Last Chance Saloon is now calling time
THE bartender at the Last Chance Saloon is currently lining up a final round for Middlesbrough.
As for Sunderland, they probably wouldn’t even get past the doorman.
They’ve been drinking in that establishment so long, they’ve exhausted their membership.
Relegation beckons for both clubs and Wednesday’s meeting between the two may not make much difference to the fate of either.
If Sunderland lose, they’ll go down. If they draw, they’ll go down. If they win, they will still go down.
A team that’s taken 21 points from a possible 96 is unlikely to win the 15 from 18 that would take them to the bare minimum 36-point survival total.
The Black Cats have made four consecutive Great Escapes, but the miracle well is surely dry now.
Boro have a few more points, so a victory would be more helpful to them. But with daunting run-in – away to Chelsea and Liverpool and home to Manchester City and Southampton – a defeat or a draw on Wednesday would pretty much seal their fate.
It means that the next time the two clubs meet it will be in the Championship, and they will both look very different.
David Moyes won’t be Sunderland’s manager. The club has sacked every boss who has threatened to take them down, so they’ll certainly ditch one who actually oversees relegation.
The club has already cut jobs off the field, and most of the higher-earning, under-performing senior pros will not be around for the re-build.
Their only real assets are keeper Jordan Pickford and striker Jermain Defoe. Neither will play for them in the Championship.
Steve Agnew is in caretaker charge at the Riverside after Aitor Karanka’s dismissal, but there has been no “assistant manager bounce” like Craig Shakespeare’s at Leicester City.
Agnew may be popular and have the club engraved on his heart, but relegation is not a good audition.
Boro would also lose their best players, headed by Ben Gibson, though their wage structure is probably more suited to the Championship than Sunderland’s.
Even though Newcastle United are on their way back, losing two teams from the Premier League will be a disaster for the local area.
But no one else will care because the football played by both clubs this season has been dire and soulless.
It will be a case of goodbye – and good riddance.