Sunderland returned to the Stadium of Light for the first time in a fortnight as they looked to end their successive spell without a win against a struggling Crystal Palace side who themselves hadn’t won in nine matches across all competitions.
With news surrounding the departure of two of Palace’s most influential figures – their captain and manager – with news of their talisman striker also set to leave, how did Le Bris tweak his system and put the outside noise to the side in order to ensure Sunderland
collected another win at home?
Sunderland Line-Up
With a full week to recover following the third-round victory against Everton, Le Bris made several changes to his side which formed a more routine look to what has been expected throughout the season. Reinildo returned to the back four to partner Sunderland’s strongest defensive unit on paper whilst Xhaka, Sadiki and Le Fée made up Sunderland’s midfield trio. Along the forward line, Brian Brobbey returned to the starting line-up following some muscle tightness suffered on Merseyside, whilst Romaine Mundle retained his place and Trai Hume came in to the right side of midfield due to the absence of Bertrand Traoré following his return from international duty.
Given Oliver Glasner’s 3-4-3 system, Sunderland were facing a slightly different shape and therefore Hume was deployed in order to help with the overloads by Crystal Palace by acting as both a traditional right midfielder in possession but also an auxiliary full-back into a back three/five when Sunderland were put under pressure.
With Chemsdine Talbi back for Sunderland’s next trip to West Ham, Mundle was provided with one last opportunity to stake his claim on Sunderland’s left flank ahead of Talbi likely returning to the starting role. Following his comments earlier in the week regarding playing time, Mundle was selected ahead of Simon Adingra and looked to exploit a weakness in Crystal Palace’s full-back position.
Opposition Line-Up
With Crystal Palace crashing out of the FA Cup last week, Glasner turned his full attention to the league with as strong a side as he could’ve named on the day. With Marc Guéhi the obvious omission, Jean-Philippe Mateta was rumoured to have met with representatives from Juventus on Friday night but still made his return to the matchday squad.
Elsewhere, with a continued lay-off of star wing-back Daniel Muñoz, Palace were forced to deploy Justin Devenny at an unorthodox wing-back role whilst new signing Brennan Johnson returned to his role just behind the striker. Dean Henderson donned the captain’s armband in the wake of Guéhi’s departure and looked to galvanise a group who were in need of a spark.
Palace play with a distinct 3-4-3 system which sees Tyrick Mitchell and normally Muñoz occupy the natural width whilst two inside forwards act as supporting forwards behind Mateta, capable of dropping into the midfield and linking up attacks or making diagonal out-to-in runs to cause chaos on the break. With more of a focus around transitional play, Glasner has often struggled to play against set defences and therefore likes them to sit deep and open up space in between the lines for the natural athleticism of their forwards.
Catching Us Cold
Sunderland have been proactive this season in their efforts to assert pressure in the opening stages of games to unsettle opposition sides; however it was the visitors who started brightest in this one through their aggressive pressing. Early pressure forced Granit Xhaka to play an uncharacteristic wayward pass into the open before Mateta eventually found himself barrelling down on goal only to be saved by a strong hand of Roefs.
The Palace press unsettled Sunderland early on due to the heavy amount of positional rotation within the Palace midfield and therefore we struggled to break the lines and often resorted to safe possession within our own half. Sunderland saw 57% possession in the opening period and 200 completed passes, which similarly to comments made last week meant that by half-time we’d completed around 68% of our average total number of passes per game in only half of the match.
An Instant Response
In what proved to be the only other attempt on target for Palace, a cheaply conceded corner was driven into the box for Roefs to punch clear; the resulting contact landed straight in the direction of Jeremy Pino who was able to caress the ball seemingly in slow motion back towards the goal before nestling in the top corner. With 30 minutes on the clock Sunderland found themselves a goal down and needed to respond quickly to avoid presenting Palace with the perfect platform to take points back down to London.
Sunderland hit back brilliantly following a slick passing move which demonstrated the importance of both Dan Ballard’s ability to break lines from the back, but also Trai Hume’s inverted hybrid role to draw attention and create space for his teammates. Ballard was able to drill a ball inside to Hume, who due to his positional rotation drew in three Palace players in Mitchell, Hughes and Pino and exploited space down the Palace flank for Mukiele to advance into before Xhaka played a weighted ball into the gap.
With Palace out of position, Adam Wharton was forced to engage with the onrushing Sadiki which allowed Enzo Le Fée to ghost into the penalty area unmarked and stroke home a delightful finish past Henderson to level up the game within five minutes of the restart. Sunderland demonstrated that when presented an opportunity to string a set of passes together, like at Spurs they’re able to carve teams open and it bodes well for our chance creation when required.
Second Half Control
Sunderland emerged for the second half after an encouraging team talk in the tunnel by Granit Xhaka and looked to really turn the screw to secure all three points. After a prolonged spell of pressure which saw Sunderland winning the bulk of their 50/50s, Mundle was bundled over in the box by Devenny and was lucky not to see a penalty given after it was clear he’d planted an elbow to Mundle’s back.
Both full-backs began advancing up the pitch by winning their individual battles as Reinildo and Mukiele combined for a 10/16 duel success rate whilst in midfield Xhaka went a perfect 4/4 and Noah Sadiki as industrious as ever won 6/9 of his duels including three tackles, three recoveries and an interception to boot.
Following Sunderland’s breakthrough by Brian Brobbey, they never relinquished control of the game and Crystal Palace didn’t register a single shot on target for the remainder of the affair. Whether this was down to good game management or simply a mental break from Palace as they resigned themselves to another defeat after a turbulent 24 hours we’ll never know.
Brobbey Magic
After some sustained pressure, Brian Brobbey was once again able to fashion a chance out of nothing and diverted the ball past Dean Henderson in spectacular fashion to complete the Sunderland comeback and secure all three points on the afternoon. Contorting his body in a fantastic fashion he was able to roll the ball down his forward foot and arc the ball over the outrushing Henderson.
With a shot-on-target xG of just 0.31, even after Brobbey had struck the ball the chance of going in remained slim so to have diverted the ball into the net against the odds shows yet another moment of individual genius from Sunderland’s new frontman.
Brobbey had a great tussle up against Lacroix all afternoon and even featured within Sky’s Monday Night Football analysis by Thierry Henry for how to perfectly execute hold-up play along with how to manufacture a finish from nothing.
Preserving the Home Record
With only Arsenal rivalling Sunderland’s unbeaten home record in the league this season, the Stadium of Light has developed a real sense of inevitability about it; therefore once Sunderland took the lead they never looked back. As the final fifteen minutes ticked over, the least it felt like Sunderland were going to emerge with was a point and it showed; Crystal Palace were unable to muster up any chances of real note with their only further attempt on goal a blocked header from Mateta.
With a real subconscious mentality of never giving up, Sunderland have now surpassed the halfway mark and with only visits from Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United remaining from inside the top six, having created a real siege mentality for opposition players when they venture North.
With relegation all but mathematically secured based largely on Sunderland’s home form, it must be highlighted that fans really do remain the 12th man this season and have created an imposing impression on all Premier League sides that make the trip up in future seasons. Building a strong base allows for the continued development of talent and allows young players who’ve previously struggled like Brobbey to thrive and find their feet in red and white.
Lighter Schedule
With Sunderland returning to their usual routine of one match per week and both Chemsdine Talbi and Habib Diarra re-integrating into training following their chaotic final on Sunday night, the squad looks to be in great shape as we face two opponents currently in freefall. West Ham are struggling but with recent wins under their belt could prove to be an issue.
