Matchday Musings: Our first taste of defeat... and it doesn't taste very nice at all

09/15/2024 01:00 AM

Ah wey, it wasn't going to last forever... but that doesn't mean I don't feel gutted about Sunderland's first loss of the season.

Fair play to Plymouth — they more than deserved their win, and I honestly never saw a performance like that coming from them against us.

They were bullish, determined, and in truth... they took advantage of our shortcomings.

Those, ironically, have all become traits of this Sunderland team so far this season, yet we were second best and punished for our mistakes — I have no complaints about us losing the game as there was really only one team in that second half who ever looked like winning it.

I don't want to be too harsh on the Sunderland players though, because in some respects I get it. I wrote earlier in the week about how I felt the international break was awful timing for us, and that seemed to be the case as we looked like a group who had spent a little bit of time apart over the last few weeks.

Maybe the travelling all over the place caused enough disruption to have had a knock on effect on the performance - who knows. It wasn't good enough and we'll just have to take it on the chin and crack on.

The game started with Sunderland controlling the majority of the ball, yet there was something missing from our performance that I couldn't quite put my finger on... yet we persevered and got a goal through a penalty, converted by Patrick Roberts after Bali Mumba brought down Chris Rigg in the box.

Happy days, though — we'd been the better side. We also hit the bar, and had it not been for a superb block Romain Mundle would have made it two with his excellent shot which looked destined for the bottom corner. I don't think we were great by any stretch, but we'd certainly had the better chances and deserved to be in the lead.

Then came the half time break, and I was wondering how Plymouth would approach it. They'd let us have the majority of the ball in the first half and naturally you'd expect them to come at us more in the second, which they did. Unfortunately though, we didn't look like we were prepared for it and some tired legs ultimately cost us.

Nine minutes after the break came the Plymouth equaliser, and it was lucky as owt but we only had ourselves to blame really as the ball ricocheted off Dan Ballard and into the net. Another own goal.

This gave Wayne Rooney's side the impetus they needed to really kick on, and they came after us more and more, with the home crowd in full voice and undoubtedly playing a part in ensuring they never lost their momentum.

Their second goal once again came thanks to Dan Ballard, who missed a clearance and fudged the ball into a dangerous area before taking out his man and gifting Plymouth a chance to take the lead — one duly taken by substitute Ryan Hardie, who sent Anthony Patterson the wrong way. I love big Dan, but he had a real off day and his two errors were compounded by the end of the game when he was carried off the pitch injured and then was seen leaving the ground on crutches. Thank god we signed Chris Mepham.

For the remainder of the half it was end to end, and Plymouth didn't seem content with having the lead. Instead of sitting back they tried to come at us even more, which almost paid off before we got ourselves level with just three minutes to go.

Romaine Mundle had been the pantomime villain all afternoon having pissed off the home crowd after getting himself into a bit of argie bargie on more than one occasion, but he managed to silence them — albeit temporarily — by scoring his third goal in three games, another cracking strike from a tight angle, cutting inside and lashing his shot into the far bottom corner of Daniel Grimshaw's goal. 2-2, and game on.

Both sides continued to go for it, and perhaps our perseverance cost us when Plymouth nabbed the eventual winner in the third minute of stoppage time — and it was another howler from a Sunderland player that gifted them it, this time Anthony Patterson, who really should have done much better with his initial save instead of rebounding the ball into the path of goalscorer Joe Edwards.

There was another late penalty shout for Sunderland that I'd need to see back again, but I think we had half a shout for it and it possibly could and should have been awarded... but it wasn't to be, and for the first time in the Championship this season we tasted defeat.

I don't like the taste of defeat. It tastes like shit. I'd really prefer that we don't taste it all that much more this season, thank you very much.

All in all I think whilst we had our moments in the game, this was by far our worst performance of the season so far and too many individual errors cost us. Players we can usually depend upon gifted all three of the goals to Plymouth, and to their credit they took their chances and deserved their win in the end.

Once I've had a few days to stew on this I think I'll take a relatively objective view on the result and consider that still being top of the league having won four from our first five is a cracking position to be in... but right now, I'm just pissed off that we missed what felt like a simple opportunity to extend our winning run and prove that your manager winning the Manager of the Month award is anything but a curse.

Ho hum. We have to put it behind us, because the games don't get any easier, and there's the small matter of the Wear-Tees derby to focus on next weekend.

We still love you all very much, Lads, but let's move on from that quickly.