{"id":604482,"date":"2021-11-20T01:54:34","date_gmt":"2021-11-20T06:54:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/?p=604482"},"modified":"2021-11-20T01:54:34","modified_gmt":"2021-11-20T06:54:34","slug":"lee-johnsons-sunderland-back-on-track","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/11\/20\/lee-johnsons-sunderland-back-on-track\/","title":{"rendered":"Lee Johnson&#8217;s Sunderland Must Get Back on Track Following a Succession of Poor Results\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Following a run of three successive league defeats, coupled with losses in the FA Cup and EFL Trophy, Lee Johnson\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/10\/31\/sunderland-lee-johnson-rotherham-united\/\" target=\"_self\">Sunderland<\/a> must get back on track during the next three games to reignite their promotion challenge.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">The Black Cats finish November with three league games in seven days, starting at home against <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/11\/14\/oxford-united-ipswich-town-fa-cup\/\" target=\"_self\">Ipswich Town<\/a> followed by consecutive away games at Shrewsbury Town and Cambridge United. Lee Johnson has come under increasing pressure of late due to the poor performances and results which has seen his side slip down the table and exit the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/11\/18\/exeter-city-replay-fa-cup-bradford\/\" target=\"_self\">FA Cup<\/a> at the hands of League Two strugglers Mansfield Town.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Lee Johnson&#8217;s Sunderland Must Get Back on Track &#8211; Starting Against Ipswich Town<\/span><\/h2>\n<h3 class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Johnson Under Pressure\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Reports have circulated in the past week that owner <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/02\/22\/sunderland-weekly-round-up-kyril-louis-dreyfus-takeover-complete-as-wembley-awaits\/\" target=\"_self\">Kyril Louis-Dreyfus<\/a> is far from happy with the club\u2019s current form. Football is an unforgiving business and although Lee Johnson will undoubtedly be given games to turn around the poor run, should Sunderland suffer defeats over the next week, the manager could see him himself under immense pressure.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Lee Johnson and Sunderland have set out on a long-term plan of making Sunderland a success both on and off the field. However, in the short term, Johnson and his team must deliver results on the pitch. Should promotion not be achieved, the season will be deemed a failure.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Three Crucial Games in Seven Days for Lee Johnson&#8217;s Sunderland\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">If the Black Cats can at least remain undefeated in the next three games, their season will be back on track. Lose and perform poorly, especially at home to Ipswich, and the pressure mounting on Lee Johnson could hit a new level amongst some sections of fans.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Ipswich arrive at the Stadium of Light having begun to turn their season around following a run of six games without a win at the beginning of the campaign. The promotion hopefuls now lie in ninth place, four points off the playoff spots following just two defeats in 14 games. 4-1 and 4-0 victories at fellow promotion candidates <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/09\/12\/oxford-united-wycombe-league-one\/\" target=\"_self\">Wycombe Wanderers<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2021\/10\/03\/portsmouth-thrash-sunderland-offering-fans-hope-project-danny-cowley\/\" target=\"_self\">Portsmouth<\/a> indicates that the Tractor Boys will be a threat on Wearside.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Next Tuesday, Sunderland travel to Shrewsbury Town for the second time this calendar year. In February, the Black Cats suffered a 2-1 defeat, a result they will be looking to avenge. Prior to Saturday\u2019s round of games, Shrewsbury are fourth from bottom of League One following three defeats in their last five games.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">November comes to an end for Sunderland with a trip to Cambridge United. The U\u2019s are currently mid-table but have not won in their last three league games and face in-form Rotherham United and Wigan Athletic prior to the visit of Sunderland.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3 class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Defender Confident Results Will Improve<\/span><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Speaking to Sunderland\u2019s official website, Carl Winchester, the midfielder who has reverted to playing right-back this season, spoke about the crucial clash with Ipswich. <a href=\"https:\/\/safc.com\/news\/team-news\/2021\/november\/ipswich-town\/winchester-pre-ipswich\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">He said<\/a>: &#8220;It\u2019s important that we put things right on Saturday and we\u2019re all looking forward to the game.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">\u201cIt\u2019s a massive game for everyone \u2013 they\u2019re a good side and we\u2019re aware of that, but it\u2019s about what we do, and we need to get back to how we were playing at the start of the season.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">&#8220;We know that once we get back to that level of performance, the results will follow.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s2\">Main Photo\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a id=\"ZDGc0k1eTjllnnwEG5_ZIQ\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.co.uk\/detail\/1235502912\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'ZDGc0k1eTjllnnwEG5_ZIQ',sig:'igXvrDBT1Mhp8s1knCxey9dyPHtjQw3JA0K4hFm7knc=',w:'594px',h:'386px',items:'1235502912',caption: true ,tld:'co.uk',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lee Johnson&#8217;s Sunderland have hit a very poor patch of form. Three games in seven days gives them a chance to put it right.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":135,"featured_media":604499,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[22,32,34],"tags":[1519],"class_list":["post-604482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sunderland","category-league-football","category-league12","tag-lee-johnson"],"modified_by":"Dale Ventham, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/135"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=604482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604482\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/604499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=604482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=604482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=604482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}