Matt Gray and Sutton United are mastering the art of going again

Despite ultimately falling to defeat against promotion-chasing Salford City on Saturday afternoon at the VBS Community Stadium, a determined Sutton United display once again proved that they are on course to make themselves a regular part of the football league furniture.

A red card for Sutton forward Donovan Wilson midway through the second half preceded Matt Gray’s men surrendering a 1-0 lead as they eventually fell to a late Ryan Watson goal, but the performance of the home side with both 11 and 10 men on the field showcased everything that has made the perennial non-leaguers such a welcome addition to League Two.

Gray, appointed manager of the south London club in May 2019, was in charge of a lower mid-table National League club when the outbreak Covid-19 meant his first full season in management was never played to completion. Against all odds, Sutton romped to the title in the following campaign and secured a promotion that ended a run of 123 years outside of the football league.

2021-22 went better than anyone could have expected. Sutton not only held their own at a level they had never experienced, but went toe-to-toe with clubs with much larger budgets and more illustrious histories, ultimately finishing eighth in the league and reaching the final of the Papa John’s Trophy.

Losing out on the play-offs on the final day of the season just a matter of weeks after falling to an extra-time defeat at Wembley would appear the perfect recipe for a hangover going into a new campaign, and wealthier clubs with greater resources than Sutton have been victims of ‘second season syndrome’ without having achieved half of what Gray and his players did last term.

It can often seem that teasing greatness by falling just short and not quite embracing it as intended can cause it to reject you entirely when you come calling for it once more, but Sutton are not allowing the greatest period in the club’s history to pass by without trying to create a few more memories.

In the summer, Dean Bouzanis, Isaac Olaofe and David Ajiboye all left the club after making 255 appearances between them across the promotion season in the National League and Sutton’s debut campaign in the football league, and the rigours of competing across four competitions have only added to the challenge faced by Gray.

“We had a big turnaround in the summer when we lost Bouzanis, Olaofe and Ajiboye,’ the 41-year-old explained. “(Ben) Goodlife goes and gets injured and is out for six months. Alex Smith got injured this week and is out for three-four months. They are huge players for us.”

However, a direct and aggressive style of play means that they often get the better of opponents with more established names on the team sheet, and against cash-rich Salford on Saturday a barrage of set-pieces and long throws meant the visiting defence were forced to work for their money.

“I’m constantly learning,” admitted Gray when asked about the challenge of competing against established EFL sides like Salford.

“I’m a young manager, I’m a reasonably new manager. Fortunately, this season I am learning all the time and that is helping us to keep getting better.

“If you look at us off the ball tactically today, they (Salford) didn’t pass it out from goal kicks once,” remarked Sutton’s young manager as he assessed his team’s relentless pressing at full-time. “We were all over them until the sending off.”

As much as Sutton had the upper hand throughout the first hour of the game, clear-cut chances were hard to come by for either side. Defender Louis John headed a free-kick across the face of goal after escaping his marker at the back post just before the interval, but stand-in Salford goalkeeper Jacob Chapman was rarely forced to get his gloves dirty.

Arguably more impressively, debutant Lewis Ward in the Sutton goal was equally unworked. Despite Salford fielding an array of talent acquired at no little expense, John marshalled a disciplined Sutton backline that was rarely troubled even after Wilson’s sending off.

Ward is something of a rarity within the Sutton squad. His late summer arrival from Swindon saw him become one of the few players to have been signed by Gray on a permanent deal when under contract at another club. Whilst Salford have spent several million pounds on playing talent since promotion from the National League in 2019, Sutton have relied on free transfers and loan signings long before they won the fifth-tier title two years later.

Gray’s capacity to make the most of these restrictions was displayed in the goal that gave Sutton the lead just after the hour mark. Half-time substitute Enzio Boldewijn – a free singing from National League Notts County in the summer of 2021 – saw a cross blocked before having another go, and on the second occasion he found the perfect delivery for Luton Town loanee Josh Neufville to open the scoring.

With a bumper crowd of 3,404 soon serenading Gray’s charges with a chorus of ‘Sutton’s going up’ and Salford showing few signs of troubling Ward, the U’s looked set to secure a fifth successive home win in a row that would have moved them level on points with the play-off places.

But within five minutes, Donovan Wilson – a striker initially borrowed from Bath City of the National League South in the closing stretch of the promotion season – had gotten into an altercation with Salford’s Theo Vassell that caused the referee’s assistant on the near side to instantly raise his flag.

Referee Robert Lewis brandished a red card and changed the complexion of the game.

Down a man, Sutton’s admirable level of organisation and determination only seemed to increase. Heroic block upon heroic block was performed by Paul, club captain Craig Eastmond came out on top in challenge after challenge, and forward Omar Bugiel found a way to occupy all three Salford centre-backs even without his strike partner.

However, their resistance was eventually broken when some intelligent movement by Salford substitute Odin Bailey was rewarded by a composed Matty Lund finish as red shirts queued up at the back post.

Even the equaliser did little to dampen Sutton spirits or diminish the enthusiasm and industry with which they had approached a hastily re-jigged plan of action devised by Gray and his coaching staff though, and it was only a moment of quality above the level of the game being played that eventually defeated them.

Despite the presence of 6 ft 5 Matt Smith in attack, Salford’s Callum Hendry opted to keep the ball on the floor in the 87^th minute and picked out Lund in space ahead of him. The scorer of the equaliser then shifted the ball in the direction of Watson, and even though the midfielder purchased from Tranmere Rovers in January had sparsely been involved up to this crucial point, he accurately swept a shot into the bottom corner beyond the reach of Ward.

Sutton nearly snatched the point that they so richly deserved, and the Gander Green crowd so desperately wanted, in the final minute of second half stoppage-time, but this time Chapman was on hand to brilliantly turn a Kylian Kouassi shot around the post and out of harm’s way.

Even though the afternoon ended with a particularly gut-wrenching form of defeat, the way in which Gray and his players conducted themselves post-match was telling. Every squad member was more than happy to sign autographs and take pictures with a reasonably-sized classroom’s worth of mascots, and their manager had few complaints about their application within the 90 minutes as well.

“We were absolutely outstanding,” Gray remarked in his post-match interviews. “We were superb both with and without the ball, and then the red card changed the game.

“We’ve got seven injuries at the moment so our squad is already a little bit thin, but our team today, I was proud of every single one of them,” he added.

“They (Salford) were the league favourites at the start of the season and have one of the biggest budgets in the league, and we have one of the smallest. But our work-rate, our energy and the way that we have coached them with and without the ball, our organisation and our pressing meant they didn’t play any football today because we got right after them.

“I’m disappointed not to keep the unbeaten home record going and we haven’t got the results away from home that we’ve deserved, so we are sitting mid-table. Am I pleased? No not really because I think we could have quite a few more points on the board.

“There’s a hell of a lot more to come from us.”

With such determination emanating from their innovative and tactically astute manager, it is hardly a surprise that the mood around Sutton seems set to remain buoyant for as long as Gray is steering the ship.

Even if difficulty lies ahead, as it surely does for a club of Sutton’s size regularly competing against opponents with the finances of Salford or the stature of Bradford City, Gray has shown, and continues to show, he is more than capable of helping this current group of players to respond when setbacks occur.

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