Regis Le Bris Must Make Pivotal Changes To Sunderland Starting XI To Save Season

Sunderland suffered a bruising Premier League defeat to Bournemouth on Sunday afternoon in another abject performance, which has left the Black Cats slumped in the relegation zone.

Bournemouth beat Sunderland 2-0 courtesy of an early goal from Marcus Tavernier, with the Cherries profiting from some atrocious defending from Omar Alderete and Kevin Danso, with the Spurs loanee dismissed just ten minutes after the opener after some more shocking defensive work from the experienced duo. 

Ten-men Sunderland looked deflated, lost and out of ideas, and the scoreline could easily have been 4-0 to Marco Rose’s side if not for several strong saves from Black Cats shot-stopper Robin Roefs. 

Unfortunately, the Dutchman could do nothing to stop Evanilson doubling Bournemouth’s lead early in the second half after an ill-fated back pass from Alderete gave the Brazilian frontman acres of space to round Roefs and double his side’s advantage, leaving Sunderland with an insurmountable deficit to climb. 

As a result of his confusing and poor selection decisions before the game, which are becoming a trend within the early stages of the season for Sunderland, Black Cats boss Regis Le Bris must make some pivotal changes to his starting XI, or he may find himself out of employment at the Stadium of Light sooner rather than later. 

The crucial change Le Bris must make to the Sunderland starting XI is to extinguish his use of natural defenders on the right side of midfield and utilise two wingers on either flank in his typical 4-3-3/4-2-3-1 system. 

At Bournemouth on Sunday, Le Bris once again lined up with trademark right-back Trai Hume in an advanced right midfield role for Sunderland, with attack-minded central midfielder Enzo Le Fee operating on the left with Chris Rigg as the number ten in behind novice forward Timur Tutierov, thus leaving over £70m worth of wide attacking talent on the bench in Malick Fofana, Nilson Angulo and Chemsdine Talbi. 

In truth, with this line-up in attack, Sunderland had lost the game at the Vitality Stadium before referee Craig Pawson even blew for kick-off, which was compounded by the horrific defending shown by Danso and Alderete. 

As a result, it is imperative for Le Bris to utilise two wingers from now on, and with his lengthy exclusion of Talbi following the Moroccan’s talks with a move to the Saudi Pro League in the summer window, it seems as though he would prefer £30.8m signing Fofana and Ecuadorian winger Angulo to operate in those two positions. 

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Unfortunately for Le Bris, this is where the Sunderland boss’ selection headache will worsen, given how poor the two wingers were in last week’s comeback win over Torreense in the Europa League, which saw both withdrawn before Jules Ahoka’s equaliser and Noah Sadiki’s injury-time winner.

Regardless of form, the Sunderland manager needs to employ two wingers and instruct them to act as attacking outlets rather than turning back and recycling possession, as both Fofana and Angulo have done far too often this season, to wrestle back some attacking threat whilst keeping Le Fee as the centrally positioned playmaker.

Sunderland's survival and thriving game plan was built on their defensive rigidity last season, but if the overly cautious Le Bris does not disengage the defensive handbrake within his Sunderland side, then the Black Cats' campaign will continue heading in full-steam reverse.