Phil Smith and Nick Barnes answer fan questions after Sunderland's draw with QPR
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00:00 Hello and welcome to another edition of On The Whistle in an eerily quiet stadium of
00:15 light, but to be honest that feels quite fitting because that would be one of the flattest
00:20 afternoons I think we've had here for a while and there was absolutely no way I was going
00:23 to sit by myself and talk through that nil-nil draw with QPR so I've convinced my good friend
00:28 Nick Barnes who you'll all know from Netflix, BBC Radio and all other things to come along
00:33 and chat through it. First of all, Barnsley, what did you make of that? Well it wasn't
00:40 scintillating by any stretch of the imagination and I was pleading them not to go and throw
00:47 it away at the end. I thought you've got close to keeping a clean sheet. Always felt a little
00:53 bit, it was probably too much to ask them to score, I just thought there just wasn't
00:58 enough in the final third. I think that they might have snatched victory but I was fearful
01:02 that they might lose the game and they have to thank Anthony Paterson really for several
01:09 good saves that kept them very much in the game. But overall I didn't think there was
01:14 much direction in the first half, I thought they looked disconnected, there wasn't any
01:22 rhythm really to the play. Hamir up front didn't really work for me, the one moment
01:29 he actually did impose himself on the game when he tackled Steve Cook and left him on
01:33 the floor and should have been 20 yards away, he just stopped, stalled. I couldn't comprehend
01:40 that really. I think they got better in the second half but just overall the announcements
01:46 made of 41,000, it was nowhere near 41,000 in the stadium, there were a lot of empty
01:50 seats, it was an underwhelming afternoon but at the same time they have stopped that run
01:58 of defeats, they've put themselves into a position where now, as I said to Mike Dodson
02:05 at the post-match press conference, there's a bit of a circuit breaker now. They've halted
02:09 a poor run, they've kept a clean sheet, they've got a two-week break, they will get players
02:14 back for Cardiff and then hopefully they can do the last few games.
02:19 The one tiny, tiny positive you can take from the game is that sense of absolute panic we've
02:24 had over the last couple of weeks, they've at least a little bit put a stop to that just
02:27 because when you look at the table now, the teams who were having a little revival have
02:32 tailed off again, they've probably already got enough points, they're probably one win
02:35 away so when you factor in that you will get four or five games out of Robert Sinclair,
02:40 you can see that it's going to be okay in terms of staying up but again what today showed
02:45 was just how staggeringly alarming the drop-off, especially going forward, no shots on target.
02:50 That would have been inconceivable under Tony Mowbray or last season and obviously the injuries
02:56 are a big part of that but again today I really thought he was going to go with Joe up front.
03:01 I just thought he's probably been the best of the options this season, I thought it was
03:05 the obvious solution. I understand that kind of respect that he wants to give him here
03:10 opportunities but it's difficult because you don't want to judge someone in their first
03:13 season of senior football too harshly, huge change for him in terms of coming to Sunderland
03:18 but at the moment the drop-off from those top attacking players is just too severe isn't
03:21 it? At the moment it's this whole what has happened to the football club this year, it's
03:27 all stemmed from Tony Mowbray's dismissal but the drop-off, they've dropped off a cliff
03:35 in all sorts of aspects. For the first time, I've just been chatting to Dan Neil about
03:41 this actually, if you think about this is the first time in probably six years that
03:46 Sunderland are going to have nothing to play for at the end of the season and it's totally
03:50 uncharted territory. You can probably argue it's more than six years because they had
03:54 relegation from the Championship as well as relegation from the Premier League and in
03:59 those seasons leading up to relegation from the Premier League they were always fighting
04:02 to the end of the season to stay in the Premier League. So suddenly Sunderland have plateaued.
04:09 And I think last season even though they did eventually get in the playoffs it looked for
04:16 a while like they weren't going to but we were kind of okay with that because the football
04:19 was still fantastic to watch and that made a huge difference and obviously it was the
04:22 first season back in the Championship but I think that's almost where the sadness is
04:26 with this team. It's not just that the results have tipped off which can happen, it's now
04:30 quite tough to watch. Today was, if we're being honest, it was hard to watch. It never
04:34 looked like scoring did it? To me, I've watched this team the last few weeks and I know Mike
04:38 Dodds has talked it up moments in the game against Southampton, against Leicester and
04:41 so on but I'm watching a team which I think would struggle in League One at the moment.
04:45 If this team at the moment was playing in League One and were fighting for their lives
04:50 they would be struggling. You'd wonder where the next win was going to come from.
04:53 That leads us into a few questions we've got. Thanks for sending them in. I'm very pleased
04:57 that you've sent questions in despite the nail mill draw so thank you very much for
05:00 doing that. The first is from my friend Sandor who asks if my catch of the phone in last
05:06 week's edition suggests I'll be a better fielder in the cricket season this year. I suspect
05:10 not but I do want a chance in the slips so be careful Sandor, I'm coming for your position.
05:14 The first question comes from Josh who says will they consider a new manager in the international
05:18 break? My personal feeling is that they won't now because I think the only situation in
05:23 which I think they would have parachuted someone in is if there was a very realistic chance
05:26 of relegation. I think that even though the performance is very alarming, I think that
05:30 point and that clean sheet means that they will have enough to get through the end of
05:34 the season. My view is yes if they get the right candidate they'll bring them in now
05:38 because obviously you would have the right time to plan. But the whole thing about why
05:42 they ended up with Michael Beale for me was because they couldn't get in the middle of
05:45 the season the candidate they wanted for financial reasons, logistical reasons. That's not going
05:50 to have changed. So my view is that their hope is that they can get through at the end
05:53 of the season even if it's very difficult and then they can then get one of the candidates
05:57 who they really, really wanted either last time out or someone who might become available
06:00 at the end of the season. So I don't know what you think but I just think their view
06:03 will be that they're probably going to stay up now. With a few players back Dodds can
06:06 do enough with the group to get through at the end of the season and then it's going
06:10 to be a massive reset isn't it? It's the most important summer I can remember. I think
06:14 this is a huge summer for the club on a number of levels and I agree fundamentally with what
06:19 you said there. I think what's interesting is Mike Dodds did say ahead of the game that
06:24 there is a shortlist and if someone stands out on that shortlist they might be coming
06:29 in next week or the week after. I don't actually see it. I think like you, now is
06:34 not the time. They're going to take stock now, they're not going to go down, they're
06:39 not going to go up. The summer is the time to make sure you've made the right appointment,
06:44 you bring them in early enough to enable them to have a good pre-season and it's key that
06:50 they are on board with recruitment because I think the last, even Michael Beale in the
06:56 short time that he was here was starting to murmur about the recruitment and the strikers
07:02 and Tony Mogre did and it's something that's not going to go away and I think whoever they
07:07 bring in has got to be either completely on board with it or the club tweaks it and is
07:15 a bit more flexible in their approach. So that leads us on to the next question actually
07:18 which is from Adam which I think is kind of relevant to what we were just talking about
07:21 which he says if Jack Clark goes and his replacement is somebody who's playing at the moment,
07:25 he really fears for what could happen next season and there could be a relegation battle.
07:29 I think at the moment, obviously we understand that the strategy is to try and bring players
07:33 in who can develop so that when a player goes you've already got someone in the building.
07:37 I think it's a stretch for me to see Bar, Mundo, even Aushish really being in a position
07:43 to take over from Clark. I'm not saying that they're not going to be good players in the
07:46 future, we were just speaking to Dodds who was praising Aushish, feels he's taken a real
07:50 step forward in recent weeks. He also mentioned that he's obviously playing during Ramadan
07:54 which is obviously a huge challenge and that was something to consider when reflecting
07:57 on his performance today which I thought was a good point. Mundo has definitely got something,
08:01 you can see his crossing ability is actually very, very good but he is raw and so I do
08:06 think this summer, especially when Clark goes, if that lifts the budget because they're able
08:09 to bring in £16-20 million, whatever it is, I do think some of that money has got to go
08:14 on getting a bit more proven quality in the final third. Is it a loan? Is it a key for
08:18 more? Is it another Ahmad style loan? I think it is absolutely imperative if Clark goes
08:23 there, it isn't just more unproven young players because you can give those players opportunities
08:28 next season, no problem, but at the moment the drop-off when Clark and Roberts to an
08:32 extent don't play is too severe. You can't see this group of players competing for the
08:36 playoffs without Clark. It's been too one-dimensional in the sense it's been over-reliant on Jack
08:40 Clark and I agree with you totally about this recruitment issue. I like it fundamentally,
08:47 I think it's the only way if you don't have a huge backer. It's sort of Cure and it's
08:51 sort of ambition but I don't think Cure in this league is something that's sustainable
08:56 in that sense. What I'd like to see, my assumption would be, if you sell Jack Clark and say you
09:02 get £20 million for him and possibly you sell one of the other players and you get
09:05 £15-20 million, you've got a £40 million war chest if you like. I would like to see
09:11 that money reinvested in a better, more experienced player because you've got the players you've
09:16 mentioned coming up behind. This team clearly needs experience. You should be able to do
09:20 both. You should be able to have a productive... It should be able to be tweaked. If you look
09:24 at that side that went up from League One, Dennis Sirkin, Dan Neil, so many players took
09:29 big steps forward. Anthony Paterson is an obvious one who sometimes you forget how young
09:32 he is actually which is to his credit and brilliant to do. But that actually showed
09:36 that the core of that team, Bart, Corey Evans, Bailey Wright, there was a balance there wasn't
09:42 there and I do think it's something that's going to have to go back to that a bit. There
09:47 will be some gems either in the Championship or League One who would fit the bill of being
09:53 that sort of player to replace Bart. My fear is that Sunderland, the perception of Sunderland
10:01 now is they're not big players. They're doing everything on the cheap for want of a better
10:05 phrase and that will put players off moving to Sunderland. For a young ambitious player
10:13 they might see another club in the Championship or lower Premier League as a better vehicle
10:19 for their ambitions than moving to Sunderland in its current set up and the way that it's
10:24 currently working for young players. It's a huge summer for Kirilu and Dreyfus isn't
10:28 it because I think supporters have for the first time, there have been really bumpy moments
10:32 where there's been a lot of criticism within the transfer windows and not signed strikes
10:35 previously. This for the first time is the time I get the feeling supporters are actually
10:38 going 'I'm not sure about this, I'm not sure about what we're doing'. For the first time
10:42 I think people are saying 'I'm not sure if this is going to get us to the Premier League'
10:45 and I think it's a big summer to almost get that belief back isn't it and show that there's
10:49 an intent and a belief. There's a big question mark about ambition and if they're in the
10:52 third year of a five year project and it's seemingly like they're going backwards not
10:56 upwards, then I think rightfully the fans are going to question it because I think there
11:01 is a feeling now that Kiril has maybe taken his eye off the ball this season on a number
11:08 of occasions for the number of decisions that have been made which have been poor decisions
11:13 and I don't think there's any question and I don't think they can walk away from that.
11:17 That dial needs to be reset. I mean like you said this summer is now that moment to do
11:22 that but there are some big big questions to be answered and they've got to get it absolutely
11:29 right.
11:30 [BLANK_AUDIO]