Venue: Stadium of Light
Date: Saturday, 10 September
Kick-off: 1500 BST
Thankfully the international break is over and it’s back to proper football – on a Saturday at 3pm no less! – mind you, whether proper football will be served upor not remains to be seen.
I mean, let’s be honest, we haven’t exactly started with the same sort of bang we did last season – more of a pop really – so we’ll have to hope the first few games were more of a warm-up and we’re about to get into our stride, starting at the Stadium of Light this afternoon.
MANAGERS’ VIEWS
Having managed to take 3 points off us last season, ahead of today’s game, Sunderland manager Steve Bruce says “I remember my first-ever game at the Stadium of Light when Chelsea came up here and were absolutely magnificent. We came away at the end of the night saying we’d been beaten by a very good team. But last season we went down to Stamford Bridge and earned what is certainly the best result of my career. We know what to expect. We know one thing – we have to play well. Believe me, Chelsea will be there or thereabouts when the medals are being handed out at the end of the season.”
Whilst on our set-up this year, Bruce says “Chelsea have had a pretty settled squad for years, and with their new signings the manager has tried to integrate some youth in there. They will be taking time to find their feet, as are we with the number of players we’ve brought in over the summer. It’s very rare that teams change their squads around and get off and running straight away. Andre’s had a wonderful rise to the top, winning four trophies in his first year as management. He is young, enthusiastic and obviously knows what he’s doing. I wish him the very best of luck, after Saturday of course.”
And the new Chelsea manager meanwhile, well aware we haven’t exactly got off to a flier compared to the competition, says “I think it can be better and our objective is to transform it. We have to improve on a weekly basis, on a game-to-game basis. It’s what people expect from us – to get fluency in the way we play. I’m very happy that we have been creating enough chances to win games and this is a good sign for us. We just need to improve on the quality and fluency of the game. Let’s see what kind of response we have now.”
LAST MEETING
Sunderland 2-4 Chelsea (1st February 2011)
SQUAD NEWS
Sunderland striker Asamoah Gyan (hamstring) and defender John O’Shea (calf) are both international casualties, whilst Craig Gordon, Fraizer Campbell and David Meyler (all knee) also miss out. Nicklas Bendtner could made his debut.
For Chelsea, Essien (knee) and Drogba (head) miss out although Petr Cech and David are both fit for selection, with Daniel Sturridge also in contention following his return from suspension. New signing Raul Meireles could make his debut.
TEAMS
SUNDERLAND (from): Mignolet, Westwood, Bardsley, Brown, Richardson, Turner, Bramble, Laing, Cattermole, Gardner, Vaughan, Colback, Elmohamady, Bendtner, Sessegnon, Wickham, Ji, Cook.
CHELSEA (from): Cech, Ivanovic, Bosingwa, Ferreira, Terry, Luiz, Alex, Cole, Mikel, Romeu, McEachran, Lampard, Ramires, Meireles, Mata, Malouda, Torres, Anelka, Sturridge, Kalou, Lukaku, Hilario.
PREDICTION
Ok, so what do we have on our side going into this game then? Well, we’ve won our last 6 visits to the Stadium of Light for a start. In fact, we’ve actually won 12 of our last 13 Premier League meetings, scoring 38 goals along the way.
Having said that, our more recent form has seen us fail to score in our last two away games in the league and we’ve kept just one clean sheet in our last seven league games. And whilst Sunderland might have lost their last 3 at home in the league, let’s not forget they did batter us 3-0 at Stamford Bridge last season as well as beating both City and Arsenal on home soil and drawing with United, so we’ll have to play a lot better than we have so far this season if we’re going to take anything away from the Stadium of Light.
Blue is the colour
