Régis Le Bris’ Sunderland have developed more than just a knack for scoring late goals of recent times, with six of our last seven competitive games seeing us score in the 84th minute or later.
Not only are we scoring late, these last-gasp goals are also generally pivotal – only Wilson Isidor’s stoppage-time third against West Ham did not directly change the result.
The drama of May’s Play-Off run must still be seared into all of our minds, of course, then Marc Guiu’s late leveller against Huddersfield
took us to penalties and Isidor got the winner against Brentford. Wilson, clearly, a fan of the spectacle!
How are we doing it so consistently, though? And should we be worried at all that we seem to need these miracle finishes to win games?
No Tippy-Tappy Football
Okay, that’s a lazy joke at Sam Allardyce’s podcast name, you got me. It is also, however, the main reason we have such a penchant for striking late in my view.
Le Bris consistently sets his teams up to be three things, in this order: well organised, defensively solid, and hard to break down; tireless in the press, whether that’s high or low; direct, pacy, and clinical on the break.
That isn’t to say he doesn’t want us to score, but we see week in, week out that Sunderland play their best when the first two ingredients are present, as the third generally takes care of itself. If you restrict the space and frustrate the opposition, sooner or later, they will make a mistake; be it haste, frustration, or simply sloppy play, the gaps will open, and you will get chances.
Then we hurt teams.
Eliezer Mayenda at Coventry was the poster child for this sort of goal, taking advantage of a Milan van Ewijk howler to be ‘Johnny on the spot’ and finish coolly to give us a first-leg lead.
For me, this is down to the above insistence of Le Bris on solidity as a platform for counter-attacking, of course, but also the mindset this instils in the players. Every first instinct is forwards – Mayenda has no thought other than to bear down on goal at the CBS Arena, just like Isidor had nothing in his mind except cutting in and finishing against West Ham.
We foster a culture of direct attacking play, so in the 89th minute when you’re running on instinct and little else it becomes that bit easier to focus on what maters – scoring goals!
Looking to the Bench
I wrote last year criticising Le Bris for his seeming reluctance to rotate his team, both in terms of starting line-ups and in-game substitutions. I’d still defend that piece – at the time, it was a problem – but Régis certainly shut me up in May!
In the latter half of the campaign, as we clearly wound down in preparation for the big games, Le Bris was changing his team, in fact, too regularly for some folk, with it being seen as somewhat of a capitulation.
In hindsight, without everything he learned about his wider squad and how he can use it, we probably aren’t in the Premier League, and almost certainly not with six points.
Once he was more comfortable shaking things up, we unlocked the ability to not just stay in games ‘til the end, but turn them around. Wembley is the perfect example, with the second half changes bringing us control of the game and Tommy Watson the super-sub, scoring THAT iconic goal. (Somewhere, I hope Rocketman is playing as you read this line.)
Both of Isidor’s strikes this term came off the bench, too, demonstrating just what value fresh legs can have, particularly when they have the raw pace of Wilson powering them.
What Price Momentum?
The darker side of this run of late goals is, of course, the ugly question: what happens if they dry up?
That is a legitimate concern, no doubt. Had we failed to score any of the late Play-Off goals, we likely wouldn’t have gone up, and missed out on possibly the most transformative summer the club’s ever had.
But is it an actual worry? I’d suggest not – we played the Play-Offs in a very specific way to suit the team we had. The late goals were icing on the cake in terms of drama, but we had no other serious option in terms of tactics. This season, we will obviously be more reliant on fast breaks again, as the majority of sides will fancy their chances of keeping 60%+ of the ball and beating us. Let them try.
On the flip side, the gargantuan boost in momentum each successive late goal has given us cannot ever be understated. After Mayenda scored against Coventry, I felt confident. After Dan Ballard, I felt euphoric. After Tommy Watson? Invincible.
The intangibles in football can make all the difference. For a young, newly-assembled team taking on its first top-flight season in nearly a decade, the boost Isidor’s twin late goals will have given them must be enormous. Not only has it helped prove they can win up here, but it’s hopefully shown the Championship lads that came up with us that they have just as big a part to play as anyone.
