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This has the potential to be one of the greatest games of the season and I just hope they have the extended highlights on The Championship on Sunday morning.
Derby are playing us at the worst possible time and I'm not sure how the Footy Mad men have come up with no score draw for this number.
Derby got beat by Stoke 2-0 at home in their last game and a trip to the Stadium of Light is the last thing they needed, but that's where they're at.
Niall Quinn opted not to have the fixture played on Sky Sports so I'm expecting our biggest crowd of the season at this game. We got 33,000 against Southend and we've put the performances in since then to ensure that improves for this top of the table clash. I'm hoping for us to be above the 40,000 mark.
Dean Whitehead is banned after receiving 5 yellow cards. Kavanagh and Elliott remain sidelined whilst Simpson faces a late fitness test, but is expected to be fit.
If Simpson doesn't recover in time then Stephen Wright could make his long awaited come back in the first team.
Team to face Derby
Fulop
Simpson, Nosworthy, Evans, Collins
Edwards, Miller (L), Yorke, Hysen
Connolly, John
Subs: Ward, Stokes, Varga, Leadbitter and Miller (T).
Prediction
For me Derby have not been at their best and they have been scraping wins by the odd goal a lot to get to the heights of The Championship. I think Sunderland will be far too stong for Derby, especially looking at how we made Birmingham look like they should have been in the bottom three and not the top three. I'm going for a great day, great atmosphere and a great result for the Mackems.
Score
Sunderland AFC 2 Derby County 0
Scorers
Hysen and Connolly
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