Work ethic, diligence & tactical nous - I've had an up-close view of Régis Le Bris's stunning Sunderland start
Phil Smith has closely observed the early days of Regis Le Bris’s Sunderland tenure - and here’s what he’s made of it so far
After a little bit of time, you begin to anticipate the mood of the head coach and perhaps even what they might be about to tell you as the dust begins to settle on a game.
With Régis Le Bris, you can do this regardless of the result. ‘The margin between victory and defeat is fragile and thin’, or some variation of this phrase, tends to be his go-to. It’s interesting because it tells us much about his temperament and management style and most importantly, why there is cautious hope on Wearside that they might have found someone capable of delivering stability and success. Le Bris would of course be the first to tell you that these are still very early days.
The most striking thing about Le Bris when he first arrived on Wearside was his command of the language. He had only begun to learn two years previous, increasingly drawn to the prospect of coaching in England and determined to put himself in the best position to succeed if the opportunity arose. The speed with which he has achieved near fluency gives you an insight into his work ethic and his diligence, and will be no surprise to those who have spent time around him at the Academy of Light. Le Bris arrives early and leaves late, intensely dedicated to the craft of coaching and often seen spending long hours poring video clips of games and training sessions. In the early weeks of his tenure he mostly took a watching brief, keen not to interfere but to learn and observe. As the season neared that began to change, the head coach increasingly keen to put his own stamp on things.
The initial results were spectacular, allaying any concerns about what had been a troublesome second season for Le Bris at Lorient in which his side had shipped both chances and goals with an alarming regularity. In the opening four fixtures Sunderland barely yielded a chance, smothering teams with a high press in stages and picking them off on the break in others. In his opening press conference, Le Bris spoke at length about that difficult second season, explaining how the team lost the cohesion which had helped them to overachieve in his first season. The early stages of this season have made clear why he is so at ease working with young players, who have the athleticism to execute a high-intensity strategy but also the willingness to closely carry out tactical instruction. Le Bris will understand all the same that on the pitch, the hard work starts now. Unsurprisingly, teams are beginning to adapt and understand Sunderland’s style and in the last block of five fixtures the slight dip in results reflected the way the opposition were beginning to find space in more dangerous areas. Sunderland have conceded more chances and unsurprisingly, more goals as a result.
Still the signs are promising, particularly on home turf. Le Bris should over the next month or so have a deeper squad to pick from and it will be interesting to see if that allows him to better alter games from the bench, a luxury that so far this season has been afforded to his opposite numbers much more obviously. Perhaps most encouraging is the ease with which Le Bris has settled into his role off the pitch. If Sunderland seems to be a more settled place in the early weeks of this season, then strong results are obviously the most important aspect of that. It’s also in part due to the fact that Le Bris is genuinely comfortable with his role and place within the club’s structure, particularly when it comes to recruitment. That marks a clear shift from his predecessors and though it’s of course possible that could change over time if different views begin to develop or the pressure rises as results dip, it’s clear that Le Bris is genuinely comfortable with most of his work being done on the training pitch.
Le Bris has also been able to strike up a good rapport with supporters, who have been impressed with the clarity and calm with which he has spoken after defeats in particular. Le Bris may differ from previously popular Sunderland managers in that he is more reserved and has a very different background, but what he shares with those who have made a success of the job is an honesty in his communication. What he also shares with them is a rare ability to completely shut out outside noise, impervious to either praise or criticism. It is a quality utterly essential to managing a club where the emotions run high. In the early weeks of the season, it became almost comical as Le Bris continued to respond to being asked about various records tumbling with a deadpan ‘it is good’, or something similar. True to his word, though, there has been no shift in tone when the first inevitable signs of inconsistency appeared. Ask Le Bris for some tactical insight and he will deliver it generously and without blinking. Go searching for a headline, and prepare to be disappointed.
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Have Sunderland found the man who can take them back to the Premier League? Quite clearly it is far too early to tell. Only when Sunderland truly hit a tough run of form, and that will happen at some stage over the course of a long Championship season, will we learn about his ability to turn the tide both on the pitch and in the dressing room. What we can say with certainty is that a huge step into the unknown for all parties has started better than any could have hoped for, and Le Bris deserves credit for his role in bringing the optimism back to a club that had endured a genuinely dismal first half of the year.