeat to Burton was typical of so many we have seen this season, how many times have Sunderland conceded just before half-time or just before the end of games?
That is always a sign of a team full of fear, so mentally week they panic and can’t keep their discipline.
If you fear the worst out on the pitch, the worst will always happen.
The sight of former Sunderland striker Darren Bent waiting to go on with about 15 minutes to go was ominous and I doubt there was a single Sunderland fan who didn’t predict what would follow.
He was bound to score, it is so predictable, especially at about the time he came on Lamine Kone went off.
Back in August I wasn’t expecting much, we all knew it was going to be a season of transition but I certainly didn’t expect a relegation scrap, never mind being the worst team in the division.
A promising draw at home to Derby County followed by an away win at Norwich and a draw at Sheffield Wednesday was a more than acceptable first three games.
A better start than many expected, but that was as good as it ever got and the collapse from there has been catastrophic, ending up with Burton Albion – the second worst team in the league – coming up to Wearside to bury us.