Sunderland’s 53-Year European Wait Ends Against AZ

Sunderland host AZ Alkmaar on Wednesday 16 September in their first European match for 53 years. Kick-off is 8pm BST at the Stadium of Light, the opening night of an eight-game Europa League league phase.

The last campaign ended in Lisbon in 1973. The first away trip this winter goes back to Portugal, this time against the cup winners who beat Sporting CP in May.

AZ Alkmaar Open the European Return

The Dutch side walk into a ground that has never staged a Sunderland European night. Roker Park held the old Cup Winners’ Cup ties. The Stadium of Light has waited until this one.

AZ reached the UEFA Cup final in 1981 and lost to Ipswich Town. They won the Dutch Cup last season, 5-1 against NEC, and arrive as a Pot 1 club in a 36-team league phase.

Sunderland sit 12th after three Premier League games, with four points and a 3-3 goal difference. They lost 2-1 at Ipswich Town on 22 August, beat Fulham 1-0 on 30 August, and drew 1-1 at Brentford on 5 September. A 1-0 Carabao Cup win over Hull City on 8 September was the last outing before this week’s European opener.

THE RETURN IN FIGURES

• The wait: 53 years since the last senior European tie, a 2-0 defeat in Lisbon on 7 November 1973.
• The prize: a seventh-place Premier League finish on 24 May 2026, sealed by a 2-1 win over Chelsea.
• The load: eight league-phase matches, four at home and four away, from 16 September to 28 January.
• The field: 36 clubs, 144 matches, and a table that sends the top eight straight into the last 16.

Head coach Régis Le Bris spent draw day talking about Fulham, not Frankfurt. The league game was the next one on the board. AZ is now the date that ends the wait.

Home Nights First, Then the Long Trips

UEFA published the dates a day after the Monaco draw. The club then posted the confirmed eight-game league-phase calendar, with every Wearside kick-off at 8pm and the first two away nights starting at 5.45pm UK time.

THE LEAGUE PHASE DATES

The league phase kicks off on Wednesday and closes on Thursday 28 January 2027. Home games cluster in September and November. The autumn then asks for two away Thursday nights in seven days, in two countries, before anyone talks about Milan.

Lisbon Ended the 1973 Run

Sunderland reached Europe as 1973 FA Cup winners, still a Second Division club under Bob Stokoe. They played four ties and won three of them. The fourth sent them home.

THE 1973 CUP WINNERS CUP RUN

1. September 1973: Win 2-0 away at Vasas Budapest, with Dennis Tueart scoring in the Hungarian capital.
2. 3 October 1973: Win 1-0 at Roker Park to finish the first-round tie.
3. 24 October 1973: Beat Sporting CP 2-1 at Roker Park, Bobby Kerr at 32 minutes and Micky Horswill at 64, before Héctor Yazalde pulls one back at 85 in front of 31,568.
4. 7 November 1973: Lose 2-0 in Lisbon and go out 3-2 on aggregate, the last senior European night the club played until this season.

Torreense are not Sporting. They are a Portuguese second-tier club whose 2,500-seat ground in Torres Vedras failed UEFA’s tests, so Sunderland will play them 193 miles south at the Estadio Algarve in Faro. Torreense still carry a Sporting scar. They won the Portuguese Cup in May, the first major trophy in a 109-year history, by beating Sporting CP in the final.

The geography is the echo. The last European away day ended in Portugal against Sporting. The first one of this campaign is Portugal against the side that just knocked Sporting out of their own cup.

What the Monaco Draw Handed Sunderland

The league-phase draw was held at the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco at 13:00 CET on Friday 28 August. Clubs went into four pots of nine clubs by five-year coefficient. Each side was paired with two teams from each pot, one at home and one away. Clubs from the same country could not meet, and no side could be drawn against more than two clubs from one nation.

Sunderland, Bournemouth and Crystal Palace all landed in Pot 3. Palace are in the competition as last season’s Conference League winners. Brighton went into the Conference League league phase. Bournemouth, in Europe for the first time, were also paired with Milan, though they host that tie.

Before a ball came out of the pot, the club account asked supporters who they wanted. The first replies named Milan.

https://x.com/SunderlandAFC/status/2092249133792817377

They got that trip. They also got a home list that a newly European side can live with, and an October that will test the squad more than the San Siro photograph will.

SUNDERLAND’S EIGHT OPPONENTS BY POT

• Pot 1: AZ Alkmaar at home, AC Milan away.
• Pot 2: GNK Dinamo at home, RSC Anderlecht away.
• Pot 3: Jagiellonia Białystok at home, Lech Poznań away.
• Pot 4: PFC Levski Sofia at home, SCU Torreense away.

Le Bris, asked whether the path looked kind, would not grade it. “I don’t know, we’ll see. 53 years later Sunderland are back in Europe so it’s a bit unknown,” he said. “We can expect strong opponents, different cultures, different experiences and we need that to get better. It’s a huge privilege and we are really proud of this opportunity.”

San Siro in December, Brussels in January

Milan at the San Siro on Thursday 10 December is the date already circled in the North East. It is the last European match of 2026, and it sits after two home Thursday nights against Dinamo Zagreb and Jagiellonia Białystok. Le Bris called the fixture a marker, not a free hit.

It’s iconic, Milan. It’s a massive club, massive history so to get back in Europe with that fixture, it’s a symbol.

Régis Le Bris, Sunderland head coach, 28 August press conference

The harder piece of the map is already on the page for October. Torreense in Faro on 15 October and Lech Poznań on 22 October are back-to-back 5.45pm UK kick-offs. Those away days already a travel race for supporters who have not had a European week in their adult lives, and for a squad that still has Premier League work on either side.

January then splits the remaining away night from the last home one. Anderlecht at Lotto Park on 21 January is the first European game of 2027. Levski Sofia visit the Stadium of Light seven days later to close the league phase. Four countries, eight opponents, no English sides, and no rematch with Palace or Bournemouth because the draw forbids it.

Eight Results Decide Who Reaches March

Each of the 36 clubs plays eight matches. After those games the table splits three ways. The top eight receive a bye to the round of 16. Clubs finishing ninth to 24th enter a two-legged play-off. The bottom eight are out.

That math is why a “kind” home list still has a job to do. Four Wearside nights against AZ, Dinamo, Jagiellonia and Levski are the points Sunderland can actually bank. Milan, Anderlecht, Lech and Torreense are the nights that decide whether those points are enough to skip February.

THE ROAD AFTER JANUARY

• Play-offs: 18 and 25 February 2027, for clubs placed ninth to 24th.
• Round of 16: 11 and 18 March 2027, with the top eight waiting there.
• Quarter-finals: 8 and 15 April 2027.
• Semi-finals: 29 April and 6 May 2027.
• Final: 26 May 2027 in Frankfurt.

Seventh place last season was the ticket, not a bye. Chelsea, Club World Cup winners, finished 10th after that 2-1 defeat on Wearside and took no UEFA place at all. Trai Hume volleyed Sunderland in front in the 24th minute from Luke O’Nien’s flick, Malo Gusto turned in an own goal on 50 minutes, and Cole Palmer pulled one back on 57. Wesley Fofana was sent off just after the hour for a second yellow, the last of them for pulling back Wilson Isidor. The win fell on the anniversary of the Championship play-off final against Sheffield United at Wembley.

Le Bris Will Not Set Limits on This Run

Le Bris has kept the same line since May. He wants humility, strong structures, and no ceiling placed on a second Premier League season he already called demanding. On draw day he folded Europe into that sentence rather than hanging a flag on it.

“We are proud to be in Sunderland. Our fans deserve to be in this position. It’s a huge experience, but we want to be competitive. It is challenging, exciting and demanding. At the same time, our main focus right now is Fulham,” he said after the pots came out.

Director of football Florent Ghisolfi has been equally blunt about the calendar. A supporter old enough to remember 1973 asked him whether Europe was even a good thing. Ghisolfi’s answer was to drop the fear talk. “We can’t have fear. Only conviction that we will be ready,” he said. “We don’t want to talk about fear of playing in four competitions. We just want to be ready to compete.”

Four competitions is the real second season. The extra cost of a European squad is already on the books, and the league table after three games is ordinary. AZ Alkmaar will not care about any of that at 8pm BST on Wednesday 16 September, when European football returns to Wearside for the first time since a Second Division side flew home from Lisbon.