Lucky Black Cats’ miracle EPL escape

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IN all the frenzy surrounding the title race, a small miracle closer to the bottom of the English Premier League table may have been overlooked: Sunderland's story of survival.

It was Sunderland manager Gus Poyet who declared barely a month ago, following a 5-1 drubbing by Tottenham, that his team would need divine intervention to remain in the Premier League.

The Black Cats were bottom of the table, with a daunting schedule in front of them, and facing certain relegation to the Championship.

Fast forward to their final game of the season against Swansea and Sunderland have already completed the great escape — if not the greatest escape.

It's the reason Uruguayan Poyet has been dubbed the miracle manager.

Sunderland are unbeaten since that loss to Spurs on April 8 and have picked up 16 points out of a possible 18. But the numbers alone simply do not do justice to the wondrous achievement.

The Black Cats travelled to Manchester on April 17, where they earned a 2-2 draw against this season's likely champions City.

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And they backed that up with an historical 2-1 win over Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. It was Jose Mourinho's first home defeat in 78 games as Blues boss and effectively ended their title challenge.

Two weeks later and Sunderland were back in Manchester, this time in search of their first triumph at Old Trafford since 1968. Seb Larsson struck the only goal of the game and the 1-0 victory over United — Ryan Giggs' first loss as interim manager — was enough to lift Sunderland out of the relegation zone. The result also condemned both Fulham and Cardiff to the drop.

Sunderland fans have stuck by their man Poyet. Source: Getty Images

By the time West Bromwich Albion arrived at the Stadium of Light last week Sunderland needed just one more win to secure their stay in the Premier League for another season. First half goals from Jack Colback and Fabio Borini got them over the line and, in the elation that followed, Poyet described the last month as the greatest achievement of his career.

"I don't know if you will see something similar ever again,'' he said after the game.

"We are the second team in the Premier League to be bottom at Christmas and stay up. With (wins over Manchester) City, Chelsea and United away from home, to be seven points away from safety and to do it with a game to spare is amazing.

"It's been an incredibly difficult season. For moments it looked like we were going down.

"I will start believing in miracles from now on and it's one of the best days of my life today.''

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Former Socceroo Robbie Slater experienced a similar escape in 1997 when his club Southampton narrowly avoided relegation.

He remembers how his manager Graeme Souness motivated the players to fight to remain in the top tier and can only assume Poyet was as inspirational with Sunderland.

"Poyet must have got his players together and said to them, 'Do you want to play Championship football next year or do you want to still be going to Old Trafford and Stamford Bridge and Anfield?', Slater said.

"In 1997 we were last with eight or nine games to go and I will always remember everyone saying Southampton are going down.

"We went on a pretty amazing run where we didn't lose, except for our very last game against Aston Villa, but we were practically safe by then. It was an amazing escape.

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"The only difference is we didn't do what Sunderland have done in respect to the quality of the teams they've played. That week when they went to City and took a point, then went to Chelsea on the Saturday and won, and won again at Old Trafford, is just extraordinary."

Just two years before helping the Saints win the fight to stay up, Slater picked up a Premiership medal with Blackburn. It may have been a completely different achievement, but Slater says the feeling was almost the same.

"Two years before I had won the Premiership with Blackburn and the feeling of elation was just as good," he said.

"With the Premiership battle you were so nervous that you had butterflies in your stomach, but the relegation battle on the last day was like having wasps in your stomach."

There will be no final day "wasps" in the stomach for Sunderland, who made a miracle look ridiculously easy.

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