Sunderland 0 - 0 West BromSunderland relegation fears grow after West Bromwich Albion stalemate
If, as seems quite likely, Sunderland do end up in the Championship next month Sam Allardyce may wish to pin a small part of the blame on Ben Foster.
West Brom’s goalkeeper performed persistent wonders to earn Tony Pulis’s unambitious team a point and a clean sheet on a day when Sunderland and their manager were left aggrieved by the decision to disallow what would have been an 11th-hour winner from substitute Dame N’Doye and, earlier, to ignore a claim that Sandro had neutered the threat from Wahbi Khazri’s menacing delivery with his hand.
Much of the game was somewhat incoherent – and frankly, decidely second-tier standard – but one thing swiftly became crystal clear; Khazri was the most effective outfield player on view.
Alternating between the right and the left flank, Sunderland’sTunisia winger was invariably at the heart of the game’s more uplifting moments. There was the outrageous early dummy he sold James Chester, West Brom’s left back – another example of Tony Pulis’s strange fixation with playing centre-halves at full-back – before crossing to Jermain Defoe whose audacious backheel flick was easily held by Ben Foster.
Later Khazri crossed superbly only for the leaping Defoe to somehow, untypically, miss the ball completely and then saw a penalty appeal rejected after his collision with Sandro in the area.
If that decision represented good refereeing, Khazri’s subsequent through-pass to Cattermole arguably represented the highlight of the first half. Unfortunately for Allardyce, the recalled midfielder – captaining Sunderland in the absence of the benched John O’Shea – proved unequal to it, Foster all too easily batting his attempted chip away with an out-stretched glove.
Perhaps wary of the threat from wide presented by both Khazri and Fabio Borini, Pulis had ditched his own wingers, starting James McClean – (once of Sunderland) – on the bench, while omitting another Stadium of Light old boy, Stéphane Sessègnon, altogether.
Initially this rather narrow formation seemed to serve West Brom quite well but their purposeful beginning soon petered out and, by the interval, they had failed to frighten Vito Mannone. Indeed the nearest they came to scoring was the moment when Salomon Rondon’s inviting crossfield ball was miscontrolled by Darren Fletcher and a decent chance evaporated.
An incandescent Pulis believed his side should have had a penalty early in the second half. West Brom’s manager was left apoplectic, claiming Roger East failed to spot the trajectory of Craig Gardner’s free-kick being adjusted by a suspected handball but such emotional energy might have been better invested complaining about his own side’s growing limitations.
West Brom were being forced ever deeper as Sunderland piled on the pressure and twice, in particular, they had Foster to thank for rescuing them. When Jan Kirchhoff made a rare advance from his deep sitting midfield role and simply steamrolled his way through a couple of challenges before shooting the visiting goalkeeper bravely diverted the danger by taking the full force of the ball in his face.
Shortly afterwards Foster stretched to the limit to scramble Borini’s swerving 20-yard shot to safety.
If Khazri’s handball penalty claim against Sandro after the ball struck the midfielder’s arm was a cause of contention, Borini will have been disappointed to volley DeAndre Yedlin’s stellar cross wide.
Realising something needed to change Pulis replaced Gardner with McClean whose was greeting by resounding booing from his less than adoring former public. Next in line to be hooked was the thoroughly underwhelming Saido Berahino with West Brom’s manager sending 16-year-old debutant Jonathan Leko on in the striker’s stead.
It was a big moment for Leko but Foster remained the afternoon’s central figure doing well to keep another Borini curler out and then saving smartly from Defoe with a leg after Yann M’Vila’s pass had undone Pulis’s backline.
Then, right at the death, Dame N’Doye – on for Khazri – hooked the ball home from close range and Sunderland seemed to have won it – only for the striker’s effort to be ruled out for offside.
Guardian