OTD: SEBASTIAN LARSSON DEBUT

On this day in 2011, Seb Larsson scored on his debut to bring us a point home from Liverpool away.

Seb started his professional career at Arsenal at the age of 16, signing a four year contract. He made his Premier League debut in February 2006. Weirdly, he was mainly played as a defender under Arsene Wenger. Whilst at Arsenal he went on loan to the Championship with Birmingham City, played further up the pitch with success, and signed for them permanently the season after.

After a four year stint with Birmingham he came to Wearside. He joined under the coach he was with previously, Steve Bruce. We signed him on a free after his contract was up and he’s got to be in the conversation for one of our best free signings. A truly underrated player.

His career with us got off to an excellent start. Lining up in that excellent light blue Tombola away top, we headed into the season with great optimism. 1-0 down at Anfield on the opening day, heading towards the hour mark, the ball came into the box from the right, Ahmed Elmohamady crossed deep and Larsson finished cleverly, with a scissor kick to equalise. A superb goal.

One thing he will always be remembered for is his free-kick taking ability. It was second to none. When he first arrived he had scored free-kicks that led to wins against Stoke City and Arsenal. After the Arsenal game his old boss Wenger came out and said: “maybe the best in the league as a free-kick taker.”

Not only was his free-kick taking superb, his technical ability was clear to see. Hence he was our corner taker for the duration of his time at the club, he even took the wide and deep free-kicks. Basically, if the ball wasn’t moving Seb was standing over it.

I think the amount of set pieces we actually had tainted some people’s opinion, because not every delivery is going to be a 10/10 but the stats don’t lie, he was one of the best at the time.

It might not have been to the liking of some of those at the Stadium Of Light, but you could tell most times he had a fire lit inside him. His energy was high and so was his passion but sometimes that passion boiled over into an anger, somewhat likened to Lee Cattermole, getting in players and refs faces if something didn’t go his way. His goal against Manchester United greatly helped us avoid relegation and most of his goals were similarly well taken. Seb was a great servant to the club.

His time on Wearside ended at the same time as our Premier League days did, as we finished 20th in the 2016/17, Seb’s contract was up. Larsson followed us into the Championship as he went to Hull City.

One season in the Championship later and he moved back home to Sweden in order to play for AIK where he managed to win the league.

Internationally Seb had quite the time. Sweden weren’t expected to win anything or necessarily even make it out of their groups in most tournaments but sometimes they could cause an upset. In the 2012 Euros they did just that. Naturally, they didn’t make it out of their group but they did beat France 2-0 with Larsson grabbing a goal. Seb retired from international football after captaining his country in the 2020 Euros, when they made it out of their group but got knocked out by Ukraine in the round of 16. It was crazy to see him still captaining his country after such a long time in the game, he seems to have been around forever.

Larsson retired in Sweden in 2022 and ended his career having played more games for Sunderland AFC than any other football club. In 2024, he was appointed the assistant manager of the Sweden national team.