Would it be a good thing for Sunderland to qualify for Europe next season? Or is it too soon in the club’s recovery mission to be contemplating a place in either the Europa League or Conference League?
Up until a few weeks ago, it had felt like a hypothetical question. Sunderland were doing fantastically in their first season back in the top-flight, but surely qualifying for Europe was taking things too far? Not anymore. Back-to-back victories over Newcastle and Tottenham either side of the international break have seen Regis Le Bris’ side climb to tenth place in the table with six games to play.
Exactly what will be needed to secure European qualification via the Premier League remains uncertain, with the outcome of this season’s FA Cup, Europa League and Conference League having the potential to move the goalposts. As things stand, though, there is every chance that finishing seventh will guarantee European football of some description next season, with eighth place also having the potential to secure continental competition. Sunderland are currently one point off both seventh and eighth spot. The battle is very much on.
Some fans have been arguing that playing in Europe next season could be counterproductive. Even with further strengthening this summer, would the current squad be able to cope with the extra fixtures and travelling demands that would be an inevitable consequence of European football?
Nottingham Forest have spent the season juggling the demands of the Europa League with the Premier League and could yet be relegated. Crystal Palace could finish the campaign as Conference League champions, but look destined for a bottom-half finish domestically after struggling for much of the campaign. In two of the last three seasons, playing in the Champions League has wrecked Newcastle United’s Premier League hopes.
Maybe that would happen to Sunderland too. The Black Cats have barely played a midweek game this season, giving Le Bris plenty of time on the training ground in which to work his tactical magic. Qualify for Europe, and Sunderland would hardly have a blank midweek at all in the first half of next season.
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Assuming that the Champions League is out of reach, it would be either the Europa or Conference League for the Black Cats. There would be a financial boost from playing in either competition, but it wouldn’t be massive. Tottenham are estimated to have earned around £21m from winning the Europa League last season. That’s effectively one player. And Sunderland would almost certainly have to make more than one addition to ensure their squad was strong enough to cope with the demands of playing in Europe.
So far, so sensible. But what about everything else that Europe would offer? Sunderland’s only experience of European football in their entire history came in the 1973-74 UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup, in the season after they were crowned FA Cup winners. They beat Vasas Budapest before losing to Sporting.
At least two generations of fans have never experienced playing in Europe. They’ve looked on enviously as Newcastle have graced the Nou Camp and San Siro. They’ve been jealous of Middlesbrough, whose European adventures took them all the way to the UEFA Cup final in 2006.
‘Have you ever seen a Mackem in Milan’ has been a stick they have been beaten with. Imagine if they were heading to the San Siro themselves next season. Potentially in a year when Newcastle were not involved in any form of continental competition.
A European away day would be the highlight of Sunderland’s season. Forget taking over Trafalgar Square, why not get the flags out on the Spanish Steps? Wherever the Black Cats were drawn in their first European encounter, the clamour for tickets and flights would be incredible.
And as Forest and Palace have shown this season, the strength of the Premier League means any English club entering either the Europa or Conference League has a more than decent chance of going deep in the competition. Never mind the excitement of that first game, what about the prospect of Sunderland playing in a European semi-final? It really isn’t that far-fetched.
Qualifying for Europe would ask difficult questions of Le Bris, Florent Ghisolfi and Kyril Louis-Dreyfus. It would almost certainly mean a tweaking of the club’s current plans. Surely, though, that would be a price worth paying.
Sunderland voted out when it came to Brexit. A decade on, and it’s time for the city to get back into Europe.