Sunderland 0 Everton 2

PRIOR to yesterday’s game at the Stadium of Light, Sunderland’s reserve team received the Premier Reserve League North trophy. In the 90 minutes that followed, however, the club’s senior squad failed to take a giant step towards securing an even greater prize.

Premier League survival is the only reward that matters in the final three weeks of the season, but while the Black Cats remain four points clear of the drop zone with three games left, yesterday’s deserved defeat to Everton has guaranteed a nervy finale.

Second-half goals from Steven Pienaar and Marouane Fellaini condemned Ricky Sbragia’s side to their sixth defeat in seven matches, and preceded a cacophony of boos that underlined just what a 40,000- plus crowd made of yet another spineless display.

Faced with an Everton side that had half a mind on this month’s FA Cup final with Chelsea, Sunderland displayed an alarming lack of urgency and spirit that hardly augurs well for their chances if either Newcastle or Middlesbrough win next week’s crunch Tyne- Tees derby.

Play with this little heart in away games at Bolton and Portsmouth, and Sunderland will get nothing. Play in a similar fashion against Chelsea on the final day of the season, and the results could be embarrassing.

Having been marginally second best in a disappointing first half, Sunderland’s players fell away alarmingly after the break. They were second to far too many balls in midfield and defence, and lacked cohesion and creativity in attack.

In short, they looked like a side destined for relegation, and if they are to survive this month, it is likely to be because of the failings of others rather than anything they do themselves.

In a season littered with poor performances, this was one of the worst of the lot.

Sbragia must take much of the blame for that, with his refusal to break up the misfiring partnership between Kenwyne Jones and Djibril Cisse looking more and more indefensible by the week.

The pair lined up alongside each other for the fourth game in succession, despite sustained criticism of their performance at West Brom. And for the fourth game in succession, they played as if they were strangers linking up for the first time.

They only combined once all game, with Cisse holding the ball up before feeding Jones for a difficult bouncing opportunity that the Trinidad & Tobago international prodded over, but that proved a rare moment of understanding amid the general confusion.

The 24thminute passage in which Jones went hurtling off in one direction, only for Cisse to p l a y the ball to the opposite side of the field, was much more representative of their play.

They weren’t exactly helped by the midfielders playing behind them, however, with Sbragia having selected a midfield that prioritised application over artistry. The result was a predictable lack of both verve and vision.

Out went Andy Reid, Carlos Edwards and Teemu Tainio from the side that had lost at the Hawthorns eight days earlier – in came Grant Leadbitter, Dean Whitehead and Steed Malbranque, players whose effort cannot be faulted, but who hardly represent the creative hub of Sunderland’s squad.

Their attacking efforts before the break were limited, with a misdirected Leadbitter effort following a one-two with Cisse bringing a wasteful end to a rare midfield foray to the edge of the Everton box.

The defensive efforts of Sunderland’s midfielders were more fruitful, and having watched his side capitulate alarmingly against West Brom, Sbragia could at least point to the paucity of Everton’s firsthalf attacking as justification for his conservative team selection.

Tim Cahill, normally such a potent presence at the apex of midfield, barely saw the ball before the break, while fellow midfielder Fellaini was equally well shackled as he struggled to support lone striker Jo.

The visitors’ only first-half chance of note came as early as the 15th minute, with Pienaar releasing Jo in the inside-left channel, only for the Manchester City loanee to drag a scuffed shot across the face of Marton Fulop’s goal.

Fulop, who continued between the sticks in place of the injured Craig Gordon, had to be at his most alert to punch clear a Cahill header from Dan Gosling’s corner, but given Everton’s reputation for slick attacking this season, the Hungary international found himself surprisingly underworked in the first half.

Within three minutes of the restart, however, he was picking the ball out of the net.

Jo was the architect of Everton’s opener, holding the ball up on the edge of the area and enabling Pienaar to spin in behind him. The South African showed impressive strength to hold off the covering Phil Bardsley, before displaying commendable composure to prod the ball past the advancing Fulop.

From Everton’s point of view, the goal was well worked.

From Sunderland’s perspective, it was thoroughly avoidable.

Danny Collins came close to grabbing an equaliser within two minutes of Everton’s opener – the defender planted a powerful header from Leadbitter’s corner too close to Tim Howard – but there was a distinct lack of urgency from the hosts that hardly reflected the precariousness of their position.

Lost causes went ignored, opponents were not closed down and too many players appeared reluctant to take a risk.

As a result, the response from the stands was anything but enthusiastic.

Things would have been worse for the Black Cats had Cahill not headed Lars Jacobsen’s cross past the post when unmarked on the edge of the six-yard box, but while the otherwise uninvolved Kieran Richardson curled a tame freekick straight at Howard, Sunderland struggled to generate any momentum throughout the second half.

So there was hardly a sense of surprise when Everton scored a second with 19 minutes left. Having scored the first, Pienaar set up the second with a run into space on the right-hand side and a deft square ball to Fellaini. The Belgian must have struggled to believe how much space he had in the heart of the area, and without a Sunderland defender in touching distance, he rolled a composed finish into the bottom right-hand corner of the net.

Matchfacts

Goals: 0-1: Pienaar (48mins, held off Bardsley and prodded the ball past Fulop) 0-2: Fellaini (71mins, slotted ball into corner of net after square ball from Pienaar)
Bookings: Davenport (31mins, foul), Leadbitter (41mins, foul), Cahill (79mins, foul), Pienaar (80mins, ungentlemanly conduct), Gosling (84mins, foul), Saha (85mins, foul), Bardsley (90mins, foul)
Referee: Martin Atkinson (Halifax) – Overly fussy, but didn’t have any contentious decisions to make 5
Attendance: 41,313
Entertainment: ✰✰

SUNDERLAND (4-4-2):
5 Fulop: Suffered a couple of jittery moments, and might have done better with Everton’s opener
4 Bardsley: His attacking limitations make Sunderland predictable whenever they venture down the right
5 Davenport: Never really got to grips with Jo’s movement and ability to hold up the ball
6 Ferdinand: Sunderland’s best defender, but struggled to contain Everton’s attacking
5 Collins: Kept on plugging away, but directed a decent headed opportunity straight at Howard
5 Malbranque: Worked hard enough, but it’s hard to think of a single positive thing he did going forward
6 LEADBITTER: The only Sunderland midfielder who displayed any stomach for the fight
4 Whitehead: Offered nothing going forward, and allowed Everton’s midfielders to repeatedly break from deep
4 Richardson: Failed to live up to potential again and rarely linked up with his strikers
4 Cisse: Failed to link up with Jones and never looked like creating a chance of his own
4 Jones: Frustratingly ineffective as he showed no signs of evading the attentions of Lescott
Subs:
Healy (for Cisse, 64mins): Didn’t look like scoring, but surely deserves an opportunity from the start 5
Edwards (for Malbranque, 83mins) (not used): Colgan, McShane, Ben Haim, Tainio, Murphy

EVERTON (4-4-1-1): Howard 6, Jacobsen 6 (Rodwell 74mins), Yobo 6, Lescott 7, Baines 7, Gosling 6 (Castillo 86mins), Neville 7, Cahill 6, PIENAAR 8, Fellaini 7, Jo 7 (Saha 81mins). Subs (not used): Nash, Agard, Wallace, Vaughan

MAN OF THE MATCH
STEVEN Pienaar – The South African scored one and set up the other, displaying a thrust and drive that was lacking in the whole of the Sunderland squad