2025 can be etched into the history books as one of Sunderland AFC’s greatest years and made up of the things that football fans can only dream of: promotions, very few home defeats, final-minute goals,
and beating the winner of the Club World Cup. Move over, 1973, there’s a new legacy in town; imagine telling yourself at Christmas in 2024 that Sunderland would be ending 2025 in 7th in the Premier League.
We’ve been fortunate this year in that our first and last matches took place at the Stadium of Light. From winning 2-1 against Sheffield United on the 1st Jan 2025, to then beating them in the Playoff Final, Sunderland really did battle ‘Til the End’.
Matches
Wins: 20 Draws: 14 Losses: 19 Goals scored: 56 Goals conceded: 58
2025 gave us 25 glorious matches at the Stadium of Light, supporting our incredible team with the ferocious atmosphere that can only be provided by the armada of Sunderland fans that we bring to every home fixture. Of those 25 home games, only SEVEN of them were losses. Talk about value for money on your season ticket.
Seeing 20 wins and 19 losses doesn’t look too believable when you consider how spectacularly well we’ve done this year, but 5 of those losses came from club friendlies over the summer. We really know when to bring our A-game. On top of that, 3 of our draws in 2025 occurred against clubs who finished in the top 6 of the Premier League in the 2024-25 season.
Signings
Signings: 18 Combined cost: £151,000,000 (approx) Loans: 4 Free transfers: 2
2025 has been a big year for Sunderland signings. It felt like we were making a new signing almost every day over the summer, and that shows in our stats. Starting with Enzo in January, there have been some incredible moves made to Wearside.
With an approximate combined cost of £151 million for our 18 new players, our position on the Premier League table just shows how much ‘trust the process’ should be our new motto. For context, when Isak left the mags, he cost Liverpool £125 mil. And you know what’s happened since.
Best Bits
Spring
Our greatest moment in Spring wasn’t necessarily one that put points on the table but, moreso, consisted of more legendary behaviour from a true Mackem. That’s right, our best moment in Spring was Luke O’Nien taking out the linesman and waving his flag. There is so much more to Sunderland than just statistics, and our club captain is the one who proves this time and time again.
Play-Offs
May deserves its own section in our best bits because it was such an incredible month for Sunderland. Dan Ballard’s incredible 121:59 header in the home leg against Coventry, which sent us straight to the Play-Off finals, will stay in the memories of so many Mackems for years to come. Arguably the most iconic moment of 21st-century Sunderland, but we’ll ask you again in a couple of years.
The end of May saw us winning the final at Wembley Stadium in one hell of an emotional rollercoaster. That day proved so many wrong and proved to the masses that Sunderland were right back where we deserved to be.
Summer
We can talk endlessly about Sunderland’s summer signings. Unlike lots of newly promoted teams, we took risks. Where other teams saw AFCON liabilities, we saw players with incredible potential and passion for the club. We plucked captain Xhaka out of nowhere in an extremely unexpected transfer, creating an amazing buzz around our first season back in the Premier League. However, nothing truly came close to the feeling of seeing us at the top of the Premier League table for those few glorious hours after our opening 3-0 win against West Ham in our first game of the season.
Autumn
One of the first major signs that Sunderland are a force to be reckoned with was that 2-1 away win over Chelsea in October. From finishing 4th in the Championship to beating the Club World Cup winners at their home ground just a few months later, Sunderland spent Autumn skyrocketing into the big leagues, and proving that they were here to stay.
Winter
Of course, the Wear-Tyne derby has to be our Winter highlight. Mind the gap. In a scenario none of us could have predicted, even the Visitors wanted us to win, allowing St Nick to deliver a header of a present to all of us on that cold day in December. And, on top of all of that, we have finished the year 2 points off 5th place. Not a bad way to spend your year.
