PREMIER LEAGUE
Venue: Stadium of Light Date: Sunday, 3 May Kick-off: 1500 BST
Coverage: Full commentary on BBC Newcastle, BBC Radio Merseyside 95.8 FM, 1485 AM, and DAB, Score updates on Final Score, BBC Sport website and BBC Radio 5 Live; live text commentary on BBC Sport website; Highlights on Match of the Day.

Sunderland (from): Fulop, Bardsley, Ferdinand, Davenport, Collins, Edwards, Richardson, Tainio, Reid, Cisse, Jones, Malbranque, Whitehead, Leadbitter, Healy, Ben-Haim, Colback, Colgan.

Everton (from): Howard, Hibbert, Lescott, Baines, Osman, Neville, Fellaini, Vaughan, Pienaar, Cahill, Saha, Jo, Rodwell, Nash, Yobo, Castillo, Jacobsen, Gosling, Vaughan.

From the Manager
(courtesy of SAFC.com)

Sunderland manager Ricky Sbragia:
“We need to get points on the board and we cannot rely on other teams.

“The team were very quiet after our loss against West Brom but we have said that kind of display will never happen again.

“We have trained well in the latter part of this week and hope we can carry that into the game.

“But we know Everton are a good team and that they are well drilled and difficult to beat. We were well beaten by them at Goodison Park earlier this season and we have to try and reverse that result.”

The lads need to stop Everton from doing the double over them. No more points lost folks, simple as that.

But will the team that wants to win show up? Probably not, Everton is way too good of a club to lose to us.

I hate, having to play Man U at anytime of the year, and this close to the end when they put their feet to the peddle for the title. I really, really want to stay up. I mean come on, the Championship, that’s a boring league. Do I see us winning here? No. But I want a game like the last match was. Hard fought, and with the possibility of a Black Cat win. Plus I wouldn’t mind seeing one of the Man U guys getting thrown out.

Teams For Saturday

Sunderland (from): Fulop, Gordon, Bardsley, Ferdinand, Ben-Haim, Collins, Nosworthy, Davenport, McShane, Edwards, Malbranque, Whitehead, Leadbitter, Richardson, Reid, Tainio, Murphy, Jones, Cisse.

Man Utd (from): Van der Sar, Foster, Kuszczak, O’Shea, Neville, Vidic, Evans, Evra, Eckersley, Ronaldo, Nani, Fletcher, Gibson, Carrick, Scholes, Giggs, Park, Rooney, Tevez, Welbeck, Macheda.

Words from Sunderland
Sunderland goalkeeper Craig Gordon on avoiding relegation:
“There’s no hiding from the situation we are in . You have to go out there and you have to fight.

“Sometimes it won’t be pretty, but that’s the situation we are in and we have to do that between now and the end of the season.

“If we can do that, I am sure we will be fine.”

Sunderland (from): Fulop, Gordon, Bardsley, McCartney, Ferdinand, Collins, McShane, Davenport, Ben Haim, Whitehead, Malbranque, Leadbitter, Tainio, Richardson, Edwards, Yorke, Reid, Cisse, Jones, Murphy, Healy.

Well with that being all said and done, I want us to win. There’s nothing better than endangering their title chances completely. I hate Liverpool with a passion (take that History FC). and I want us to win by alot. However, do I see us winning? Not really, I still think we are a player away from being a top 10 team.

Score Prediction? 2-1 Liverpool. Jones gets our only.

Sunderland (from): Gordon, Fulop, Colgan, Bardsley, Ferdinand, Collins, Kay, Hartley, McCartney, Edwards, Malbranque, Whitehead, Richardson, Leadbitter, Yorke, Tainio, Reid, Murphy, Healy, Cisse, Jones.

Just when you think you’ve seen the Rovers enough, we play them again. I wish for once, we’d play another team, I mean come on.

Some more Match facts from BBC Sport:

HEAD to HEAD

All competitions

This is the fifth time these clubs will have met this season. Prior to this tie; Blackburn won 1-2 at the Stadium of Light in the fourth round of the Carling Cup, but Sunderland had the better of the exchanges in the league, winning 1-2 at Ewood Park and drawing 0-0 on their own patch.

FA Cup

This is the sixth time Sunderland and Blackburn have been drawn together in the competition. Blackburn have progressed in all five of the previous occasions.

So what’s my fearless prediction? Well, I hope that the Black Cats win 1-0, with Cisse getting a late goal.

Lemme preface this blog by saying, I hate Newcastle. Any club that employs Joey Barton isn’t cool in my book. He should just go away. But enough with the editorial.

I liked the BBC SPORT Preview so I copied it here:

Venue: St James’ Park Date: Sunday, 1 February Kick-off: 1330 GMT
Coverage: Live on Sky Sports 1. Live commentary on BBC Radio 5 Live, text commentary on BBC Sport website & highlights on Match of the Day

Newcastle will give a debut to Kevin Nolan, but Charles N’Zogbia and keeper Shay Given will not feature.

Michael Owen (ankle) and Danny Guthrie (hamstring) have been added to the Magpies’ injury list.

Sunderland could be without midfielder Teemu Tainio, who picked up a knee injury in Tuesday’s win against Fulham.

Paul McShane is out with a hamstring problem but George McCartney (calf) should be fit and Kieran Richardson has recovered from his ankle injury.

Newcastle (from): Harper, Forster, Krul, Enrique, Bassong, Coloccini, Taylor, Edgar, Duff, Gutierrez, Nolan, Lovenkrands, Geremi, Donaldson, Donninger, Godsmark, Xisco, Carroll, LuaLua, Ranger.

Sunderland (from): Fulop, Gordon, Colgan, Bardsley, McCartney, Ferdinand, Collins, Whitehead, Malbranque, Leadbitter, Tainio, Richardson, Edwards, Yorke, Reid, Cisse, Jones, Murphy, Healy, Chopra.

Do I expect a loss? HELL NO. But I do expect like a lot of our matches, that this will be a close one, and could get even better if Ricky signs a defender tonight. (oh and drops McShit back to the Unibond leagues. Or better yet, send him to America and to the NPSL. I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t be ripping on footballers, but he’s a professional and can take it.

Anyway, sorry for the digression. I think the score will be 1-0 Black Cats, with Cisse getting a goal in the second half, just after the 70th minute.

Some notes from the website:

General news:
• Sunderland are 15th in the Barclays Premier League after their 3-0 defeat at Everton.
• The Black Cats have 22 points – four ahead of bottom clubs Blackburn and West Brom, and two more than 17th-placed Middlesbrough – and are just four points behind Fulham who are ninth in the league.
• Away from home, Sunderland have won three games (Tottenham, Blackburn and Hull), drawn two (Wigan and Fulham) and lost five (Aston Villa, Stoke, Chelsea, Man United and Everton), scoring 10 goals and conceding 16.
• League form guide: L L W W D L
• Following Blackburn’s win over Blyth on Monday night, Sunderland will play Rovers for a fourth time this season, in the fourth round of the FA Cup sponsored by E.ON, on Saturday January 24 (kick-off 3pm).
• Steed Malbranque, Phil Bardsley, Teemu Tainio and Dean Whitehead are all on four yellow cards and will get a one-game ban if they reach five before the end of February.

(thanks to the website for all the information and the pictures).

What do I think will happen? We’ll win, because Boro can’t score of defend. We’ll win 3-0, two Kenwyne Jones, one Steed!

Free Blog Poll

Any Borro fans out there want to comment? Feel free to leave any smack talk too. And if you are a Black Cat, leave me your hatred for Borro.

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For some, this could be a good way to work out the kinks and get us another win (and winning money).

General news:
• Sunderland are currently 15th in the Barclays Premier League, following their 3-0 defeat at Everton on Sunday.
• They’re just a point away from Bolton, who are 11th in the league on 23 points.
• Sunderland have won three games at home this season (Middlesbrough, Newcastle and West Brom), drawn two (Arsenal and Blackburn) and lost five (Liverpool, Man City, Portsmouth, West Ham and Bolton).
• League form guide: L L W W D L

Match officials:
• The referee on Saturday is Steve Bennett from Kent, who took charge of Sunderland’s 2-1 defeat at home to Portsmouth earlier this season. Mr Bennett has so far issued 70 yellow cards and one red card in 16 games so far this season.
• His assistants are Glenn Turner and Jeremy Simpson, and the fourth official is Clive Oliver.

(taken from Sunderland’s amazing website)

What do I think is going to happen during the game? Well, I hope that the Blackcats will win pretty soundly, and make Bolton useless again.

Prediction?

Sunderland 3-1.

Jones, Cisse, Steed!