Benji Kimpioka saved Sunderland’s blushes today, when he netted his eighth pre-season goal (including u23s) which earned us a draw against Hartlepool United. Jack Ross had this to say afterwards: “It was obviously very warm, so the conditions were tough to play in,” he said. “Fitness wise we were good, and I said after the game in midweek there were a lot of things to improve on and I thought we did that in certain aspects we did that today. By and large I thought we were good and we dominated the vast majority of the game. The goal we conceded was disappointing but there were a lot of things that were good today and that gives us another platform to build on.”
Sunderland: McLaughlin (Stryjek 65), Matthews, Flanagan (Taylor 79), Hume, Love, Cattermole (Robson 65), Honeyman (Molyneux 79), McGeouch (Mumba 72), Gooch (Nelson 79), McManaman (Kimpioka 79), Maja (Maguire 65).
Afterwards, Jack Ross admitted that we are in for Bradford City striker Charlie Wyke. Ross said: “He’s a player I knew about before I came to England and I think when you see the areas that we need to strengthen and the type we need to strengthen that area, he’s a player that I like. But he is contracted to another club so we will see how that progresses over the coming days. At the moment, we need to get a couple out of the way before any come in. But in terms of my identification of targets and desire to get them in, that’s been there and I’ve passed it on to others to get them in. Hopefully that will be the case over the coming days because we have another game on Tuesday and we are asking some boys to play quite a lot of games before the season starts! Hopefully we will have more numbers in over the course of the next week to 10 days. I see my job as getting the best out of what I have at my disposal. It’s very easy to hide behind excuses, but I have to concentrate on getting the best out of what I have inherited. We are very low on numbers in certain areas of the pitch but there is no point complaining about it, I just have to get on with it. Ideally, we would like to have more in, and hopefully that will be the case ahead of these pre-season games, but I think we said even before pre-season started that we were going to be chasing our tail a little bit because of all the circumstances that have been around the club in recent years. All I can do is try to improve the ones we’ve got individually and as a team, and if we do that we will be the best we can be and we’ll see where it takes us.”
There was also some interesting communication between Stewart Donald and fans on twitter after the match, loving the fan interaction…
Here’s a selection:
We can all see we need 6 or 7 new players that are going be quality. We are on it just give us 1 week or 2 max. We have bids out there and yes we r slightly behind the curve but there has been much to do and we know we need some quality additions. Just a little more patience
I have less patience with myself than you then. We can all see what is needed - it was always going to be like this at the start of ore season but it’s where we end pre-season that matters. I know what we need and more importantly Jack does!
You are just concerned like everyone else. Not a dickhead at all - you just want the best for the club. I understand that - no issue at all. I will do what I said. Biggest budget. A big enough transfer kitty and wronguns gone. I just need the transfer window to play out.
