Shrewsbury Town VS Sunderland – Match Preview & Prediction

The Black Cats take on League One side, Shrewsbury Town as Sunderland’s FA Cup journey begins, 50 years on from their famous FA Cup win in 1973.

Sunderland will be hoping to lrogress past the third-round of the cup for the first time since the 2014/15 campaign, where they reached the fifth-round before being knocked out by Bradford City.

They are the favourites today, but they are facing a team with a few of their ex-players from the recent League One days with Aiden O’Brien, Tom Flanagan and, on loan, Carl Winchester are all among Shresbury’s ranks.

The last time the two sides met was back in April 2022 at the Stadium of Light and Sunderland came out 3-2 winners, despite the returning Tom Flanagan getting himself on the scoresheet.

The Black Cats will most likely have a reshuffle in terms of the squad as youngsters, Ben Middlemas, Tommy Watson, Mason Cotcher and, 15-year-old Chris Rigg all expected to be named in the squad.

Shrewsbury currently sit 16th in the league one table and they come in to the game with 3 straight defeats in the league, most recently a 0-3 home defeat against Fleetwood Town on New Year’s Day.

Sunderland have been in good form of late as they continue their push for Play-Offs in the league and they will be looking to build up some momentum and confidence by getting back to winning ways in the cup today.

Prediction

Shrewsbury Town 0-2 Sunderland

Scorers – Abdoullah Ba and Patrick Roberts