Top 4

[MBH]

Might sound harsh but I blame your managers inexperience for the penalty misses.

He never thought that the Burnley keeper would use gamesmanship to increase the pressure on Isodor.
Historically you see it so many times, the longer the delay for a pressure penalty, it greatly increases the chances of a miss.

To be fair to Isodor..his penalties weren’t terrible….he went for power over accuracy and the Burnley keeper pulled off 2 good saves.
Also it took bottle for him to take the 1st penalty and even more bottle for him to take the 2nd penalty.

Only last week Chris Wilder showed experience learning from the Isidor penalty miss.
We got a deserved penalty against Norwich, a nervous looking Rhian Brester picked the ball up and placed it on the spot at the Kop end.
Think Brewster has missed his last 2 penalties and we all thought “surely Brewster isn’t taking the penalty”
Some of the Norwich defenders tried to delay the penalty, one whispered something to him, the Norwich goalie came off his line dancing around trying to put off a nervous looking Brewster…..one of the Norwich defenders was booked for delaying the penalty…with the irony that the booking delayed the penalty further.

Then once everyone was settled….Brewster simply handed the ball over to Harrison Burrows…the real penalty taker (Moore has took previous penalties but he’s out injured). Obviously this was all pre-arranged, there was no time for any pressure to build resulting in Burrows confidently slotting it just inside the post.

Yes thats a good point. I said something similar to my son.

 

[MBH]

The way I see it is that when all 4 teams click/ play their best, Leeds are best followed by Sunderland.
So can totally understand the Leeds and Sunderland fans confidence verging on arrogance.

The only negatives for Leeds and Sunderland fans is that every team (even the best) occasionally have off days
And we’ve seen it a few times already this season, when Leeds and Sunderland have an off day, they can drop points against any team in this league.
Also the Sunderland team are young and inexperienced so might fall away when they become tired towards the end of the seasons
And how will the Sunderland players and fans handle the pressure. Regards Leeds they have this history of falling apart under pressure.
Just the odd defeat with a few draws for Leeds and their fanbase will go into melt down demanding Farke is sacked.

Whereas Burnley and Sheff Utd are quite similar, don’t tend to play as well but have quality players, so tend to still win 1-0 even when having an off day.
Also both Burnley and Sheff Utd have recently seen their teams promoted from the Champiomship, so know what to expect
And both Sheff Utd and Burnley managers (Wilder and Parker) have previously achieved promotion from the Championship.

Burnley have this amazing habit of never conceding, so if they get their attack sorted they could go on a long winning streak.
Sheff Utd are harder to predict, had terrible injuries in the 1st half of the season and still being in 2nd place is very impressive.
Sheff Utd will be significantly (on paper) stronger in the 2nd half of the season with 5 new signings during this transfer window.
All the new signings are expected to go straight into the 1st 11, so our bench should now be really strong with options.
However having theoretically better players doesn’t automatically mean the team will perform better, they need time to gel.

I dont think our fan base has an arrogance about being in the top 2. In fact the majority dont think we will do it. Now Leeds - yes - they seem to think they are the 1970 Brazilians reincarnated. however they are so good that they are a huge 2 points ahead of your lads. Maybe not as good as everyone thinks they are?

they are famed for imploding at the death - who says they wont do it again?

 

[Blademan18891889]

They definitely weren’t better than us at the Stadium of Light.

I thought they were, not saying I'm right but my opinion is there manager completely outsmarted wilder that night, let us have the ball, we barely created a clear chance, hit us on the break and they had several good chances, they were always the team looking more likely to score.

 

[MBH]

But there is always" if only the ref had given a penalty for Burnley for a foul 3 yards outside the penalty area ... "

You know as well as I do that the refereeing decisions even themselves out over time.

Yes the "penalty" looked outside the box, but the referee gave it. somewhere along the line you'll Get a decision you shouldn't. That's football - and referees aren't perfect.

 

[MBH]

Think a few are being a little critical of United after the Hull result.

Yeah the performance really wasn’t great but we managed to concede 3 from an expected goals of 0.46. We had a perfectly good equaliser chalked off for 1-1 which could’ve swung the momentum right in our favour.

We’ve won the most games in the division.

Some talk like we’re up there undeservedly. We’re not. As above, we’ve got the most wins. We’re on a 2 point deduction. Yeah we’ve not blown many teams a way but a fair chunk of those games have been really comfortable victories in second gear where we’ve barely faced a shot on target.

We’re up there on merit and so far have done the best business of the window compared to the other 3.

Games like Hull happen - but when you are one of the top clubs in the league there will always be an inquest, just as there has been at our (predictably) poor performance against Plymouth at home. Goes with the territory of having a demanding fan base.

But yes you lads shouldn't lose sight of the fact that you are second for a reason.

 

[ancientblade]

Games like Hull happen - but when you are one of the top clubs in the league there will always be an inquest, just as there has been at our (predictably) poor performance against Plymouth at home. Goes with the territory of having a demanding fan base.

But yes you lads shouldn't lose sight of the fact that you are second for a reason.

it was a result that has been threatening to happen for a few weeks now hopefully weve got it out of our system mind although hull played really well did think the result flattered em a bit if our goal had stood which it should have i think we would have won the game i was impressed with sunderland at the lane thought we were a bit lucky to win that game

 

[Sheffsteel]

Games like Hull happen - but when you are one of the top clubs in the league there will always be an inquest, just as there has been at our (predictably) poor performance against Plymouth at home. Goes with the territory of having a demanding fan base.

But yes you lads shouldn't lose sight of the fact that you are second for a reason.

Agree but the problem I find and it’s becoming a really ugly/ worrying modern day phenomenat
is the desire on social media to give exaggerated polarised opinions, the more extreme and attention seeking the better.

So after the Hull defeat, there’s been so much abuse and negativity from supposed United fans aimed at the manager and the players.
Stupid comments like any team that can’t beat Hull wont be promoted and personal insults aimed at Wilder.
Not realising that these things happen, Leeds couldn’t beat Hull the other week, Sunderland couldn’t beat Plymouth, the worse team in the league.

Not sure if you get this in Sunderland from Newcastle fans but here in Sheffield, you have plenty of Wednesday fans pretending to Blades and Blades pretending to be Owls constantly trying to sabotage and derail the morale at their rival clubs. Also Sheffield United have a long history of bad luck and near misses, so there are quite a lot of older grumpy Blades who always predict doom and gloom, they find a negative angle on everything we do.

Critical thinking giving pros and cons about a subject finishing with a measured more middle ground conclusion is becoming old fashioned/ kind of boring these days.
YouTube shoulders some of the blame because in order to gain views (financial reward) it’s important that videos are sensationalised and exaggerated.

 

[MBH]

Agree but the problem I find and it’s becoming a really ugly/ worrying modern day phenomenat
is the desire on social media to give exaggerated polarised opinions, the more extreme and attention seeking the better.

So after the Hull defeat, there’s been so much abuse and negativity from supposed United fans aimed at the manager and the players.
Stupid comments like any team that can’t beat Hull wont be promoted and personal insults aimed at Wilder.
Not realising that these things happen, Leeds couldn’t beat Hull the other week, Sunderland couldn’t beat Plymouth, the worse team in the league.

Not sure if you get this in Sunderland from Newcastle fans but here in Sheffield, you have plenty of Wednesday fans pretending to Blades and Blades pretending to be Owls constantly trying to sabotage and derail the morale at their rival clubs. Also Sheffield United have a long history of bad luck and near misses, so there are quite a lot of older grumpy Blades who always predict doom and gloom, they find a negative angle on everything we do.

Critical thinking giving pros and cons about a subject finishing with a measured more middle ground conclusion is becoming old fashioned/ kind of boring these days.
YouTube shoulders some of the blame because in order to gain views (financial reward) it’s important that videos are sensationalised and exaggerated.

Yes social media is a curse and a blessing, but there are too many people going from one extreme to another.

As for Newcastle fans - they try and derail everything to do with Sunderland and even turn up at our matches, particularly away and take great delight in advertising the fact by wearing their black and white shirts. Go on any of our twitter feeds after a game and you will find copious mags belittling Sunderland. They have a bit of a complex about us, for some reason. It's bizarre behaviour. doesn't matter that they are miles better than us ATM there is something bordering on an inferiority complex for some reason and they hate it when anyone says anything good about SAFC.

It was good to beat them 6 times in a. row.....LOL.

 

[MBH]

it was a result that has been threatening to happen for a few weeks now hopefully weve got it out of our system mind although hull played really well did think the result flattered em a bit if our goal had stood which it should have i think we would have won the game i was impressed with sunderland at the lane thought we were a bit lucky to win that game

We played well that night but the missed penalty and Watson being taken off didn't help our cause. Watson was causing all sorts of problems and of course is currently injured - back hopefully in the next fortnight.

 

[dsr-burnley]

Yeah that's a fair way of looking at it.

Serious question, considering the dull style of football, do you think Burnley will stick with Parker if you fail to achieve promotion?

If we play this style of football, we will be scoring 9 goals in 29 matches, not conceding at that rate. If that's the way it goes, Parker will be gone before this time next year.

 

[dsr-burnley]

So you don't score a lot of goals because you don't want to.?

That's an oversimplification. What it amounts to is that Parker won't risk going forward at home to (say) Stoke because he is worried about letting a goal in. If Sheffield United were playing a team at the bottom, a team that had come to defend, and it was 0-0 with 20 minutes left, I suspect you would try and change things up a bit and try and win. Parker won't do that - he will carry on the same old way to make sure that we get at least a point.

 

[dsr-burnley]

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And that's before you mention the two 1-0 wins against Swansea and Plymouth, both won with penalties given by stupid defenders doing something unnecessary under no particular pressure.

There are too many arrows on (or rather off) that dartboard. It's not that we can't hit the target, it's that we don't try often enough.

 

[ancientblade]

And that's before you mention the two 1-0 wins against Swansea and Plymouth, both won with penalties given by stupid defenders doing something unnecessary under no particular pressure.

There are too many arrows on (or rather off) that dartboard. It's not that we can't hit the target, it's that we don't try often enough.

yes of the two teams last night leeds were the ones trying to win the game imo burnley looked content not to lose i dont think theres anything between the top 4 and it could go right to the wire

 

[blade too long]

Terrible game but predictable that it ended as a draw.

As for 'worst result behind us"...you think so? Honestly? I can tell you now as a Sunderland supporter that the draw with Plymouth will not be the end of our poor results as the jitters take hold - and neither will it be for you lads. There will be another one or two of the "Hull's at home" or "Plymouths at home" before the season is out.

We play Middlesbrough next Monday - tough game for us.

We go to Leeds shortly as well - a game that has Sunderland win written all over it. Does that mean I think we are streets ahead of Leeds? No. but does it mean that since 1967 and my first football match I can instinctively tell which games SAFC will do well in and those we will bladder? Pretty much.

We also play Luton at home next month - thats Luton who have one away win all season and they will arrive at our place with us unbeaten at home. Guess what happens next if we take them lightly?

17 games to go and the likes of Hull, Plymouth and Luton have suddenly cottoned on that if they dont start picking up shock points at places like SUFC and SAFC - they are going down.

No time for complacency - from fans or players/manager. It's about to get tougher.

sunderland are like us , realists , every game is between 2 teams trying to win , not as Leeds think , the opposition are below them and are swept away easily

all teams can carry a threat , Hull came and sheffield uniteded , sheffirld united , hard work keen closing and taking their chances

EVERY TEAM THATS EVER GONE UP HAVE LOST GAMES AND DRAWN PLENTY
17 games to go 51 points to play for

leeds have won 5 of 14 away games 1 in 3
blades have won 8 of 15 so won 1 in 2

9 away games leeds have dropped points in blades dropped points in 7

lets not panic

 

[blade too long]

latest prediction

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[Silent Blade]

latest prediction

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It's all bollocks

 

[Mario1889]

Burnley have a run of around 6/7 easy fixtures coming now, I don’t think they play a side in the top 10 for a couple of months, I’d have rather they lost last night.

 

[dsr-burnley]

latest prediction

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Burnley to have three 0-0 draws, fourteen 1-0 wins, and one 2-0 win. Apart from underrepresenting the 0-0 draws, they've sussed us out. I wonder who the 2-0 win was against?

 

[Ndiayewillalwaysloveyou]

Really need to get a result when we play Burnley. You don't get top 2 losing most games to sides around you.

Leeds H
Leeds A

Sunderland H
Sunderland A

Burnley H
Burnley A

 

[jono_t2000]

Really need to get a result when we play Burnley. You don't get top 2 losing most games to sides around you.

Leeds H
Leeds A

Sunderland H
Sunderland A

Burnley H
Burnley A

Burnley A is an easy draw if we want it.

Question is do we want the 3 points but risk getting 0 and then gaining 3 points on us.

Or are we happy for both teams to get 1 point.

Probably happy with the latter tbh.

 

[Houston_Blade]

Burnley A is an easy draw if we want it.

Question is do we want the 3 points but risk getting 0 and then gaining 3 points on us.

Or are we happy for both teams to get 1 point.

Probably happy with the latter tbh.

We just need to not lose to Burnley. I’m sure Wilder will set us up in a way to maximise their strengths though.

People bang on about the -2 being a potentially decisive factor this season. So far we’ve played Leeds twice and got 0 points, Sunderland twice and got 3 points, Burnley once and got 0 points.

We were lucky that Sunderland had one sent off and missed a penalty in the home game.

We’ve scored 3 goals in these 5 games and conceded 9.

The Burnley game is important psychologically as it could prove that we don’t always shit the bed against top teams.

 

[UddersBlade]

We are ‘flat track bullies’ so I expect that we will lose to Burnley - but still get to the 95 pts needed to go up - 8 wins 1 draw needed from 12 games. Be surprised if Burnley given their defensive approach beat that.

 

[Bell4]

Really need to get a result when we play Burnley. You don't get top 2 losing most games to sides around you.

Leeds H
Leeds A

Sunderland H
Sunderland A

Burnley H
Burnley A

We have