Sunderland and Liverpool: The Beach Bowl
There’s a lot of Irish interest in Saturday’s lunchtime kick-off at the Stadium of Light that extends way beyond the Roy Keanes, Martin O’Neills, Niall Quinns and the oh so many other legends of this country that have dipped their toes in either pond.
But when the pair clash tomorrow, there’ll be much more riding on the result than just a bit of local pride (across the sea in Ireland).
Liverpool are at a crossroads right now. Seven points off the top four, seven points off Villa – that paints perfectly the purgatory between heaven and rotten hell that Brendan Rodgers finds his team in at the moment and a loss to the Mackems in the north east would see just two results separate the Merseysiders with Sunderland.
We’ve got the fever for another clash between the two and, to celebrate the vested Irish interest in the fixture, we’ve cobbled together the greatest – allegedly – combined team between players who have crossed the Sunderland-Liverpool divide.
And we’ve even gone for a fashionable 3-5-2 to line them out.
Simon Mignolet
How apt that a formation title doesn’t include the goalkeeper position because, with Mignolet between the sticks, it wouldn’t change a thing. We’re expecting the Belgian to crawl back to Gus Poyet’s doorstep any time now only to find the Sunderland boss shacked up with Costel Pantilimon.
Barry Venison
England might’ve underused the defender but Sunderland and Liverpool found 11 years worth of use out of him. Last seen on Mike Bassett: England Manager.
Phil Babb
This is where the team gets good (you know, before it drops off dramatically again). The combined Sunderland and Liverpool legends might not be the most convincing bunch of fellas but very little will get past Babbsy at the heart of our defence.
Sebastian Coates
Brendan Rodgers offloading the Uruguayan to Sunderland was the best bit of business he’s done at Liverpool. It might only be a loan deal but Mackems fans already feel cheated. 14 Premier League appearances in four seasons so far but Coates completes our backline. Unfortunately.
Jason McAteer
We have Macca patrolling the right flank like he did in a more defensive role towards the end of his career with Sunderland. McAteer is the enforcer of the team. Will make things happen on the wing and he’ll be a valuable defensive boost against the bigger sides.
Jordan Henderson
“Did I ever catch up with you about that Lourdes thing? It was looking a wee bit dodgy there for a while.” Jordan Henderson says the money was just resting in his account and now he could even be given a Golden Cleric for being a top priest footballer. His move from Sunderland to Liverpool looked to have initially ruined him but he could captain our team the way he’s going.
Don Hutchinson
Big Don played for both teams but, you know, who didn’t he play for? He’s currently a pundit with PLTV (for now) and offering some dodgy opinions.
Just think,who ever is in charge of signings at liverpool. What a bad decision not getting Sanchez and Bony!! Be top of Lge with those two⚽️
— Don Hutchison (@donhutch4) January 9, 2015
Alan Kennedy
Five-time league winner Alan Kennedy isn’t exactly freed from the shackles of defending in this side, even though we need that bit of quality in the engine room. The Sunderland-born player is deployed on the left with a license to get forward and use that wise head of his but, more importantly, to get back and keep an eye on Sebastian bloody Coates.
Bolo Zenden
Now we’re talking. Where Kennedy will have to paper over the cracks, the only requirement of Zenden is to go and make things happen. There’s no obligation on the Dutch player to track back or even work hard, just make some magic when we have the ball.
El Hadji Diouf
Definitely an acquired taste but we just couldn’t overlook his 0.04 league goals a game in the Premier League with Sunderland and Liverpool.
Djibril Cissé
Well, he’s fast. Poor Cissé’s career just got progressively worse after tearing it up with Auxerre, winning a Champions League in his first campaign with Liverpool until he wound up doing the rounds in Qatar, Russia and Corsica. In fairness though, he’s proved he can find the net and, let’s face it, if we’re waiting on Diouf, we’ll be waiting a bloody long time.
