Pace and power needed – Cats can’t fail again
RECRUITMENT SYSTEM HAS BEEN REVAMPED BUT THIS SUMMER IT NEEDS TO DELIVER IN A WAY IT HAS FAILED
Here we are again, looking longingly to the summer months. For respite, certainly, and also in the hope that this time, there will be a rebuild to believe in.
That August rolls around and brings with it a new Sunderland team that, for the first time in many a year, is ready to hit the ground running. A team that, for the first time in a decade, truly reflects the resilience and spirit of the city it purports to represent. Few will hold much hope. Should Ellis Short remain in charge, there will in all likelihood be a small budget for the manager to work with once again.
Sunderland will be able to shift a number of players, but some will remain, unwanted elsewhere.
Unless a new owner comes in with new funds, new ideas, the needle is unlikely to shift dramatically.
Nevertheless, the close season will bring an opportunity of sorts, even if Short remains in charge, and it is one that Sunderland simply have to take if they are to prevent large swathes of its support well and truly falling out of love.
Boss Chris Coleman will not give up on the relegation fight until the last whistle, but you suspect that, deep down, he is itching to get to a point where he can make substantial changes to his dressing room and squad, regardless of what division that is from.
There will be a natural turnover of players, with a number coming to the end of their contracts and others making their loan moves away from Wearside permanent.
Two words will surely dominate the rebuild. Pace and power. Coleman has made repeated reference to them during his short time at Sunderland, saying that, in these leagues, it can ‘change your life’.
Of all the injury woes he has suffered, the continuing absence of Paddy McNair and Duncan Watmore have surely been the most damaging. This season, Sunderland have been unbalanced, onedimensional, weak, lacking identity.
A major injection of athleticism is required if the Black Cats are going to become competitive and, most importantly of all, rebuild hope and faith in the stands.
Without investment, it will not be easy, but Sunderland simply cannot afford another summer where they fall into the trap of scrambling for players who have too long been out of favour, out of the weekly grind of playing football.
Saturday’s opponents, Preston North End, made for a fascinating case in point.
When Simon Grayson was poached from Preston and appointed Sunderland manager last summer, it was an appointment not universally celebrated but one largely accepted.
Absolutely central to that was the reputation Grayson was building for mining undervalued markets, finding talent that was proving remarkably adept at stepping up to the second tier.
He had rolled the dice on the largely ignored League of Ireland, bring in Andy Boyle, Daryl Horgan and Sean Maguire. They have not been universal successes, but Maguire is in the middle of a scoring streak that has made Jordan Hugill’s January sale irrelevant.
Many of his better players, including the consistent Chris Maxwell and the talented Tom Barkhuizen, were picked up for a pittance in the lower leagues.
At his Stadium of Light unveiling, Grayson said that he could return to the League of Ireland, and that all areas of the British Isles would be fertile recruitment ground.
Yet, ultimately, it was the same old story –