Have you heard the joke about the so-called “Deserved Premier League Table” and how the team currently sitting proudly in fourth place should apparently be in the lower reaches of the league on the basis
that we’re allegedly outperforming various metrics by a considerable distance?
Well, pass me a needle and thread so I can stitch my sides back together, because as part of the latest episode of Sunderland’s Supposedly Unrepresentative Start To Life In The Premier League, the good folks at Opta have effectively decreed that the efforts of Régis Le Bris and his players are actually an illusion; a fallacy based on, well, what, exactly?
To put the tin lid on it, the story of this startling breakthrough was gleefully published in the form of an alternative league table printed by The Daily Mail on Saturday.
When I read the article in question, I scoffed and didn’t waste a single second in dismissing it as the latest piece of sensationalist claptrap from a mass media that seems to take peculiar pleasure in both talking Sunderland up and slapping us down whenever the mood takes them. “Granit Xhaka is the signing of the summer…but they’re actually not achieving results that tally with their underlying data” is quite the take, but such is modern-day football that you have to take the rough with the smooth — particularly as a newly-promoted side.
As I’ve previously written on the pages of Roker Report, I’m not, and never will be, a disciple of data or someone who uses XG ratings and the like to pass judgement on Sunderland’s efforts on a Saturday afternoon.
Perhaps this puts me on the wrong side of the argument when it comes to the modern game and therefore pigeonholes me as an out-of-touch “legacy fan”, but I’ll simply never believe that graphs and the like are the most effective method of gauging how well a team is doing.
At its heart, football is not mathematical.
Despite the abundance of data that’s now on tap and the amount of airtime given to those who believe it’s the only way to truly judge a team, the game that we all love remains a contest of heart, skill, creativity, the ability to handle pressure and the vision to see things that others can’t.
Last Saturday night, for example, you didn’t need to crack an algebraic equation to understand that Brian Brobbey’s equaliser against Arsenal was a showcase of sheer tenacity and coolness under pressure — and nor did you need to call upon a NASA scientist to deduce that Dan Ballard’s opener was a most simple yet beautiful goal: an accurate free kick, a dominant header, a sweet touch and a crisp strike. Well-judged, effective, and priceless.
Similarly, how do you quantify leadership, unity, inspiration and high standards?
You see it every week when Granit Xhaka takes to the field and leads his teammates into battle, but to actually try and summarise it in numbers? Impossible. The desire to make that block, to cover an opponent’s run or to rise above your marker at a corner has to come from a primitive place, not the inner workings of a computer — and that’s what we’ve done all season.
For some time, there’s been a creeping Americanization of football in the United Kingdom, from the increasingly gimmicky television coverage to the influx of data that I suspect your average fan doesn’t give two hoots about.
The movie Moneyball might’ve highlighted the alleged genius when it came to player trading and performance analysis of Oakland Athletics guru Billy Beane (despite the A’s not winning baseball’s World Series since the glory days of ‘The Bash Brothers’ in 1989) but I prefer to judge football matches with my eyes — and my eyes tell me that the Lads are where they are on merit after a series of wholehearted performances, a willingness to stand toe-to-toe with opponents of high class and a refusal to concede defeat even when things looked cagey.
Have we got it completely figured out? No.
There’s always room for improvement and of course we’ll be on the losing side now and again, but to cite such a flimsy methodology as concrete proof that we don’t deserve to be where we currently are is an insult to the efforts of the players as well as the supporters who’ve backed the Lads so vociferously during 2025/2026.
Let me wrap this article up with a question: let’s assume Sunderland win a game with a last-gasp goal having been behind on all of the major metrics — possession, chances created, and so on — for much of the game.
As you’re walking back across the Keel Crossing and chatting with your mates about the game, are you going to be focusing on our “field tilt” readings and heat maps, or the fact that the Lads have just grabbed another three points through sheer heart, desire and will to win, sending you home happy in the process?
I rest my case.
