Lynden Gooch opens up on his big Sunderland call, an incredible turnaround and what's next - exclusive

The sliding interception is on the money and the ball flies halfway down the next practice pitch.

After a (very) short summer of rest and recuperation, Lynden Gooch is back.

“Seems to be getting shorter every year,” he jokes.

There was interest from elsewhere as his contract edged to its end but deep down, those tears Gooch had shed on the Wembley turf revealed where his heart still lay.

This club, where his roots run deep and where he has played for 16 years now, was where he wanted to be.

“It was obviously documented in the press that I could have left, and I could have, probably for more money,” he says.

“But I felt like where I wanted to be for the long term, especially after the success we had, I didn’t want to leave after that.

“Then to work with the manager again, I’ve got a really good relationship with him.”

None of this was inevitable, though. By June his mind may have been made up but there is a very plausible alternate history where Gooch is not part of this Championship squad, looking to a new chapter in Sunderland’s history with optimism.

That day was also the emotional denouement to a remarkable turnaround, which brought Gooch back from the point where he genuinely believed his love affair with Sunderland was about to end if not on a sour note, then certainly an underwhelming one.

Versatility was becoming less of a virtue and more of a curse. Gooch was drifting from position to position, criticism was stinging and the club’s direction was unclear

Alex Neil changed all that.

Gooch may prefer to operate in an attacking role but at least now he understood his role would be in the defensive unit. Once he knew that, he could embrace it. As Sunderland’s form slowly but very surely began to turn, he never looked back.

“There were definitely some tough times last season where I thought maybe I was going to need a fresh challenge,” he explains.

“Especially around January time I thought my time here was probably going to come to an end.

“Football is really strange, things can change really, really quickly so after January I tried just to get my head down as best I could to try and achieve something. Luckily we were able to do that.

“That whole experience, it was just class.

“From the first day the gaffer came in, he just said, ‘look whatever has happened has happened. We’ve got a really good chance of achieving something still, so let’s not waste it’. We all just sort of took it from there.

“One of the things when he came in was he said that he wanted to try and play me consistently in one position,” he adds.

“For me, that was really good after playing here, there and everywhere.

“I’m always happy to do that for the team but I did feel I probably needed a bit of stability so that I could focus on doing the job properly, rather than having to change my mindset [every game] depending on where I was playing on the pitch.

“Everything changes depending on where you’re playing so that consistency was important.”

So what next, is the obvious question at this point.

It’s notable that in Sunderland’s pre-season exercises so far, Gooch has been operating as a right winger.

Recruitment is ongoing and competition is significant but it is not lost on the American that he has a chance to catch Neil’s eye.

Fundamentally, though, his stance has not changed: he’ll do what’s required as Sunderland try to make the step up.

“The manager knows I like to play further forward but it’s not something we’ve discussed,” he explains.

“We don’t have to, he knows I can fill in where needs be.

“At the minute, he wants to try and get me up the pitch. It’s not a conversation we’ve had, but that is the way training has been since we came back in.

“Hopefully I can prove myself in that role but look, Patrick [Roberts] is a top player. Then you’ve got Leon [Dajaku], Jack Diamond who is back from a really, really good season on loan at Harrogate.

“I need to prove myself, I know that, and get those goals and assists that I have done previously.”

For the team more generally, it’s hard to place exactly what the ambition for this season will be.

The gulf between League One and the Championship is severe and so first and foremost, it has to be about consolidation.

For most supporters, Dan Ballard’s arrival offered an exciting start but the transfer business still to be done will reveal the immediate ambitions.

Gooch has a measured but upbeat assessment, that there is a core here who in time achieve something with the right support.

A good place to start is to try and keep riding the wave, one that brought a club back together and transformed his own prospects along the way.

“Everyone around the building is so happy to say that we’re a Championship club again.

“It’s been a tough few years because everyone around the place was used to us being in higher leagues. People were praying that this year would be our year so it’s nice to have that feeling of everyone being happy, and most importantly ready to go again.

“One nice thing as well is that we’ve re-signed Bailey and Patrick, so we’re keeping the core of the playing group together.

“I spoke to Bailey a lot during the summer, we’re close mates. We both wanted to stay but obviously it had to be right for both of us.

“But I think it’s something you’ve seen with other clubs that have gone up from League One, Sheffield United probably are the biggest example of it. They kept that core together and over a bit of time, they built and were able to then go up to the Premier League.

“Every club is different but I don’t think you want to have a massive change and then have to start all over again. We’ve got a lot of good players and players who have played at this level before as well, so I think it’s really good to see that we’re together still.

“We want to keep the momentum going, that feel-good factor we’ve built.

“Hopefully there will also be those additions to the squad that takes us to the next level, and that’s really important.

“Keep the core together, make those additions, and I think we can be a really good side.”

Exactly where you’ll find Lynden Gooch on the pitch still remains to be seen.

What you’ll get from him, though, is pretty clear.

It’s an asset that in the end Sunderland knew they couldn’t lose.