Sunderland celebrate promotion to the Premier League (Image: Ian Horrocks)
Sunderland celebrate promotion to the Premier League (Image: Ian Horrocks)
SUNDERLAND co-owner Juan Sartori says promotion to the Premier League is the result of club bosses "betting on something very different" on Wearside.
The 44-year-old Uruguayan has played his part in the rebuild of the club alongside majority shareholder Kyril Louis-Dreyfus, and was at Wembley on Saturday to see the Black Cats win promotion in the most dramatic circumstances.
Promotion was the culmination of years of hard work at the Stadium of Light, with the Black Cats hauled from the doldrums of League One thanks to a bold recruitment strategy which saw the club invest in exciting young players.
RECOMMENDED READING:
Luke O'Nien on his Sunderland love, Wembley joy and pain & 'being in Fantasy Footy'
'If things get tough in Premier League, Regis Le Bris deserves unwavering support'
Patrick Roberts' Wembley injury revelation, Sunderland thanks & fatherhood dream
Sartori told the media in his homeland: “It was a very nice moment, very exciting. It was many years of effort.
"We bought the club almost seven years ago, destroyed in the third division and it was something that took us from that moment very low until this weekend where at Wembley, in front of 80,000 people, with the whole world waiting to see if Sunderland would return to the Premier League.
“We won that game full of stories. Many people talk about money, they say it’s the most expensive game in history, because you have like $200m in prize money to go up to the Premier League in one game, which is something unique, but for us it’s the culmination of a project of many years, with many individual stories.
“Those of you who followed and some of you will have seen the Netflix documentary, you know that the whole world was waiting to see when Sunderland would get back to the Premier League, and what we put together is a project where we bet on something very different, because if you see, it’s the youngest club in all levels of English football. If you look at the players one by one it’s full of stories where we bet on youth, hunger, the desire to do something new and make history again.”
Sartori admits he would love to see a player from his homeland in the red and white of Sunderland in the Premier League, but would only push for such a transfer if he knew it would benefit the Black Cats on the pitch.
"That’s always a dream, but you also have to separate heartfelt decisions from patriotic ones, so one would like to make the right decision at the right time,” he said.
“I’m sure that one day we’ll manage to bring a Uruguayan to Sunderland, and that it will be under the best conditions, but that’s what we’ll see now. The goal isn’t to bring a Uruguayan; it’s a dream that I hope can come true one day.”