Phillips discusses Chelsea win
Former Sunderland striker Kevin Phillips joined Graham Hunter for The Big Interview this week to discuss his career, starting from his right-back days at Baldock Town to winning the European Golden Boot with Sunderland.
While he talked about his Sunderland career, Phillips mentioned the best game he was ever involved in was the 4-1 win over Chelsea during the 1999/2000 season.
The striker says he could see fear in the eyes of the Chelsea players, with Sunderland desperate for revenge for the opening day defeat at Stamford Bridge:
That was the best game of football I have ever played in, ever, it was just incredible.
We spoke about it before the game, about the first game of the season, that we owe this lot one.
At the time we were full of confidence, we were playing well, we were doing fine in the league and that day was just one of those days.
You would have been to a football match where one team, everything they do, everything they touch comes off and we find ourselves 4-0 up at half-time. It was incredible.
We pressed them, we didn’t give them a minute’s peace and you could actually see - once we started pressing them, we got at them from the first whistle, you could actually see in their eyes what they saw in our eyes on the first day - a little bit of fear.
You could just see, hold on a minute, these lot are not up for it today. It was an incredible performance.
You can listen to the rest of Graham Hunter’s Big Interview with Kevin Phillips on acast HERE.
Academy manager on Sartori’s Uruguayan talent push
Academy of Light manager Paul Reid joined us and Kevin Ball on the Roker Rapport podcast yesterday to discuss the goings on at the academy and the club in general.
During the chat, Reid was asked about Juan Sartori’s hopes of bringing Uruguayan and South American talent to the Academy. Reid admitted that talks were ongoing over implementing that strategy but that the discussions were in their infancy:
None of that has actually happened yet, it’s very much in it’s infancy, the idea even itself.
For me it’s something to explore, why would we not try and tap into someone that is so influential in Uruguay, someone with so many contacts. Let’s explore the possibility if we can take advantage of that.
Obviously the logistics of bringing over a group of young players from South America needs working out. It certainly wouldn’t be a case of flooding the Academy with players from Uruguay. The logistics of actually even identifying the talent over there and making an assessment of them is still being discussed.
It’s still a long way from that actually happening but it is being talked about but I am open to it. There are a lot of factors that need to be considered, bringing players over from the other side of the world and the impact it will have on current Academy players.
You can listen to the full interview by clicking the links below.
⭐️ RR PODCAST SPECIAL! ⭐️
— Roker Report (@RokerReport) November 14, 2018
Joining us for an in-depth chat on @SunderlandAFC’s Academy are Kevin Ball & @PaulReid06!
ITUNES: https://t.co/sghyCU2xzq
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Former defender praises new goalkeeper coach
Craig Samson became Sunderland’s new goalkeeper coach this week, succeeding Jimmy Walker in the role after he left to join Paul Lambert at Ipswich Town.
Samson was first choice goalkeeper at Saint Mirren but retired to take up his position with Sunderland and upon his departure, his former Buddies’ team-mate and ex-Sunderland defender Anton Ferdinand took to Instagram to praise Samson: