Sunderland 0 - West Bromwich Albion 0

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Brendan Clegg:

That was a great point all things considered. Bartley on one leg in at the last minute and we held on for 0-0.

I thought Sunderland had a right go and dominated us for spells.

I thought we absolutely fought for everything and showed that we wouldn’t roll over in adversity.

I think we learned again that there is absolutely nothing in this league to be afraid of and, even if it’s via the playoffs, we will likely not have a better chance to get out of it in the next 3-4 years.

It was more hard-working and never give in than a good performance. Although Sunderland were better and we benefited from a very observant Lino call as well as some great last-ditch defending, we did create the two best chances in open play - the first for Maja who had gobbled those up this season but miscued, the second for Dobbin who had a fair bit to do from a cut back but hit a weak effort that was probably going wide anyway.

On the subs… I guess Racic was necessary, I’d probably have moved Grant left and got Swift or Cole on instead of Dobbin just to give us a bit more experience/reliability.

Were it not for our run of draws and the pressure growing, you’d say this was a very good Championship Tuesday night winter away result.

• Palmer - 6 not that much to do
• Holgate - 7 one lapse when he tried to let the ball roll out and it wasn’t happening. Otherwise decent
• Bartley - 7 brilliant half, hope he makes the weekend
• Heggem - 8 outstanding
• Styles - 7 another good showing, neat, aggressive
• Fellows - 6 A lot of defending but made 2 great chances
• Molumby - 6 didn’t stop running or smashing into people
• Mowatt - 6 Outnumbered in there but also put a big shift
• MJ - 4 Just nowhere near it and so weak. Needs to stay high and attack people, not drop in behind the left back
• Maja - 6 So many great deft touches and looked after it.
• Grant - 7 He was a hyena, cowardly scavenging a career based on the odd goal and individual numbers… he’s become a bloody lion, leading from the front, running himself stupid, battling for everything and making things happen through determination. I can’t quite believe it but huge credit to him.

• Racic - 6 Did enough, kept it safe
• Dobbin - 4 The odd fast feet moment but can’t pass it 5 yards… gave it away so much
• Swift - 6 Moved it okay
• Cole - No time at all but did win a free kick and ran about a bit.

Kev Buckley:

This match saw the best away side visiting the 3rd best home side, and that pretty much sums it up: but here's some thoughts by way of a report for the BOING website anyway!

The BeIn commentary team must have been handed a team-sheet on which Diakite was taking the place of the suspended Furlong at right back, but by the time the game kicked off, it was Holgate in the full-back role, with Bartley, originally slated to be ready for the weekend, pressed into service alongside Heggem.

Neither side seemed to be pressing or creating much, although the occasional display of intent to win the game did occur, with Fellows, making the first of his many showings as a second right-back in the fifth minute, in conceding a corner, whilst Palmer had to save a deflected shot in the eighth.

Fellows got to show his attacking skills in the thirteenth, with a great run and pull back that set up Maja just to the right of the spot but Maja fell over and the resultant shot, such as it was, went wide.

We have all seen games where whichever two of Molumby, Racic and Mowatt have started simply wall-pass it back to the backline, effectively turning the back four into a back six, but here, with Fellows doubling up at right-back, it had shades of a back seven, with the end result, of all our "inviting Sunderland on" being the conceding of possession via a long ball as we finally ran out of keep-ball passing options. Having said that, Sunderland didn't really look as they knew how to create chances when up against a back seven, so maybe the plan was working.

Wasn't clear why Bartley was brought off at half-time - guesses would have been "brought back too soon" or "saving him for the weekend" or something else entirely - but he was: Racic coming on to play in the back line.

Similar questions for the slightly more like-for-like half-time swap of Dobbin for Johnston - like-for-like in that they both played on the left wing and Johnston has been about as effective as Dobbin since his return to the club. We really need him to get back his last-season's form: it can't just be the tactics?

By the hour mark, Palmer was making the most of the spare balls on cones so as to waste time, by rejecting the one in his hands and trotting over to the nearest cone to acquire a different one with which to restart the game from goal-kicks. It really had sunk that low.

Either side of seventy, Sunderland had two good chances: a goal- bound shot from the box that was blocked by a sliding Albion defender, and a well worked move that saw a player free, at our left post edge, shooting just wide of our right post.

Maja for Swift, with about ten to go, left Grant with the number nine role all to himself, although Cole replaced him with just one to go: yet another substitution that seemed to be made so as to have made it, rather than in an expectation of it achieving anything.

In between those two substitutions, Dobbin had a chance to hit the target from the edge of the box but didn't, although the covering defender clearly thought it might have and so conceded a corner that came to nothing.

With Middlesborough losing, Albion's latest bore draw point somehow sees us still in touch with them, at the bottom of the top six, on goal difference, although, if Blackburn, in eighth, win the game in hand they have on sixth and seventh, we'll be down to eighth.

Yes, we had to juggle things around at the back, and yes, it's a point taken off a top-six side, but I'm not sure that that really excuses the inability to really create all that much, let alone enough to allow an attack as "potent" as ours to miss the ones the "goals for" stats suggests they are going to.

Given that Maja has so little being created for him, by the nine outfield players behind him, Fellows really is the only player in the whole matchday squad - so subs included - who looks likely to recreate the kind of chances we were creating, and scoring, last season, and, in games like this, where he's been asked to spend a lot of the game doubling at full-back, "Albion nil" may well be the best we can hope for: and that's a worry, not least, as Brendan notes, a slightly depleted Sunderland weren't all that good on the night either.