Post by caspday on Oct 23, 2012 19:58:21 GMT -5
Sunderland 1 Newcastle United 1: So much hatred, so much bile, so much police Matthew Stafford Jerseypreparation, and yet ultimately AB1024zyh it was all decided by one player leaving the pitch before he had planned.Much will be made of the dismissal of Cheick Tioté so early in a derby that never matched its build up. The player himself deserves a significant apportionment of blame for that. His wild lunge, when barely a quarter of the contest had passed, was reckless, dangerous and the injury to Steven Fletcher could have been more severe. There was surprise at the red card but not fury, as his manager Alan Pardew, in his acceptance afterwards, was testimony to.
Referee Martin Atkinson at times proved inconsistent for such a tribal Calvin Johnson Jerseycollision, but the call was correct and it dictated that Newcastle could not play the expansive game which, on yesterday's showing, would have been too much for their hosts. It certainly had been before he went off.Tioté's removal was not, however, why Sunderland scrambled a fortuitous point. It was because a player who had stood out, left the field with cramp five minutes before it was scored.Fabricio Coloccini had played 61 minutes of football in the previous seven weeks before he led his side out yesterday.
That made what followed even more remarkable. Coloccini was Ndamukong Suh Jerseyuntouchable. He dominated Fletcher to the point where the Scot, who has been the only Sunderland player to score in the Premier League this season, was barely relevant.Coloccini marshalled and outmanoeuvred everything the numerically superior Sunderland could muster. Pardew was gushing in his praise afterwards for his captain, and with good reason. There was a comparison to Bobby Moore. Coloccini was that good.From the 25th minute, when Tioté was dismissed.
Sunderland did not directly test goalkeeper Tim Krul, who was also Jahvid Best Jerseyreturning after a period of inactivity (he had missed seven games with an elbow injury), with a shot.Instead, there was only a brief intake of breath from the travelling Newcastle support, housed in the upper tier of the North Stand for the first time, when Krul fumbled a cross from James McClean in front of them. Even then the Newcastle keeper collected at the second attempt, and he did so with support from his defenders.
The decision to partner Coloccini with Mike Williamson had raised James Bryant Jerseyeyebrows, but the latter too was colossal at the heart of the Newcastle defence. There were key elements to this game and they boiled down to the quality Pardew had spoken of beforehand, and the issue that Steven Taylor had screamed in Saturday's papers.Martin O'Neill admitted afterwards that his players were annoyed when they read they would not make the Newcastle starting XI, (nor did Taylor as it turned out), but there was a collective failure to respond to the assertion when the greatest opportunity.
the match itself, was presented to them. If Taylor's News From:newlionsjerseys.comcrass argument was meant to focus on the gap in ability between the two sides, then yesterday's game suggested he was ultimately correct. He will have a long time to reflect on whether his timing was right, or whether he should have spoken about such an inflammable topic.However, Sunderland's supporters, understandably outraged, took hatred to a new level with the song that rang around the Stadium of Light throughout the game.