From Wearside to the World Stage: How Netflix’s ‘Sunderland ‘Til I Die’ created a sports documentary dynasty

In April 2021, Michael Krogh pressed play on a TV documentary of a football club almost 6,000 kilometres away. 

He jokes about how it all began – but what happened next is barely fiction. 

The Michigan-based sports fan opened Netflix and began to watch ‘Sunderland ‘Til I Die’ – but he was unaware that he had skipped ahead. 

“So, because I’m an idiot, I didn’t realize that I was watching Series 2,” he says. 

“Apparently my twin brother who shared my Netflix account had watched Series 1.” 

Dropping straight into the club’s compelling and dramatic League One season, rather than the disastrous and miserable second of consecutive relegations, Krogh found himself engrossed in a club – and a story – on the other side of the world. 

He adds: “I was hooked pretty immediately because that first year in League One was exciting. 

“I personally enjoyed League One, but that’s because I was falling in love with the team. 

“I enjoy the scrappy ball that’s played at that level, and I loved the characters: [Lynden] Gooch, [Luke] O’Nien, [Aiden] McGeady, and Jack Ross. 

“The passion of the supporters was palpable as well – and those red and white stripes were lovely.” 

For Krogh, the connection he formed with the club went beyond the screen and reflected his own heritage and identity. 

Originally born in South Dakota but relocated to Detroit, the Minnesota Vikings and Minnesota Twins fan saw himself – and his own culture – in Sunderland. 

“Detroit and Sunderland have a similar history: hard working, industrial, and now degraded a bit,” Krogh explains. 

“Both have bounced back quite nicely, but the halcyon days are behind. 

“All are professional teams that have proud histories but have won nothing to little. 

“The Vikings have the fourth best winning percentage of any NFL team since they started, but they have never won a Super Bowl. 

“The Twins trace their lineage back to the Senators, one of the founding clubs in the American League, but their last World Series was in 1991, one of only three in their 132 years. 

“So, Sunderland really resonated, because it was clearly a proud club with good support.” 

That kind of connection through a screen is often difficult to make; yet it was exactly what Fulwell73, the production company behind ‘Sunderland ‘Til I Die’, set out to create. 

The company, who had previously worked on ‘The Late Late Show with James Corden’ and Usain Bolt’s documentary ‘I am Bolt’, were used to dealing with global names – but ‘Sunderland ‘Til I Die’ offered something different: an opportunity to capture the everyday stories and voices that sit behind the football club. 

Executive producer Leo Pearlman says: “We didn’t assume that it would engage a global audience, but we believed in the principle, that authenticity travels. 

“When storytelling is done properly, geography becomes irrelevant. 

“What people connected with wasn’t Sunderland as a club, it was Sunderland as a story: a proud, working-class city, deeply tied to its team, navigating adversity. 

“That level of emotional truth is universally understood.” 

‘Sunderland ‘Til I Die’ opened the floodgates in the sports documentary world, with sports from Formula One to golf and clubs from Manchester City to Wrexham following in the show’s footsteps. 

And – as Pearlman reveals, its popularity came from the show’s raw personalities. 

“It demonstrated that long-form, multi-season storytelling could work in sport, if it was honest,” he continues. 

“Others have produced strong moments, the Manchester City series benefits from Pep Guardiola, and the Tottenham Hotspur series from José Mourinho, but they tend to fragment into highlights. 

“What we built was sustained engagement over time, across episodes and seasons. 

“That’s a different discipline, and it’s harder to achieve. 

“Football clubs are often framed through results and personalities, but their real identity sits with the people who sustain them every day. 

“By focusing on those voices, the staff, the supporters, the community, we captured something far more representative and far more powerful.” 

Eight years on, the documentary remains a global hit. 

According to streaming data analytics platform ‘FlixPatrol’, the show accrued 8.3 million viewing hours between 2023 and 2025 – evidence of the documentary’s ever-lasting appeal, something which Pearlman believes is down to its “authenticity”. 

He says: “I don’t think it’s overstating it to say it opened the floodgates and, in many respects, it still hasn’t been matched. 

“Much of what followed has been sanitised; you can feel the tension between storytelling and brand protection. 

“Our view was the opposite; authenticity strengthens a brand. 

“Audiences recognise truth instantly, and they reject anything that feels controlled. 

“We chose the harder path, and it created something far more enduring, both for us and for the club.” 

The documentary captured an audience on a global scale, with Pearlman saying the show opened the club’s appeal in the US, South Korea and Mexico. 

Krogh is a part of that US market. 

Alongside him, around a third of Sunderland’s North American Supporters’ Association’s 350 members joined because of the documentary – and for Krogh, that “personal connection” has been vital. 

He says: “They are my connection to the club. 

“Since no one around me supports them, they have been the personal connection I have. 

“I envy a lot of them because they are from the North East. 

“I almost feel like a fraud. 

“However, none of them have made me feel that way. 

“They’ve always made me feel like one of them, and they always are there to talk about it. 

“Without them, I think the passion would have fizzled a bit.” 

Only one year after learning that Wearside even existed, Krogh visited the North East. 

“I went to the Stadium of Light, the Fans Museum, and I had lunch at A Love Supreme,” he says. 

“Everyone was like, “Why are you visiting Sunderland?” 

“They thought it was so cool that a dude from Michigan, who brought his family to Scotland and England, would take a full day to travel to Sunderland. 

“People just loved that a ‘Yank’ supported their club. 

“They couldn’t believe it. 

“That’s the power of STID.” 

This summer, that journey is set to reach another big milestone for Krogh. 

Sunderland will tour the United States in pre-season, facing Liverpool, Leeds and Wrexham in Nashville, New Jersey and Philadelphia respectively. 

“I got tickets for my family to the New Jersey and Philadelphia games,” says Krogh. 

“I’m scoring jerseys for my two daughters. 

“I coach my youngest daughter’s second-grade soccer team. 

“My youngest is more into soccer and Sunderland than my oldest daughter. 

“I’m excited to see the lads in person and share it with my family.” 

As ‘Sunderland ‘Til I Die’ – and many of its successors – have proven, a sports story told through its authenticity has the power to travel globally. 

And – although Krogh’s story is personal – it isn’t the only such story you’d find. 

The documentary began a sports documentary dynasty, and because of it, as Krogh describes: 

“I found my team. I found a community.”