The 49,000-seater Stadium Of Light has staged England internationals but never League 1 football. But, after back-to-back relegations, Mackems’ fans are facing a reality check as their team begin life in the third tier against Charlton Athletic, who should provide a stiff test having reached the play-offs last season.
Sunderland News
New Sunderland owners have brought in the SFA’s Manager Of The Year Jack Ross to replace the sacked Chris Coleman and he’s brought in several players with League 1 experience and others who have played at a higher level to ensure the Black Cats are promoted back to the Championship at the first time of asking.
Goalkeeper Jon McLaughlin and centre-back Glenn Loovens both played in the Championship last season with Burton and Sheffield Wednesday respectively. Another former Owl, Chris Maguire, will be asked to provide the craft in midfield where he will alongside new skipper George Honeyman. Charlie Wyke returns to the north-east having been top scorer at Bradford last season and he’ll be expected to score the goals. Sunderland’s financial clout could see them storm League 1 as Wigan and Blackburn did last season but owners and manager will need to turnaround several seasons of downturn and it may not happen immediately.
Charlton News
The Addicks’ final 10 games of last season saw a return of 19 points and they crept into the top six only to lose both legs of their play-off semi-final with Shrewsbury.
Lee Bowyer has now had a whole summer to re-evaluate his squad and has found a younger like-for-like replacement for the now-departed Josh Magennis in the shape of Lyle Taylor, top scorer last season with AFC Wimbledon. The experienced Darren Pratley has been brought in to partner Jake Forster-Caskey in midfield but the Londoners will be hit hard by the loss of Ben Amos, Jay Dasilva and Sullay Kaikai, who have all returned to their parent clubs. Centre-half Ezri Konsa has moved to Brentford and Ahmed Kashi has also left so it may be a while Charlton find the right formula this term.
Sunderland v Charlton Head-to-Heads
There have been few previous meetings between these two sides but Charlton did the double over Sunderland when they met in the Premier League in 2005.
Sunderland v Charlton Current Best Odds
Sunderland 19/20 Draw 5/2 Charlton 18/5 (Odds Correct at 3.15pm August 3rd)
Sunderland v Charlton Predictions
An early win for Sunderland in League 1 is important to get their long-suffering fans back on board after the trauma of the last two seasons, even though it’s not so vital in the grand scheme of things. It will take a while for Charlie Wyke to get on the same wavelengths as his new team-mates and Charlton proved hard to beat under Bowyer at the end of last season. BetVictor are among several bookmakers offering 5/2 that this opening game in the league ends in a draw and they are also best odds about a Sunderland win. Under 2.5 Total Goals may also be a decent bet at 6/5 with BetVictor.
