‘Laughing’ Sunderland star incurs wrath of Professor Phillips in shock Port Vale defeat | OneFootball

Port Vale pulled off an FA Cup giant-killing to beat Sunderland, but far more jarring than that shock result was a goalkeeper smiling to incur the wrath of Black Cats legend Kevin Phillips.

I had a mate at school who frequently got in trouble for smiling. Upon being pulled up for bad behaviour he couldn’t help but grin when being told off. Those of us revelling in what we initially thought was our pal’s mischievous bent but further frequent evidence made clear was quite simply his face would then wait for the very same response from understandably irate, no-nonsense teachers as Kevin Phillips’ to Sunderland goalkeeper Melker Ellborg’s mush in defeat to Port Vale.

Much like a teacher viewing his reaction as a slight on their authority, Black Cats legend Phillips failed to hide his fury as Ellborg backtracked impressively and headed Luke O’Nien’s horrible back-pass over his own bar.

In fairness to Phillips, who hyperbolised throughout the half-time discussion, branding the first 45 minutes “really poor” from his former side and hitting out at the forwards who “did nothing”, a goalkeeper smiling after saving the blushes of one of their teammates did feel awfully jarring.

It’s a situation which calls for a b*llocking, not least because instead of hailing Ellborg’s brilliance, the frivolous reaction had the adverse effect of exposing him as a wholly unserious character. Goalkeepers are an infamously quirky bunch but that eccentricity manifesting as merriment felt all wrong, as did his apparent indifference to an audience extolling his virtues.

As we used to advise our mate, Ellborg should simply stop smiling. But after Ben Waine scored a fine header past him following a goalmouth scramble to give League One Port Vale the lead from the resulting corner, a second inappropriate moment of gaiety from the Sunderland keeper suggests that, like Gorgeous George, he just can’t help it.

Ellborg rushed out of goal and brought George Hall down just outside his box and rather than grimace or profess his innocence to the referee, he was once again seen beaming.

When VAR started to take a look at the incident to decide whether to upgrade the yellow brandished by Anthony Taylor to a red for the denial of a clear goalscoring opportunity he was still smiling.

When a Port Vale player came over to chat to him as his continued role in the game remained in doubt, Ellborg looked like he had just heard a witty anecdote down the pub. It was bizarre.

As was the lethargy of Sunderland’s performance against a side struggling to retain their League One status. The pitch wasn’t great, Port Vale were aggressive and got in amongst them, but Sunderland were really, really poor. As Professor Phillips said after the game, “Port Vale just wanted it more and there’s no excuse for that”

Regis Le Bris also admitted that the home side played with an “intensity” that his side couldn’t match. Unfortunately the Sunderland boss wasn’t asked about the dressing room mood and therefore failed to report on what we can only assume was a sea of glum faces and one inexplicably, infuriatingly happy one.