Sunderland's recent FA Cup record is a disgrace and,…

Sunderland's recent FA Cup record is a disgrace and, as the 1973 anniversary approaches, it matters

There's no polite way to put this: Sunderland's recent FA Cup history stinks. For a football club that, quite rightly, lionises the players who famously beat the then-mighty Leeds United at Wembley in 1973 to bring the trophy back to the North-East, the Black Cats' recent record in football's oldest cup competition is lamentable.

One solitary cup game won in seven seasons is a disgrace. In that run, Sunderland have competed as a Premier League club, a Championship side, and a League One team.

They both entered and exited at the third round stage in 2015-16, 2016-17, and 2017-18, and - in the wake of relegation to third tier - crashed out in the first round in 2019-20, 2020-21, and 2021-22, with the last two seasons seeing them fall at the first hurdle on home soil against League Two Mansfield Town. A first round win, against League Two Port Vale in 2018-19, provides what can laughably be described as the 'highlight' of this miserable sequence, but it was rapidly followed by a second round defeat against Walsall.

Not since 2014-15 when they were in the Premier League have Sunderland progressed beyond the third round, and even then they managed to fall flat on their face when Gus Poyet's side was humbled by Bradford City - then operating two divisions below them in League One - at Valley Parade in the fifth round. And, incredibly, you have to look back to the previous season, 2013-14 when they ultimately reached the quarter-finals, for the last occasion when Sunderland beat a team in the cup that was competing either in the same division as them or above - Southampton in the fifth round, since you ask.

Of course, the FA Cup has long since lost the lustre that it held through to the end of the 1980s, when many fans regarded a cup win at Wembley as being on a par with winning a league title. The advent of the Premier League and its sackloads of cash means that clubs now prioritise the avoidance of relegation from the top flight, or securing promotion to it, above getting their hands on silverware.

Even lower down, when in League One, Sunderland fans accepted that promotion to the Championship was far more important than a cup run. And this season a cup run would offer scant consolation if it came at the expense of the club's league form and they found themselves fighting a relegation battle.

But it does not have to be a binary choice. One of the pluses of promotion to the Championship last season is that Sunderland have skipped the early rounds, and last night's third round draw has handed them a date with League One Shrewsbury Town at the New Meadow in January.

Successive Sunderland managers have, by and large, respected the competition by naming strong sides and avoiding the temptation to make wholesale changes, and there is no reason to believe that Tony Mowbray will take a different approach. So this will be viewed not only as a winnable tie, but a tie in which Sunderland will be favourites - although given the competition's history of upsets, and the Black Cats' ability to shoot themselves in the foot, nothing can be taken for granted.

In May, Sunderland will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the club's storied 1973 FA Cup triumph. In the meantime, they can best honour its memory by avoiding yet another early exit.

Sunderland's recent FA Cup record is a disgrace and, as the 1973 anniversary approaches, it matters

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