Sunderland reporter Chris Young gives his verdict after the Black Cats suffered an opening day drubbing at Leicester City. Costel Pantilimon: Kept the score respectable with several saves, but beaten four times. 4 Billy Jones: Completely at sixes and sevens and removed for his own good. 2 Sebastian Coates: Exposed when left one-on-one, and a shadow of the no-nonsense defender who finished last season. 3 Younes Kaboul: Deserved some sympathy for van Aanholt’s wayward positioning, but it looked like it was his first competitive game since January. 3 Patrick van Aanholt: Partly at fault for three of goals and completely abandoned his defensive duties in the second half. 2 Lee Cattermole: Daft tackle to concede a penalty and was sacrificed for the necessary change of system. 3 Jack Rodwell: Began to be a bit more involved late-on, but utterly anonymous for the first hour. 3 Seb Larsson: Kept working, but like the rest, didn’t look sharp. 4 Adam Johnson: Provided a nice through-ball for Defoe’s goal, but too many slack passes. 4 Jeremain Lens: Welcome to Sunderland! Some nice touches, but clattered a couple of times. 4 JERMAIN DEFOE: Arguably the only player to emerge with any credit, opened his account and could have had a couple more. 7 Subs: Fletcher (for Cattermole, 30): Got a goal and at least managed to hold the ball up. 5 Matthews (for Jones, 54): Didn’t look much more defensively solid than Jones. 3 Leicester: Schmeichel 6, De Laeet 6, Huth 6, Morgan 6, Schlupp 7, King 6, Drinkwater 7, Mahrez 9, Albrighton 8, Okazaki 7, Vardy 9. Subs: Benalouane (for De Laet, 75) 6, Fuchs (for Mahrez 77), 6, Kante (for Vardy 82), 6. Prolly about right maybe abit kind for some lol.
And we made them look like real Madrid, there is instilled a mentality too be in the bottom 3, and no manager is going to change that. I saw a better team in 1990 than this one, they are league 2 standard and it is shocking. Do these players watch/know the basics of football ? are they interested in our club. The mags spend £36 m on 3 players and what have we done ?. Vardy cost £1.5 m for Leicester and they have Huth who I said we should have signed years ago. Hopefully Junajez will come in as well as a premier standard defender before next week. Big match next week now.
Problem is monty the heads dropped after they scored and didn't look interested in the game. It's like terry said on a thread we need to start giving teams like Leicester respect that includes our fans to.
It was harsh on Lens too, some lovely touches, found acres of space but never got the ball, set up our 2nd goal. Only to get a 4? Bit harsh, when the midfield three are so similarly marked when they were undeniably to blame for the bad performance. Lazy ****ing half arsed ****s in the middle of the park.
He was, but I'm not saying he's a 10, I think a 6 is fair. to put him in the same group as the three CMs in the 3/4 category is harsh imo.
