They will always have Stamford Bridge. If, as looks likely, Sunderland’s seven-year spell in the Premier League ends next month, they will always have the memories of the greatest result of a period in which they have spent too much and achieved too little. They can think back to the 2010 day when they inflicted Chelsea’s heaviest home defeat of the Roman Abramovich era.
What a day it was, too. Nedum Onuoha, the right-back, seemed as surprised as anyone when he strolled through the Chelsea defence to score a memorable solo goal. The forwards Asamoah Gyan, now at Al Ain, and Danny Welbeck made the final score 3-0.
Sunderland did not miss their injured finisher Darren Bent. Their forward line seemed so potent that the problem was where, and how, to accommodate their three potential scorers.
Jump ahead to the current day – and the nostalgic on Wearside would rather we did not – and they return to Stamford Bridge six points from safety, given slight hope by Wednesday’s unexpected draw at Manchester City, but in the knowledge that the team has not won for nine games. In October 2010, they had three feared forwards. Now they do not have a striker with more than three league goals to his name.
They are bottom of the league. They have not even had a season, they have had a three-and-a-bit months. They did not win in the division until the end of October and have not won since early February. They took 23 points from 16 games in that brief burst and have three from the 17 either side of their good form.
They still have both more own goals and more red cards than league wins, statistics that sum up their propensity to cause themselves problems needlessly. They have a manager who, after securing a draw at the Etihad Stadium, started railing at unspecified "stupidity" he seemed to feel was undermining Sunderland.
The feeling was that Gus Poyet was referring to suggestions he might leave in the summer, which, in turn, stemmed from his ambiguous comments about his future.
Poyet's status as a Chelsea favourite guarantees him a warm reception on Saturday. More intriguing is his situation at Sunderland. He first revived them, steering them to the League Cup final with a series of spirited, tactically clever performances, and then appeared to give up on them.
Perhaps his defeatism proved contagious, but it provokes questions of whether a manager who has the talent to go to the top also has the temperament, or if he is too emotionally volatile. It means Sunderland mirror their manager: no one knows what to expect.
Five of their six wins have come against top-half teams. Ignominy has been a constant companion in meetings with the lesser lights. It has created a paradoxical situation where this season has provided more genuine highlights than many predecessors: the stirring cup run, with its triumphs over Chelsea and Manchester United; the home-and-away victories over Newcastle United and the annual hard-fought 1-0 win over Manchester City.
This has felt a mediocre seven years in the Premier League. For much of that time, it has seemed joyless. Sunderland have one top-half finish, courtesy of the under-appreciated Steve Bruce, whose side spent a couple of months in the top six, and a few derby wins and a handful of triumphs against Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspur and City. But in general, neither ambition nor expenditure have been reflected in the league table or performance level.
Nothing has proved sustainable. Players who do impress, such as Bent, Simon Mignolet and Jordan Henderson, have tended to move on. Others have descended into mediocrity or been marginalised at a club with a ludicrously high turnover of players. Talented footballers such as Gyan, Djibril Cisse, Kenwyne Jones, Stephane Sessegnon, Andy Reid and James McClean have flickered but ultimately flattered to deceive. It indicates that, as Poyet has suggested, there is a problem with the culture of the club and that, too often, they have recruited the wrong characters.
The Stadium of Light has become a black hole, a place where players lose form or interest. Some simply vanish and, while search parties could be commissioned in an attempt to find some of this season’s stranger signings, the pressing need is for points.
The chances are that Chelsea will deny them any, and that Sunderland, in the top six when they last won at Stamford Bridge, will remain the bottom one.
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