Regis Le Bris demands more from Sunderland wingers after Hull 'struggles'

Romaine Mundle and Patrick Roberts have been two stars of the Sunderland show this season, but Regis Le Bris still wants a lot more from them.

Sunderland wingers Patrick Roberts and Romaine Mundle / IMAGO / Focus Images

Regis Le Bris wants to see more variation from his wide players after Romaine Mundle and Patrick Roberts struggled create at Hull despite seeing plenty of the ball.

Sunderland ended up winning the game 1-0 thanks to a brilliant second-half solo effort from Wilson Isidor, but the first half was particularly frustrating for the Black Cats.

Le Bris’ men saw plenty of the ball, and Roberts in particular found himself in some great positions and able to take on the defender one-on-one.

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Both Mundle and Roberts are wingers who like to come inside onto their stronger foot, and Le Bris is wondering whether an over-reliance on that is making them too predictable to defend against.

He also questions whether it makes them too unpredictable for teammates to anticipate when and where the ball will be delivered.

“It’s not very easy to break that final third and we struggled,” Le Bris admitted after the win at Hull. “It’s not easy to break a low block like that.

“We tried many options. It was the one-v-one situation where we were not very efficient but this final part of the build-up phase is still the most difficult and I think we need time just to adjust our patterns to make it more predictable for us - so it’s easier to understand when Patrick or Romaine will cross for example and to understand when it is important to be in the box and arrive at the right time.

“These patterns are not set at the moment, but we will work on it. It’s another part of the game and maybe that game [Hull] was specific because they had the ball a lot of the time, more than expected probably.

“With Patrick it was unusual to have the ball so often in this one-v-one situation and he struggled a bit but it’s a new experience and we will improve this. It could be an option to change [the wingers] over because another one-v-one could cause [defenders] different problems.

“And they can cross with the wrong foot because they did it. We spoke with the players and I said, ‘if you want to come inside with your strong foot you need to create danger with your opposite foot because the defender will have these two options to defend.’

“If it’s only their main foot it’s easier to defend. I think we need to finish our actions and crosses are very important for that.”

With Abdoullah Ba out of favour (although he did put in a very good performance for the under-21s on Monday) and Ian Poveda injured, Sunderland do not have a plethora of options out wide.

Youngster Tommy Watson appears to be the closest to displacing Mundle or Roberts, although they have generally been in sparkling form this season.

Le Bris has also publicly mulled over the option of moving Wilson Isidor to a wide position and starting Aaron Connolly or Eliezer Mayenda (when the Spaniard is back from injury) up front, so there are certainly ideas to explore should Le Bris want to shake it up a little.