Four key questions Michael Beale must answer after Sunderland horror show

Defeats won't always build pressure on head coaches, but the manner of Sunderland's abject surrender at Huddersfield will do Michael Beale no favours at all.

Michael Graham | Feb 14, 2024

Four key questions Michael Beale must answer after Sunderland horror show /

It is never simple with Sunderland, but the 1-0 defeat to Huddersfield Town was even more demoralising than usual.

I mean, perspective is important, and we have obviously had much darker days than these, but there is a growing feeling of arduousness about watching Sunderland play now.

Some might argue that was the case in the latter weeks of Tony Mowbray’s tenure as well, and I respect that argument. For me, though, even if there was a drip of it under Mowbray, it has become a flood since Beale arrived.

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It’s important, of course, that we don’t turn every defeat and setback into a crisis with Beale. He seems to have the support of the club and isn’t going anywhere any time soon. He is more popular than he was, but one look on social media following the Huddersfield game will demonstrate just how fragile the recent ceasefire has been.

That ceasefire has been mainly based on results, mainly because the performances have been pretty patchy still, even in the three-game unbeaten run that the abject surrender to Huddersfield smashed to pieces.

There probably still hasn’t been a good genuinely good performance under Beale yet. There has been a good spell here, a decent half there, but that’s about it.

What is clear is that we have seen enough of Beale and his football to start forming opinions of our own and making judgements. It certainly isn’t just as case of ‘Rangers fans said this’ anymore.

And, for me, based solely on his football, there are a few key questions Beale needs to answer – because not much of it is looking very good at all, and even less of it is consistent with his words.

What is the tactical plan?

Michael Beale - tough night for Sunderland head coach — IMAGO / PA Images

It’s important that we don’t rewrite history when it comes to Tony Mowbray. After all, he was only popular, not perfect.

While there were perfectly legitimate and defensible reasons for sacking Mowbray, one thing you could never accuse his team of was lacking an identity and clear tactical plan.

Okay, the plan wasn’t always great, and it certainly wasn’t flexible, but you could see the patterns in their play and clearly understand what his team was trying to do.

Since Beale has taken over, it’s no longer possible to say that about Sunderland. There are no patterns in their football, little discernible intent, and no identity at all. I am sure Michael Beale would disagree with me on that, but I suspect few others would.

‘Play it forward quicker’ seems to be the crux of it, but that’s not really a tactical pattern. Full-backs are maybe getting forward a little bit more? Well, Trai Hume is at least, when he plays on the right anyway, but that’s about it.

And for all you can see faint hints of those potential tactical ideas, they are like dust in the wind and vanish as quickly as they arrive. It’s certainly not consistent.

We’ve been led to believe before that creating more overloads in wide positions is important, and yet…

What’s going on with the balance?

Abdoullah Ba - Sunderland midfielder — IMAGO / Focus Images

When Michael Beale first took over, a big problem tactically was a lack of natural balance in the team.

In the games against Preston, Newcastle and Hull (at home), Beale played Alex Pritchard on the right with instructions to drift inside. In fairness, Pritchard was never going to do anything else.

When Patrick Roberts returned from injury, Beale told us all how big a miss he was because he was a player who brought balance to the righthand side. That was fair enough.

“He’s been a loss because I think we lost our balance,” he said. “When I first came in, to lose Niall [Huggins] in the first game and then to lose Paddy, I don’t think people realise how big an impact that had on us.

“If you think of our flying full-backs and our wide players that come in, we’re a team that if we didn’t get you on the left, we’d try to get you on the right and that would open up space in the middle. All of a sudden, we’ve lost a lot of balance in our team.”

However, Abodullah Ba was available for those three games. He was just sitting on the bench.

Then, at Huddersfield, Ba was on the pitch, but he started the game playing on the left, alongside Jack Clarke, while Jobe Bellingham tried to play both central midfield and right wing simultaneously.

Now, with Roberts and Mundle sat on the substitutes bench, there was even less reason to believe it was forced. It’s a very deliberate choice. In fact, Beale talked about it specifically the day before.

“The idea in principle was right to overload that side, and I think they are going to have find a way to play together if they're going to play,” he said, referencing the game against Plymouth.

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“They've got to learn that they're stronger together and play in combinations, I think if you're a right-sided defender and you have to come up against Jack and Abdoullah, it becomes very difficult to double up on Jack."

So it’s clear by now that Beale is deliberately vacating the righthand side of Sunderland’s attack. He has now done it, through choice, in four of his 11 matches. Sunderland have lost three of them.

So, which one is it? Beale can’t offer up a claimed enforced lack of balance as an excuse for defeats whilst also choosing it even when he has his full array of wide options available for selection.

It’s just an incredibly confusing situation and when a head coach tells supporters one thing and then does another, it’s never going to inspire much trust.

Why are Sunderland not creating chances?

Jack Clarke Sunderland disappointed — IMAGO / NurPhoto

Sometimes you look at a team who are struggling and it’s clear they are struggling for confidence. Chances in front of goal are snatched at and games are lost.

That’s not what is happening at Sunderland under Beale, though. Chances are not even being created.

With the exception of the home win over Stoke, it’s hard to remember Sunderland really carving open a defence since Beale arrived.

Huddersfield was more of the same. Trai Hume’s big chance, the first of the game for the visitors, came in the 89th minute. In injury time, a Huddersfield defender nearly sliced into his own goal. That was it.

Last week against Plymouth, Sunderland scored with two efforts from outside the penalty box and one fine individual strike. Against Middlesbrough it was a goalkeeper error.

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Jack Clarke scored a brilliant solo effort against Hull, and with long range efforts against Ipswich and Doncaster, the latter of which was heavily deflected. Against Preston, it was another long-range effort, from Alex Pritchard on that occasion, and a Nazariy Rusyn goal that came after more brilliant solo work from Clarke.

There certainly are not many quality chances at all in Beale’s 11 games in charge that you can really remember that were not a result of defensive or goalkeeper error.

That’s a huge worry and I don’t care how Beale tries to dress it up.

If a ‘number 9’ is the plan, why not use the one available?

Michael Beale has spoken quite a bit about how he wants more penalty box presence, and it has been noticeable that Sunderland have been trying to cross the ball more since he took over.

And yet, Luis Hemir has been used for just 18 minutes in total – all in the same game – since Beale took over. They were the most impressive 18 minutes of the Portuguese striker’s Sunderland career so far as well.

Hemir is undoubtedly raw and he has a lot to learn, especially when it comes to his responsibility when Sunderland are out of possession.

However, he is also an imposing physical presence, can play with his back to goal, win headers against defenders, thrives off crosses and has a knack for finding space in the penalty box.

“We don't score enough goals from the nine position,” Beale said after the Huddersfield defeat.

“Trai had a big chance, their keeper makes an incredible save after, Paddy [Roberts] gets down the side and crosses it - where were we?!”

Okay, I can accept that is a frustration for Beale, as it is for the rest of us, but it rings a little hollow when he won’t even try his most natural number nine even when chasing a game.