 The match took place at Wembley Stadium. | |||||||
| Event | 2018–19 EFL League One | ||||||
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| Date | 26 May 2019 | ||||||
| Venue | Wembley Stadium, London | ||||||
| Referee | Andrew Madley | ||||||
| Attendance | 76,155 | ||||||
The 2019 EFL League One play-off final was an association football match which was played on 26 May 2019 at Wembley Stadium, London, between Charlton Athletic and Sunderland to determine the third and final team to gain promotion from EFL League One to the EFL Championship. The top two teams of the 2018–19 EFL League One season gained automatic promotion to the Championship, while the teams placed from third to sixth place in the table partook in play-off semi-finals; the winners of these semi-finals competed for the final place for the 2019–20 season in the Championship.
Sunderland had reached the play-off final in their first season back in the third tier of English football, having been relegated from the Premier League in the 2016–17 season and the Championship in the 2017–18 season. The two clubs had faced one another in a play-off final before, in the 1998 Football League First Division play-off final, making it the first time in the history of the play-off format that a fixture had been repeated. The 2019 final was watched by a crowd of more than 76,000 people and refereed by Andrew Madley. Sunderland took the lead early in the first half when Charlton's Mouhamadou-Naby Sarr scored an own goal. The equaliser for Charlton came from Ben Purrington before half time, and Patrick Bauer scored the winning goal late into additional time in the second half, ending the match 2–1 to Charlton.
Sunderland started their next season in League One which was temporarily suspended as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. After the season was curtailed, they finished in eighth position on points-per-game. Charlton's first season back in the EFL Championship was also interrupted by the pandemic, and after resumption, the club ended the season in 22nd position and were relegated back to League One.