Kenwyne Jones – Sunderland’s Striker
Kenwyne Joel Jones (born 5 October 1984 in Point Fortin, Trinidad and Tobago) [1] is a Trinidadian professional footballer who plays as a striker for Premier League club Sunderland. He previously played for Southampton, Stoke City, Sheffield Wednesday, W Connection and Joe Public.
He began his football career with Joe Public in his native Trinidad and Tobago. He moved to W Connection in 2002,[2] and he was a utility player in the Trinidad and Tobago team in 2003 against Finland. In 2004, he joined Southampton, where he was converted to a striker.[3] He was later loaned to Sheffield Wednesday and Stoke City during the 2004–05 season.
| Personal information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Kenwyne Joel Jones | |
| Date of birth | 5 October 1984 (age 25) | |
| Place of birth | Point Fortin, Trinidad and Tobago | |
| Height | 1.89 m (6 ft 2+1?2 in) | |
| Playing position | Striker | |
| Club information | ||
| Current club | Sunderland | |
| Number | 17 | |
Sunderland
On 29 August 2007, it was confirmed that he had joined Sunderland in a deal valued at £6 million with fellow-Trinidadian Stern John moving to Southampton.[19][20] The Trinidadian stiker made his debut for Sunderland on 1 September in a 1–0 defeat to Manchester United and scored his first goal for the club in a 2–1 home win over Reading on 15 September.[21]
Jones was linked with a £12 m player move to Liverpool in November 2007, with Peter Crouch moving to Sunderland.[22][23] Jones was again linked with high profile clubs on 21 December 2007, including Chelsea and Liverpool, but Sunderland manager Roy Keane insisted that he would be going nowhere.[24] Jones scored his fifth goal at the Stadium of Light, with a header from the near post off a corner kick, in Sunderland’s 3–1 win over Bolton on 29 December.[25] Chelsea captain John Terry praised Jones, saying: “Jones was fantastic and I have played against him twice now. He is a very good player, very hard working and probably the best in the air in the entire Premier League, he really is that good” after Chelsea had won the match 1–0 on 15 March 2008.[26]
On 1 June 2008, Jones suffered a knee ligament injury in a collision with Goalkeeper David James in the seventh minute of Trinidad & Tobago’s 3–0 defeat against England.[27] He made his first appearance of the 2008–09 season playing for 60 minutes in Sunderland reserve team’s 2–0 victory against Wigan Athletic.[28], followed by a return to Sunderland’s first team in the Tyne-Wear derby on 25 October 2008 as a second half substitute, when he helped Sunderland to secure a 2–1 victory over their local rivals.[29] His first goal following his return came on 12 November in a 2–1 League Cup defeat against Blackburn Rovers.[30] He continued his recovery from injury with a goal, again against Blackburn, on 15 November 2008 as Sunderland won 2–1.[31]
Jones put an end to speculation linking him with a move to Tottenham Hotspur by signing a 4 and a half year contract at the Stadium of Light on 27 January 2009.[32] After a spell of six games without a goal, Jones scored against Manchester United in a 2–1 defeat.[33]
On 22 August Jones contributed to Sunderland’s 2–1 victory over Blackburn Rovers scoring two goals. Jones again contributed with two goals for Sunderland when they were at home to Wolves on 27 September, in a 5–2 win. One goal being the highlight of the game, curling the ball home from 22yards out.[34] Jones scored his fifth goal of the season with a header against Manchester United, out jumping Ben Foster to give Sunderland a 2-1 lead but in the dying moments of the match at Old Trafford, Patrice Evra’s shot was deflected in for an own-goal by Anton Ferdinand to level it up and end the match as a 2-2 draw.
Source: Kenwyne Jones, Sunderland F.C., English Premier League News, Sunderland Striker information at wikipedia.org.
Marton Fulop – Sunderland Goalkeeper
Márton Fülöp (Hungarian pronunciation: [?ma?rton ?fyløp]; born 3 May 1983) is a Hungarian footballer who plays for Sunderland as a goalkeeper.
| Personal information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Márton Fülöp | |
| Date of birth | 3 May 1983 (age 26) | |
| Place of birth | Budapest, Hungary | |
| Height | 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m)[1] | |
| Playing position | Goalkeeper | |
| Club information | ||
| Current club | Sunderland | |
Sunderland
Fülöp made his debut for Sunderland on 9 December 2006 in the 2–1 victory over Luton. In December, Fülöp expressed his desire to join Sunderland permanently.[7] His deal at Sunderland was made permanent for £500,000 on 2 January 2007, in a deal which involved Ben Alnwick going to Tottenham Hotspur.[8]
Fülöp signed a year long loan deal with Leicester City on 16 August 2007,[9] making his debut against Crystal Palace two days later, which ended in a 2–2 draw. On 1 September, the goalkeeper made a string of superb saves against Plymouth Argyle to ensure Leicester a point at Home Park.[10] This would be the first of a number of fine performances from Fülöp. On 26 September, he repeated his string of superb saves which contributed in the team’s shock victory over Aston Villa in the Carling Cup.[11] He was twice named in the Championship Team Of The Week, on 1 October and 22 October.[12][13]
Fülöp made another fine performance against Chelsea in a Carling Cup match on 31 October, twice denying Claudio Pizarro and pushing an effort from Scott Sinclair onto the post, but could not prevent his side from losing 4–3.[14] His form during that season prompted the club to bid for him on a permanent basis in the January transfer window. Fülöp told Sky Sports on 21 December that he was interested in a permanent deal with Leicester,[15] and the club made an offer for him on 29 December, together with Graham Kavanagh.[16] He played his last match for Leicester in a 1–1 draw against Charlton Athletic at the Walkers Stadium on 29 December 2007.[17]
Fülöp was recalled to Sunderland on 31 December.[18] On 4 January 2008, Leicester manager Ian Holloway accused Roy Keane of being greedy after his initial bid to sign Fülöp was rejected. A total of £1 million was offered, however Keane demanded £3 million. Holloway refused to pay more than £1 million, ending any hopes of keeping Fülöp.[19] Fülöp revealed on 25 January that he was unhappy to be recalled by Roy Keane and that he actually wanted to stay at Leicester.[20]
Fülöp was loaned to Stoke City on 22 February 2008,[21] but was recalled by Sunderland just four days later as back up cover to Craig Gordon following Darren Ward’s injury, making one appearance in the final Premier League game at home to Arsenal.[22] Stoke had a bid of £1.7 million for him rejected by Sunderland in June,[23] but the clubs later agreed a fee in July of £3m.[24] However, the deal collapsed after Stoke signed Thomas Sørensen on a free transfer instead, after the deal was stalled because of payments to Fülöp’s agent. Due to Craig Gordon’s injury, Fulop has taken over the goalkeeping position, and was in goal for the second Tyne-wear derby of the season on the first of February 2009. With Gordon’s injuries Marton has become the first choice keeper and proved his worth with many fine performances to help keep Sunderland in the Premier League at the end of the 2008/09 season. He also got recognition for several saves made in the Premier League opener away to Bolton, which they won 1-0.
Source: Marton Fulop, Sunderland Goalkeeper, Sunderland Football Club, English Premier League information at wikipedia.org
Fulham 1 – 0 Sunderland
English Premier League News : An impressive Bobby Zamora scored his sixth goal of the season to lift Fulham to eighth spot in the Premier League after they beat Sunderland.
Zamora also hit the bar before half-time and Erik Nevland should have scored too but he shot straight at Marton Fulop from a Zamora lay-off.
Mark Schwarzer saved Kenwyne Jones’s shot when he intercepted a back pass and Darren Bent volleyed wide.
Fulham faded after the break, but held off a spirited Sunderland effort.
The result means Sunderland’s woes away from home continue as they now have just one win from their last 18 league trips. Meanwhile, Fulham boss Roy Hodgson will be content his team held firm after their European exertions on Thursday.
Read full story of English Premier League News at BBC News.
Freak goal was ‘wrongly allowed’
English Premier League News : Freak goal was ‘wrongly allowed’A former FA Premier League referee says he is “amazed” Sunderland’s winner against Liverpool, which deflected off a beach ball, was allowed to stand.
Jeff Winter told BBC Radio 5 live: “Everyone’s going to have a field day but nobody’s getting upset about it.
“But the laws of the game clearly state that if there’s an outside interference the game has to be stopped.
“The referee and his assistant knew something was wrong, and it should have been a dropped ball.”
The incident occurred when Darren Bent took a first-time shot from just inside the penalty area in one of Sunderland’s first attacks during Saturday’s Premier League match at the Stadium of Light.
The ball evaded Glen Johnson’s attempted block and, at almost the same time, deflected off a large red beach ball at the edge of the six-year box.
Liverpool goalkeeper Pepe Reina found his eyes initially drawn to the path of the beachball and was wrong-footed, in no position to make the save.
Winter said: “Sunderland fans would say it would have probably gone in anyway and that it was a Liverpool fan who threw it [the beach ball] on the pitch.
“But I’m absolutely amazed. It is a basic law in football and the goal should just not have stood.
“I am absolutely amazed that a referee at that level of football, that between him, his assistant and the fourth official they didn’t see what had happened and give the correct decision.
“There would have been absolute ructions at the Stadium of Light because the fans wouldn’t have understood what had happened but I was watching yesterday afternoon and I was thinking ‘hang on this can’t be right’.
“I try to defend referees whenever possible but on this occasion everyone is having a laugh and a joke but this, in terms of interpreting the laws of the game, is far more serous than when a ball crosses a line and somebody doesn’t see it.”
After the incident, Reina was furious and rushed to remonstrate with a referee’s assistant – but the goal stood despite a Fifa law which states: “The referee stops, suspends or terminates the match because of outside interference of any kind.”
Rafael Benitez, Liverpool’s manager, refused to focus his anger on the fifth-minute incident calling it a “a very technical question”.
“It was a special situation but we didn’t play well,” he said.
“The goal changed the game but we made some mistakes and gave the ball away. When we had our chances, we didn’t take them. These things can happen. It’s a bad situation for us that the [beach] ball was in the middle and was influential but again I will say we didn’t play well – that’s the main thing for me.”
His counterpart, Steve Bruce, said he initially thought the strike might have taken a deflection off Johnson rather than the beach ball.
Having found out what had actually happened, he said: “If you really know that rule then you are a little bit sad. I didn’t know the rule that if a ball hit an object it should be a dropped ball, I always thought it’s Sod’s Law and you carry on, but there we are.
“We’ve had a bit of luck there way, it’s one of those things but it’s obviously helped our cause.
Roy Keane – Sunderland AFC Manager
Manager of Sunderland AFC. – Roy Keane
Roy Maurice Keane (born 10 August 1971 in Mayfield, Cork) is an Irish former professional footballer and the current manager of Barclays English Premier League club Sunderland.
A dominating central-midfielder, Keane has been hailed as one of the greatest players to grace the game in the modern era. In a highly successful 17-year career, he played for Cobh Ramblers in the League of Ireland, Nottingham Forest and, most notably, Manchester United (both in England), before ending his career with a brief spell at Celtic in Scotland.
Keane was noted for his aggressive and highly-competitive style of play, an attitude which helped him excel as captain of Manchester United from 1997 until his departure in 2005. Keane helped United achieve a period of unprecedented success in more than 12 years at the club, during which he established himself as one of the greatest players in the club’s history.
He played at international level for much of his career, representing the Republic of Ireland over a period of fourteen years, most of which he spent as captain. In the 1994 FIFA World Cup he played in every game although he was sent home from the 2002 World Cup after an argument with national coach Mick McCarthy.
During his first season as Sunderland manager, he took the club from twenty-third position in the Coca-Cola Championship to win the league and gain promotion to the Premier League. Keane’s arrival has been largely attributed as the catalyst for Sunderland’s recovery.[1] He managed to steer Sunderland, Barclays English Premier League Football Club, to safety in the 2007/2008 season and will be looking to build on that success in the new season.
Personal information
Full name : Roy Maurice Keane
Date of birth : 10 August 1971 (1971-08-10) (age 37)
Place of birth : Cork, Ireland
Height : 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m)
Playing position : Midfielder
Club information : Manager of Sunderland
League : English Premier League Club
Managerial career
During his time at Celtic, Keane was suggested as a potential managerial successor to Gordon Strachan by former Celtic player Charlie Nicholas.[41] However, it was Championship club Sunderland where Keane chose to launch his managerial career, re-uniting him with the club’s chairman and outgoing manager, Niall Quinn. The two men, publicly at least, were on opposing sides during the fall-out from the Saipan incident, but they were on good terms at the time of the managerial appointment, with Quinn urging Sunderland fans to “support and enjoy one of football’s true greats”.[42]
Keane signed a three year deal immediately after Sunderland’s victory over West Bromwich Albion on 28 August, the Mackem’s first win of the 2006-07 season after a dreadful run of four consecutive defeats under Quinn’s temporary management. With his new club sitting in the relegation zone already, second bottom of the Championship table, Keane chose to enforce changes quickly. His first actions as manager were deciding to keep the existing assistant manager, Bobby Saxton, and to appoint his former Nottingham Forest colleague Tony Loughlan as head coach. He wasted no time in bringing in new additions to the squad, with a total of six players signing on the final day of the August transfer window. The most notable signings were Keane’s former Manchester United team-mates Dwight Yorke[43] and Liam Miller,[44] supported by former Celtic colleagues Ross Wallace and Stanislav Varga,[45] as well as Wigan Athletic pair Graham Kavanagh and David Connolly.[46]
Keane’s first two games as manager could not have gone much better; first coming from behind to beat Derby County 2-1, followed by an easy 3-0 victory over Leeds United. Sunderland began to steadily creep up the league standings under Keane’s management, and by the turn of the year they had escaped the bottom half of the league. Five further players were signed during the January 2007 transfer window, three (Anthony Stokes, Carlos Edwards and Stern John) on permanent contracts and two (Jonny Evans and Danny Simpson) on loan from Manchester United, Keane’s old club. Results continued to improve, and Keane was rewarded with both February and March’s “Manager of the Month” award,[47] whilst his team began to challenge for the automatic promotion places at the very top of the table.
Keane tackled the players non-professional approach with a firm hand. When three players were late for the team coach to a trip to Barnsley in March, he simply left them behind.
Sunderland secured promotion to the Premier League along with Birmingham City on 29 April when rivals Derby County were beaten by Crystal Palace.[48] A week later, the Coca-Cola Championship title was sealed, and Sunderland’s revival under Keane was complete. His achievements also earned him the Championship “Manager of the Year” award.[49] A sign of Keane’s bigger ambitions was shown by his decision not to celebrate promotion with an open-top bus parade through the city.[citation needed]
Sunderland, Barclays English Premier League Football Club, did not have the best of luck – both with injuries and some notable refereeing decisions that went against them – in the Premier League, though many pundits hailed their fighting spirit under Keane and backed them for survival. The lowest point of the season coming at Goodison Park, where they were heavily defeated 7-1 by Everton, which Keane described as ‘one of the lowest points’ of his career. However in the second half of the season the team’s form was much improved (especially at home) and Premier League survival was guaranteed with two games to go with a home win against Middlesbrough. Keane carried on his trend of buying ex-Manchester United players by signing Kieran Richardson, Paul McShane, Danny Higginbotham, Phil Bardsley and Jonny Evans on loan. He has also carried on the strict trend of discipline by putting Liam Miller (one of Sunderland’s apparently more consistent players) on the transfer list for being regularly late for training and other team meetings.
In September 2008 Keane became embroiled in a row with FIFA Vice President Jack Warner over the withdrawal of Dwight Yorke from the Trinidad and Tobago national team. Warner accused Keane of being disrespectful towards small countries.[50] Keane responded by calling Warner “a clown” and insisted that Yorke was retired from international football.[51]
Keane has reiterated his displeasure with the attitude and selection policy of the FAI. In March 2007 Keane claimed that several Republic of Ireland players get picked solely based on their media exposure and that the organisation was biased to players originating from Dublin or other Leinster regions. Keane claimed that Sunderland player Liam Miller was not picked because he was from Cork and that players with significant potential were failing to get picked for the national team. He also alleged that the FAI were incompetent in the running of their affairs.
“Once you keep playing them on the reputation they’ve built up through the media or because they do lots of interviews, then it’s wrong. “There’s a fine line between loyalty and stupidity.”[52]
His former manager Sir Alex Ferguson, currently Manager of Man Utd FC, had previously said that he wanted Keane to succeed him as Manchester United coach when he retired. However, in the wake of Keane’s acrimonious departure from the club, Ferguson became evasive regarding Keane’s prospects as a manager: “Young managers come along and people say this one will be England manager or boss of this club, but two years later they’re not there. It’s not an easy environment to come into, I wouldn’t forecast anything.”
Source: Roy Keane, Sunderland AFC Manager, Barclays English Premier League Football Club information at wikipedia.org