As O’Nien got stuck in, unscrewing the back off one of the old metal supports, a fan came over to offer him some advice. “You should sign that on the back, just in case you make it one day,” said the supporter, clearly oblivious as to O’Nien’s identity. “Keep plugging away and you could be famous. What’s your name again?”
It is safe to assume every Sunderland fan knows who O’Nien is now. When the 30-year-old runs out at Hillsborough tomorrow evening, he will be making his 300th appearance for the Black Cats. He is joining an illustrious group of players who have made an indelible impression on the club’s fabric, with his passion, drive and whole-hearted embrace of everything Sunderland stands for having long endeared him to the fanbase. He might have been born in Hemel Hempstead, and still be warmly regarded at Wycombe, but he will now forever be red-and-white.
“It means the world to me,” said O’Nien, as he contemplated hitting the 300-mark. “I didn’t actually know until I read the programme (at the weekend), but it will be a special moment for me. Not just for me, for my family, for my kids.
“When I finished the game (against Hull last Saturday), I took my kids around the pitch. They just see their dad running around, but I can tell them I’ve done it 300 times for this club now, which is nice. Although they probably don’t really care!
“I won’t be moving up on any goal charts or anything like that, so this sort of thing is very special to me. Everyone knows how much the North-East and the City of Sunderland mean to me. Getting to 300 would be incredible, but I’ll swap all of them as long as we win on Friday.”
When O’Nien moved to Sunderland ahead of the 2018-19 season he was joining a club that had just suffered a disastrous double-relegation taking them from the Premier League to League One.
O’Nien was a crucial figure in League One, leading by example as he slotted in wherever he was required, whether that be in midfield, at full-back or at the heart of the back four. Plenty predicted he would be unable to survive in the Championship. Plenty more suggested, last summer, that his time would probably be up when Sunderland appointed Regis Le Bris.
Instead, he has flourished in the second tier, establishing himself as both one of Le Bris’ most trusted on-field lieutenants and the Black Cats’ first-choice centre-half. Loyal, committed, ambitious. Everything you’d hope a professional footballer should be.
“I think the relationship when I joined the club just worked really well,” said O’Nien. “I had no interest in leaving. I’ve loved it here and there’s still a lot more to be done.
“I had some goals and ambitions when I joined the club. I’ve achieved some of them. This club has helped me, not just on the football side of it, but getting married, kids, everything up here.
“This place means the world to me, and there’s still a lot I want to achieve here. Not just individually, but collectively. As long as the club keeps moving forward, that’s one of my jobs here.”
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O’Nien’s debut for Sunderland came on the opening day of the 2018-19 season when he struggled in the first half of a 2-1 win over Charlton Athletic before being replaced at half-time. It was hardly the most auspicious of starts, but a look through the names of some of the players who lined up alongside him – Jon McLaughlin, Glen Loovens, Alim Ozturk, Donald Love, Chris Maguire – underlines just how much has changed over the course of his 300 games.
A host of team-mates have come and gone. Sunderland, as a club, has been completely transformed. Yet O’Nien has been the great survivor, the only member of the entire squad for that Charlton game that is still on the Black Cats’ books.
“My first game wasn’t the best game I ever had,” laughed O’Nien. “I watch it back, but I get better and I improve. I’m 300 games in now, and people never thought that after my debut. That’s the recipe and formula I take into every game.”
Tomorrow, O’Nien will understandably take a second or two to reflect on the past. After that, though, it will have been and gone. There might not be another 300 games to look forward, but O’Nien is determined to do everything he can to ensure that the future is bright.
“It doesn’t really matter too much what’s happened, to be honest,” he said. “What’s happened has happened now. It’s how you look at it back, how you watch it, how you get better.
“As long as we’re not the same team and at the same standard as we are today in two or three months’ time, then that’s the most important thing. We keep getting better and keep pushing each other. That’s all you can do.”
