Last season, Sunderland became the first winners of The Championship. They did it in style, finishing seven points above runners-up Wigan Athletic.
Mick McCarthy, who took over at the Stadium of Light in March 2003 to replace Howard Wilkinson, succeeded in steering the Black Cats to the Premier League in his second full season in charge.
Sunderland, who like Newcastle and Middlesbrough are a popular club in the north east region, will be looking to avoid the drop after only one season.
Their stadium is one of the home jewels in UK football. It would be a pity if it had to host matches from The Championship in future.
As many other clubs who return to the top flight after demotion, Sunderland find cash hard to come by.
Many of their signings arrived from lower divisions. In all, they have not spent more than £4 million to bolster the side this summer.
So far this season, Sunderland have not attracted a full house for home matches - the club's coffers need to be boosted to keep up with the progress.
For the first two home matches against Charlton and Manchester City, they had an average of 33,500, indeed well below the capacity of 49,000.
Their season opening has been awful, losing four straight matches, two of them in front of their own fans.
They must pull up their socks if they do not want to face a hard winter struggling against relegation. McCarthy has already warned that his side must improve defensively to survive in the Premiership.
McCarthy, born in Barnsley on February 7, 1959, launched his playing career with the Tykes in 1977 as an 18-year-old centre-back.
After appearing in 272 matches and assisted the side to promotion from the Fourth to the Second Division, he left Barnsley and moved to Manchester City for a fee of £200,000 in 1983.
He went over the Hadrian Wall to star for Celtic, winning the double in 1988 before he moved abroad to play for Lyon. Two years later he returned to England and signed for Millwall.
His baptism for Ireland came in 1984 against Poland, in Dublin. Perhaps, McCarthy's biggest honour was when he captained the Irish World Cup team in the finals of 1990 in Italy, moving into the last eight before bowing out to the hosts.
Two years later he hung up his boots after the 2-0 victory over Portugal in Boston.
He remained at The Den and became Millwall player-manager in March 1991.
McCarthy took the team close to the Premiership in 1994 after his side finished fourth, but then lost out to Derby County in the play-offs.
After good cup runs in both domestic knockout contests the season that followed, Millwall topped the classification, but then fell to a mid-table placing. It was here that Jackie Charlton left the Ireland national side, and the FAI offered McCarthy the job.
He took over officially on February 5, 1996, two days before his 36th birthday.
His aging side needed a good shake-up and a number of youngsters were introduced after the Irish lost to Belgium in the group play-offs for a place in the 1998 World Cup in France.
Deciders again
Ireland's next aim was to qualify for Euro 2000 as they faced Yugoslavia and Croatia.
After topping the group for some time, Ireland lost priceless points in injury time to both Croatia and Macedonia. Ireland had to face the dreaded deciders once more and their path was blocked again, this time by Turkey.
In the 2002 World Cup qualifiers, a home victory over favourites Holland put them on their way, but inferior goal difference to Portugal left them to face Iran in another do-or-die duel.
Yet, it was third time lucky for the Irish as they progressed to the finals in Japan and South Korea.
Then, in Asia, there was that spat with team captain Roy Keane, who was sent home after he insulted McCarthy in front of the rest of the squad.
After going through the group stage, Ireland were eliminated on penalties by Spain after a 1-1 draw.
Following a disastrous start in the qualification matches for Euro 2004, McCarthy still received the backing of the FAI.
But on November 5, 2002, he resigned from the job, having agreed a compensation deal with the Irish FA.
Meanwhile, Ireland had made giant steps in the FIFA world rankings and McCarthy lifted them from 54th to 13th in his five-year spell.
Back in England, Sunderland dismissed manager Peter Reid in October, 2002 and national team director of football Wilkinson was given the job.
Yet, he did not last the pace and after five months he was replaced.
Sunderland were engaged in a battle against relegation from the Premiership when McCarthy took over and the side was demoted after they lost all of their remaining seven fixtures.
McCarthy vowed to take them back to the top and after two years of hard work Sunderland returned as champions of the Football League.
The squad
Goalkeepers: 1. Kelvin Davis, 13. Ben Alnwick.
Defenders: 2. Stephen Wright, 3. George McCartney, 5. Gary Breen, 6. Steven Caldwell, 22. Alan Stubbs, 26. Daryl Murphy, 28. Daniel Smith, 30. Joe Murphy.
Midfielders: 4. Carl Robinson, 7. Liam Lawrence, 8. Dean Whitehead, 12. Nyron Nosworthy, 14. Tommy Miller, 15. Danny Collins, 19. Martin Woods, 21. Matthew Piper, 23. Grant Leadbitter, 33. Julio Arca.
Forwards: 9. Jonathan Stead, 10. Stephen Elliott, 11. Andrew Welsh, 16. Kevin Kyle, 17. Anthony Le Tallec, 18. Andy Gray, 20. Chris Brown.