Ciaran McKenna says…
Enzo Le Fée — magnifique!
“Le Magician” was brilliant.
He’s really stepped it up a gear the last month or so and he kept that form up. He didn’t put a foot wrong, pulling the strings and doing his defensive duties well. He gave up the penalty, too, although I’m not 100% sure why.
The fact that we had him in the Championship last year is becoming more and more baffling each week.
Romaine Mundle impresses
He was really good yesterday.
He’s been poor in his Premier League appearances so far this season, so this was a good chance for him. He showed the ability
and talent he has; his little jinking runs brought a lot of joy and he looked really dangerous.
Hopefully that gives him a good platform to push on.
A professional Sunderland performance
It was a really good, professional performance from the Lads.
It would’ve been easy to become complacent in the game and I’m glad they didn’t. There’s always a risk of faltering against lower league teams by slowing down to their tempo, but that never happened and everyone played brilliantly.
It was a tough battle at times with their directness, but we showed good team spirit and got the job done.
Sub-par displays from our strikers
Wilson Isidor and Eliezer Mayenda were poor and neither of them gave Régis Le Bris nor Brian Brobbey anything to worry or think about.
I’m aware that it must be difficult to have played so much last season and even at the start of this season only to be pushed out of the team, but Brobbey was signed for £20 million and has played really well so he deserves to start.
I love them both but Mayenda and Isidor need to improve and do more.
Lee Morrison says…
An assured performance all round
Given that we seem to have had a weekend of narrow results against Premier League opposition (Arsenal aside), it was reassuring to see such a controlled performance.
With our lineup being as strong as it was, we can rest assured that Régis Le Bris is taking the cup seriously and although we only won by a one-goal margin, we dominated in all areas.
Had their goalkeeper not performed as well as he did, we would’ve been looking at a comfortable three or four-goal win.
A strong showing from Romaine Mundle
Like many others, I’ve been bemused to see the amount of ill-advised comments about Mundle over the past few weeks, so it was fantastic to see him attacking their full back from the off.
At times, he was our strongest threat and I hope that this game will give Mundle the confidence to push on and seize opportunities when they arise.
To write off one of our own players in a much more challenging league after coming back from a serious injury is nothing short of pathetic, and I hope that Mundle gets his own “Watson-esque” moment to prove the doubters wrong.
Some absolutely atrocious commentary
Sweet Christ.
From not knowing where we’d signed players from to just blatantly spouting rubbish, I don’t think I’ve heard two worse commentators for one of our games for quite some time. Sadly, TNT Sports have a deal with the FA for several more years.
Here’s hoping we get a home draw in the next round, or at the very least, we get some more competent people to work on our game.
Greater competition needed for Brian Brobbey?
Whilst the rise of Brobbey has been something to behold, we do need other players to be available in that position.
For me, though I suppose you could put it to a lack of service at points. Wilson Isidor did very little to challenge Brobbey for that starting role up front and I was hoping that much like the West Ham home game, this would be the chance for both Isidor and Eliezer Mayenda to get on the scoresheet and show what they’re capable of.
As things stand, for me personally, there’s a gap in quality between Brobbey and his competitors.
