Why the feeble Cats face further turmoil
AFRIEND of mine recently backed Sunderland to get relegated at 1,000/1. Two weeks later, the odds had dropped to 100-1 and he cashed out for nearly £300.
He certainly had a much happier Christmas than most Sunderland fans, who are subjected to fresh ignominy with each passing week.
The Black Cats spent Christmas day 13th in League One, eclipsing the previous all-time nadir of 12th set in 1987.
The new record would not last nearly so long. By the end of Boxing Day, following a miserable 0-0 draw with bottom side Bolton, Sunderland lay 15th - and those odds had shortened to 40/1.
Sunderland will not go down. Bury’s demise has already removed one of the four relegation spots. Southend and Bolton will fill almost certainly fill another two, while MK Dons, currently occupying the final slot, have collected just 18 points from 22 games.
At that rate, 39 points will ensure survival, meaning the Mackems would require just four wins from their remaining 26 matches. Easy.
Nevertheless, the club is bang in trouble. Stories abound of visitors to the Academy of Light being met by deserted corridors and echoing rooms.
Meanwhile, a whole swathe of seats at the Stadium of
Light have been rendered unusable thanks to unrepaired holes in the roof.
These are the kinds of problems you see at Non-League grounds, not the relatively modern home of the six-times champions of England.
Rumours about imminent administration are wide of the mark. Sunderland have no significant debt and only moderate liabilities.
But it is becoming clearer with each passing day and each sign of neglect that Stewart Donald, who bought the club from Ellis
Short in 2018, is not in it for the long haul.
An owner with a long-term strategy invests in infrastructure and staff; he doesn’t court buyers at every opportunity, as Donald and minority shareholder Charlie Methven have from day one.
“The notion that I am going to leave Sunderland in the short-term, having made a quick profit, is simply wrong,” insisted Donald last season.
Yet this a man who invested just £7m of his own money in purchasing the club and immediately touted it around for £50m. Different
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with flipping a club, of course.
Milan Mandaric made a mint from it, and generally left healthy businesses behind. Yet he operated in a different era, before lower league wages took flight.
Such is the expense involved in running a club at the top end of League One in modern day football that buyers are growing ever more scarce.
“If someone’s worth £100m, that’s obviously a hell of a lot of money,” explained former Wigan chairman David Sharpe after Bury went bust in August. “But if they’re covering losses of £10m every season - which is entirely realistic at the bottom end of the Championship that’s ten per cent of their wealth disappearing every year.
“Who in their right mind will want to do that? That’s why we got out. It’s why so many good owners are walking away. And I’m sure it’s the reason nobody wanted to buy Bury.”
It is also the reason nobody wants to buy Sunderland. As Sharp said, anybody who thinks they can flip a club now is completely deluded.
Anybody who tries is left saddled with a club they either can’t or won’t support, inevitably leading to neglect and decay.
Such is the situation Sunderland are now enduring. And unless Donald is prepared to sell for a song, it is hard to see how things can improve.