CUP CONCERNS

On Tuesday night, Sunderland were dumped out of the Carabao Cup by Huddersfield Town. A second string Sunderland side drew 1-1 with the League One team before losing 6-5 on penalties. To many fans, this was just another meaningless game in a cup we had no chance of winning but other fans started to ask questions.

Not only did our “B team”, which fielded some first team regulars from last season like Enzo Le Fee, Wilson Isidor and Patrick Roberts, as well as new signings Nordi Mukiele, Arthur Masuaku and Marc Guiu lose to a team who play two levels below us and didn’t have their strongest side out either, but it was another game in a streak where we have been knocked out in the first round of a cup competition.

Some fans wondered when we last won a game in a cup competition. You have to go back to January 2023 for the answer, when Sunderland won 2-1 away at Shrewsbury Town in the 3rd round of the FA Cup. That is Sunderland’s only win in our last 11 cup games. Before that, you have to go back to October 2021 when a League One Sunderland side drew 0-0 with Queens Park Rangers before knocking out the Championship outfit after a 3-1 penalty shootout win at Loftus Road.

Following Sunderland’s relegation from the Premier League in 2017, the overall feeling within the club and the fanbase was that the league should be the main priority and the cups would have to take a step back. This mindset particularly heightened following our relegation to League One in 2018, where promotion from the 3rd tier was crucial.

From 2017 to the present day, Sunderland have played 31 games in both the League Cup and the FA Cup. Of those 31 games, Sunderland only came out the winner 11 times. Seven of those 11 wins came in our only notable cup runs in the last eight years, where we reached the last 16 of the Carabao Cup in the 2019/20 season and went one better by reaching the quarter-final of the same competition in the 2021/22 season. Other than these runs, our only other wins in the Carabao Cup in this time period came in the 2017/18 season. We’ve been knocked out of the first round of this tournament in six of the last nine seasons.

In this time period, Sunderland have also failed to make it further than the 4th round of the FA Cup, when we were beaten 3-2 by Fulham in a 4th round replay in the 2022/23 season. Sunderland have been knocked out in the first round we’ve entered in the FA Cup in eight of the last ten seasons. You have to go back to 2014/15 for the last time Sunderland made it to the 5th round.

Sunderland have lost in 17 of the last 31 cup games, 12 of those defeats coming against sides who were either in the same league as us or below at the time. Those 12 defeats came against Middlesbrough, Walsall, Oxford United, Gillingham, Hull City, Mansfield Town twice, Sheffield Wednesday, Crewe Alexandra, Preston North End, Stoke City and Huddersfield Town. This further adds to the current belief at the club where the cups simply don’t matter and we don’t necessarily try our hardest to win these games.

The attendances at these home fixtures also add to the lack of care from the fanbase. Other than a sold out crowd against local rivals Newcastle United, we’ve only had two cup games with an attendance above 20,000. 30,000 fans attended that FA Cup replay against Fulham in 2023, who were Premier League opposition while we were still in the Championship and 22,000 fans attended the Huddersfield match a few nights ago, which was our first cup game as a Premier League side in eight years.

Fans on social media criticised the club for the process of selling tickets for Huddersfield. The club were only releasing a few blocks at a time, starting in the east stand and eventually working their way around to the south west side of the Jimmy Montgomery Stand. Some fans felt that with the buzz of being back in the Premier League still being fresh and the added quality that our 2nd string side now had, the club should’ve made the entire lower bowl available from the start so fans could choose where they wanted to sit rather than being restricted to whatever block was available at the time.

Perhaps this could’ve driven a higher attendance but with attendances being so low in previous home cup games, you can see why the club used the strategy of releasing certain blocks at the time. However, since they were selling out quite quickly, you could argue that the club should’ve taken the plunge and opened more areas of the stadium sooner.

Low attendances in home cup games aren’t just a recent trend however. Going back to the 2010/11 season, when we were a stable, mid-table Premier League team, Sunderland have only had a further five cup home games with an attendance of 30,000 or higher. Two of those were against Middlesbrough, another was against Leeds, and the last two were in the latter stages of the cups. Speaking of which, during our run to the League Cup final in the 2013/14 season, where every game was at home except the 2nd leg of the semi-final, the highest attendance we had was 31,000 for the semi-final 1st leg against Manchester United. 31,000 for a cup semi-final. The average attendance for Sunderland’s run to the final that year was less than 21,000.

For a club who has won eight major trophies in its history, two of those being the FA Cup, we just don’t seem to care about these competitions anymore. Maybe it’s because we’ve only reached a major cup final three times since our last win in 1973. Maybe it’s because of our awful record at Wembley which has only started to turn around in the last few years.

The prize money in the game could also be a reason why. As of the 2024/25 season, the winners of the FA Cup receive £2 million and the League Cup winners only receive £100,000. In contrast, Sunderland received around £200 million for winning the Championship play-offs last season so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that teams don’t really take the cups seriously anymore.

Sunderland are currently on a streak of five first round exits in cup competitions and most wouldn’t be shocked at a 6th in the FA Cup in January. Will we see Sunderland go on a cup run in the coming years? What will it take for us to start taking the cups seriously again? When will we next win a cup game? Questions that unfortunately have a strong possibility of not being answered for a few years.