Sunderland Till I Die

Sunderland football club documentary coming to Netflix.

On December 14, a documentary on Sunderland’s football team will be uploaded onto Netflix.

An invite only preview was shown in Sunderland’s empire. Nathan Fryatt was one of those invited, he said ‘‘The premiere was really good.  Was nice to see past and present players there amongst us watching it.’ Another account from Michelle Lightfoot who was also invited commented saying, ‘I enjoyed it.’ and ‘If you have connections to Sunderland or from Sunderland, people will realise how special our city is and the people are.’

In an interview for Spark, with David from Fulwell73, the creators of this documentary, he said the reason they are making this and what they want to achieve is, ‘To tell the whole world about it, show not only the club but the city.  A little snapshot of the city.’  He then spoke about the passionate fans Sunderland have, regardless of what league they are in.  As well as himself, being questioned on ‘Why do you support Sunderland?’ when living in London.  His answer being ‘Sunderland is the greatest football team in the world.’ 

This will bring a light to Sunderland and show people the culture of football. Robert Porter, 18, a fan for 14 years and previous season ticket holder, said, ‘Definitely, I’m going to watch it, it will show the public how dedicated we are as fans.’ 

Robert also commented on what it could do for Sunderland as a whole and said, ‘nothing in particular, other than showing us off as a club.’ 

Could this show off the rise of hooliganism, or the negative effects and stereotypes of football? After watching the trailer, it doesn’t show Sunderland supporters in a particularly good light.  Seeing a bloody faced man walk across a busy street doesn’t promote the idea people were hoping, yet, showing the truth of the club’s fans.  Despite this Nathan commented on the hooliganism, saying, ‘there’s a couple second long clips from the Celtic game’ then finishing off his answer with ‘but we all know it was Celtic fans who in sighted the violence that day.’ 

Despite the hooliganism aspects it shows true passionate supporters and the sadness it can bring after a loss.  Michelle mentioned the portrayal of fans with, ‘some fans were portrayed as reasonable and others just had the passion.’