Exclusive:We're just two 'silly' mates who dreamed of playing for Sunderland - now we could win promotion at Wembley

There’s a brief pause and a knowing grin as the pair weigh up the question. How would these two mates describe each other?

“Quiet but hilarious,” Dan Neil says of Anthony Patterson. Intentionally? Sometimes, is the response.

“He’s quiet when you first meet him but when he gets comfortable, he’s absolutely hilarious. He’s got alright banter, to be fair.”

Patterson thinks a little longer, rejecting his mate's suggestion of ‘top golfer’.

“A dope,” he deadpans.

“He’s a bit silly… a bit like me to be fair.”

So there you have it, just two dopey mates. Except on Saturday, they’ll be two mates playing at Wembley. For their boyhood club. For a chance to lead this sleeping giant back into the Premier League.

Neil and Patterson have been playing together for the best part of a decade now, regulars in the same U21 side and then becoming close friends after their promotion to the first-team squad during pre-season in 2020.

It’s a friendship that has helped navigate the highs and lows of Sunderland’s journey from League One back to the brink of the top tier, the man of the match displays and the dips in form, the changes in manager, Wembley wins and everything in between.

“We’ve had a similar sort of pathway up into the first team,” Patterson says. “We’ve been able to use that to sort of support each other and we’ve just built that connection now where we've become close mates.

“We sit next to each other on the bus and we both know how the other is feeling. It’s quite nice to have that with someone.”

“One of the privileges of playing for such a big club is that when you lose games it's like the end of the world, and when you win you know it's making everyone’s weekend,” Neil adds.

“It’s one end of the spectrum to the other. The losses feel horrific but the wins feel unbelievable and I think that’s the privilege of playing for a club like this with the fanbase it has. The losses are tough and as local lads we probably feel it a bit more than most, but we feel the wins just that little bit more as well. But nah, we talk about anything else really. Take your mind off it, focus on the next game.”

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Though both made their breakthrough in the same season as Sunderland won promotion from League One, their journeys within that were very different. Neil started the season in sparkling form but was dropped to the bench by Alex Neil, just as Anthony Patterson was seizing his chance inspired by a COVID-19 outbreak ahead of a game against Wycombe Wanderers.

So Wembley means something a little different to them both. Promotion to League One was a special day in Neil’s career but now he has the chance to be at the heart of the action.

“I was obviously delighted when we won promotion out of League One, and to have been part of the squad and played a part over the year,” he says.

“I lost my place in the team towards the end of the season and not getting on the pitch at Wembley has been a bit at the back of my mind. Two years ago when we played Luton I was in the team, chance to get to Wembley… that’s another reason I was so buzzing when we got past Coventry.”

Patterson, by contrast, is a relative veteran. He was in the travelling squad for the losses to Portsmouth and Charlton, and then the win over Tranmere Rovers. By the time of the play-off final against Wycombe Wanderers, he was one of the first names on the teamsheet.

His moment came when a long ball bounced awkwardly over Bailey Wright’s head, Sam Vokes running through on goal. Neil was then just a Sunderland fan watching on again.

“Of course I backed him,” he grins.

“Patto was unbelievable in that stretch, massive saves. I still remember Oxford away, that save he made from the header, I was on the bench for that one as well! So when the striker went through I absolutely backed him.”

“I don’t remember much about the moment itself,” Patterson recalls.

“I’ve seen videos since, I remember it hitting my leg and then I had no idea where it had gone. I looked around a little bit for it and then realised it was still under my leg. I still don’t really understand how it just stopped there.

“It was a strange season, jumping between clubs a couple of times. I got the phonecall to say that I’d be playing in that game at Wycombe. Tough game, I struggled a bit I think as you could see but took a look from it in terms of the goalkeeper I am now. I think it’s the best way really, to just have to go in at the deep end. You learn a lot quickly about yourself.”

“It was unbelievable to watch,” Neil adds.

“Most of the first-team lads, especially the ones who had come through the academy, had seen how good he was. He maybe didn’t get the credit he deserved going through the academy, in the U18s and U21s especially. We were terrible in the 21s for a couple of years and Patto was keeping it to 3-0 when it could have been ten. He didn’t get the credit he deserved for that. He did well at Notts County and I was delighted when the chance came up for him.”

In the aftermath of Sunderland’s relegation to League One, there were many talented youngsters in the Academy who opted to leave. Higher divisions, higher wages. For some it has worked out and for others not so much.

Neil and Patterson saw an opportunity, a decision that has been vindicated spectacularly in the last couple of years.

“When the club got relegated to League One, it was my first year full time,” Neil explains.

“We’d seen the club in the Premier League and how great it was all the way through to the academy, and then quite a few things probably took a bit of a hit in the club as a result of back-to-back relegations and the financial side of that. I remember thinking, especially when the new ownership and the focus on youth, that if there’s a chance to get into Sunderland’s first team, it’s right now. I can’t wait three years until we’re potentially in the Premier League and it’s so much harder to get into the team. I think we both saw that the pathway had opened up. Coming through the academy and seeing how good the club was in the Prem, then falling off with those relegation, it was a massive motivating factor to put it back where it belongs.

“It was never that difficult a decision for me,” Patterson adds.

“Dan has said it there but it opened up the pathway for young players and I was really lucky to get that chance. It was a no-brainer, I just wanted to play football and you could sense there was a good chance to do that here.”

Neil adds: “You’re just looking at, ‘where is my best chance to play?’ If you move to a club in a higher division at the time, are you going to get the chances that I could get here? Ultimately I made the right decision. You want to be part of that team who are the ones to put Sunderland back where they belong.”

That dream has never been closer to being realised. The pair say they still just feel like two academy lads who have somehow ended up playing for Sunderland. Neil has done Covent Garden and Trafalgar Square in years previous, and says he’ll take Patto when they’re old and can’t walk. But for now, it’s time for them both to take centre stage.

They’ve come a long way since that pre-season of 2020 and Saturday could yet be the biggest day of their careers.

Though apparently some things never really change.

“We’re both still idiots,” Neil says.

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