How Sunderland have become so good

Jobe Bellingham of Sunderland celebrates after he scores the opening goal against Oxford United
(Image credit: Ian Horrocks/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images)

After going close to back-to-back promotions via the play-offs in 2022/23, last season was a big old nothing for Sunderland. After some promising early-season form that put them fourth after 10 games, a malaise set in that did not lift for the rest of the campaign.

Sunderland lost to all but four of the rest of the Championship at some point over the campaign, with relegated Huddersfield joining automatically promoted Leicester and Ipswich in doing the double over them.

Tony Mowbray was regretfully dismissed in December. Michael Beale lasted barely two months in the job before being dismissed following consecutive defeats at struggling Huddersfield and Birmingham. Caretaker Mike Dodds oversaw a pretty dismal end to the campaign – just two wins from 13 – but the bottom-of-the-table pack was already so firmly entrenched that it didn’t particularly matter.

And now… under summer appointment Regis Le Bris, Sunderland sit top of the Championship, having taken more league wins (nine) and scoring as many goals (25) in the first 15 games of this season than did in the final 30 games of last term. Their rate of clean sheets has more than doubled, from 28 per cent last season to 60 per cent this. They have lost just twice.

Where before there was boredom and apathy, now there is excitement. How far can this team go? And can they stay the course and end an eight-year exile from the Premier League, half of which was spent down in League One?

Sunderland manager Regis Le Bris (Image credit: LOIC VENANCE/AFP via Getty Images)Youthful Kyril Louis-Dreyfus arrived as a co-owner of the club in February 2021, becoming the majority shareholder in May last year alongside 36 per cent owner Juan Sartori. Under the Swiss-French billionaire – a member of the extremely wealthy shipping magnate Louis-Dreyfus family – Sunderland have invested in the squad, with a particular focus on young talents.

However, this is not a story of a very wealthy owner pumping shedloads of cash intot he club to try and take them back to the promised land. Yes, Sunderland’s wage bill swelled by more than 50 per cent following their promotion back to the Championship in 2022 – but this really only brought them in line with the divisional average.

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As the best-attended side in the Championship, Sunderland had the third-highest revenues excluding parachute payments in the division in 2022/23 (the last year for which numbers are available), with their £8.9m loss before tax relatively small by wacky spend-heavy Championship standards. They made several signings this summer, but mostly free transfers who have barely featured or not featured at all.

What we have seen from Sunderland so far this season instead owes itself to the coming of age of a number of young players, clinical finishing, adaptable tactics, excellent goalkeeping… and a little bit of luck.

With an average of 23.3, Sunderland have had the youngest starting XI in the Championship this season. But even in that youthful side, Chris Rigg stands out as a success story.

The academy graduate broke into the side as a 15-year-old early last year and was gradually introduced to first team action before establishing himself as a regular starter this season. Still just 17, Rigg has become the youngest goalscorer in League Cup history and the youngest league goalscorer ever for Sunderland.

Despite being the division’s top scorers, Sunderland do not have a superstar goalscorer, instead sharing the goals around the team, and England youth international Rigg has played his part in that with three goals so far.

A tricky dribbler who operates in attacking midfield, Rigg captured particular attention in September with a sensational backheeled winner from a near-impossibly narrow-angle against rivals Middlesbrough.

Sunderland star Chris Rigg (Image credit: Getty Images)Yet despite the exciting talents littering their side, there is a sense that Sunderland may be in a false position. Go off xG game by game according to data we have compiled from Infogol, and Sunderland should have just 22 points with six wins, four draws and five losses and a goal difference of just +2, which would put them 9th or 10th – distinctly mid-table form.

Instead they are top of the table, with nine wins, four draws, just two losses, and a goal difference of +14. The difference between stats and reality? Outperforming the numbers at both ends of the pitch.

Keeping that up in front of goal is difficult over a season: there’s always a side or two at this level who get that run of good luck early in the season before falling away once deviation to the mean catches up to them. Sunderland’s top scorer Romaine Mundle, for example, has 4 goals from xG of 1.69 from the left wing; he is exceptionally unlikely to keep scoring at nearly three times his expected goals rate for the rest of the campaign.

There are some signs creeping into the stats that the season should be turning against Sunderland. After dominating the chances in the first four games (all won) despite playing largely on the counter-attack, Sunderland have “won” just two of their past 11 according to the xG.

Rigg Back-Heel Seals Victory | Sunderland AFC 1 – 0 Middlesbrough FC | EFL Championship Highlights – YouTube

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Those questions around the sustainability of their form have been helped along by a run of three draws in a row – but if there is hope for Sunderland that they can avoid the dreadful gravity of underlying statistics, it is at the other end of the field. A good goalkeeper is a good goalkeeper. And this season, Antony Patterson has been great.

Another academy graduate, goalkeeper Patterson has one of the highest save percentages of any goalkeeper in the division this season (79.4 per cent), and no other regular goalkeeper in the Championship keeps out shots that he shouldn’t with greater frequency: two of the nine he has conceded have been penalties, and another two were own goals.

Patterson picked up an injury in late October, but deputy Simon Moore has conceded just twice in four games in his absence – both of which came in the 2-2 draw against Coventry on the eve of the international break.

That could be crucial in Sunderland’s ongoing bid to defy the stats and continue their excellent, table-topping form. The Huddersfield side that unexpectedly finished third in 2021/22, for instance, had a particular knack for refusing to lose even games, doing so just once over the regular season, thanks in large part to the near-faultless performances of Championship goalkeeper of the year Lee Nicholls.

Dennis Cirkin of Sunderland celebrates after scoring his team’s second goal against Coventry (Image credit: Martin Swinney/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images)There is also legitimacy in the hope that this young team can only get better with experience and inter-personal familiarity; while Le Bris has taken an admirably pragmatic, game-by-game approach to his tactics.

Sunderland have dominated and won games with 35 per cent possession (away to Cardiff on the opening day) and 64 per cent possession (at home to Oxford) this season. Sometimes they set up 4-3-3, sometimes they drop an extra man back a bit deeper and go 4-2-3-1.

Momentum and belief can be wonderful things, and if Sunderland can rebound from the blow of letting a two-goal lead slip to a 2-2 draw at home to Coventry last time out, Sunderland could well ride their current wave all the way through to the end of the season.

Whether that will be enough to keep them in the automatic promotion places is another matter: the chasing pack have all made up ground on the league leaders over the past month or so, and Sunderland are currently top only on goal difference. But with 31 points already in the bag, a top six finish at the very least is a reasonable expectation.

Steven Chicken has been working as a football writer since 2009, taking in stints with Football365 and the Huddersfield Examiner. Steven still covers Huddersfield Town home and away for his own publication, WeAreTerriers.com. Steven is a two-time nominee for Regional Journalist of the Year at the prestigious British Sports Journalism Awards, making the shortlist in 2020 and 2023.