'Showing progress’ - Graeme Murty reacts as Ahmed Abdullahi, Harrison Jones and Jack Whittaker shine

Graeme Murty praised Sunderland U21s’ clinical finishing after his side continued their strong run of form with another impressive victory, with Ahmed Abdullahi, Harrison Jones, Jack Whittaker and Jake Warers all on the scoresheet.

Murty’s side have built significant momentum in recent weeks and once again demonstrated their attacking quality, though the lead coach admitted the performance was at times disrupted due to the number of changes within the team.

“Interesting game, very, very disjointed, I thought, because of so many changes and so many dropped in from the first team,” Murty said after the game. “As we kind of expected, the lads accommodated that quite well. We played some really, really good stuff, and we played some stuff that was really clunky.”

Despite those inconsistencies, Murty felt Sunderland’s ability to take key chances ultimately proved decisive. “Against a young Leeds team, I thought were really aggressive and really intense. They brought real good physicality, and I really enjoyed watching them play. I enjoyed the game, if I'm honest, and I thought that we showed once again our ability to be clinical in critical moments of the game. That enabled us to take the game away from Leeds a little bit.”

Two goals from Abdullahi plus strikes from Harrison Jones, Whittaker and Waters underlined the attacking depth within Murty’s squad, with several of Sunderland’s young players continuing to show encouraging development. Murty said that progress is exactly what the club hopes to see from its academy prospects.

“They're showing progress, and that's all we can expect from our young players,” he said. “We are in a really fortunate position because we get to see them over the years, and people who come to watch them get to see them intermittently. They get to see them every Saturday or every Monday whenever they come and step onto the pitch, but we get to see these young men grow over a number of years.”

Murty also highlighted the importance of the environment created around Sunderland’s academy, insisting development extends beyond performances on the pitch. “We're really proud of the environment that we create that enables our young players to learn, to improve, to grow as young men, not just young athletes,” he said. “We're really pleased that they're going to go from wherever they get to with us into another environment and represent what we do really well, but we would obviously hope for that to be progressing through to our first team.”

Murty believes the challenge for the club’s young prospects is maintaining the consistency required to reach that level. “We know the standard is really high, we know the standard hasn't been removed, and we aspire to help young people develop into athletes and players that can perform at that level on a consistent basis. If we can do that, allied to the hard work that they do, then we set our young players up for success.”

Despite Sunderland’s positive run of results, Murty acknowledged that there were still aspects of the performance that concerned him, particularly defensively. “The characteristics that you're talking about are the way that we want to play, the way we handle the ball, some of the patterns you might see and the finishing areas we strive to get into,” he said. “But also we're seeing things that are rearing their heads a little bit that we're a bit concerned about, with people not getting tagged when they run into the box, having three runs on our goal that we need to sort out a lot better and a lot earlier.”

Murty revealed that he and his coaching staff deliberately stepped back during parts of the match to encourage the players to take greater responsibility. “Myself and Matt were really quiet on the sideline intentionally because we wanted to see a few leaders come to the fore and take control of the game and really grasp the reins of the game. We saw it intermittently, and for these young players to continue their development, we need to see it more consistently. But they're really young, and they've just won seven in a row, so I can't be too harsh,” he added.

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Murty also pointed out that success within the academy setup is not only measured by results. “It does, and it changes, and that's some of the things that you need to get used to as a 21s coach,” Murty added when asked about continuing Sunderland’s momentum. “The schedule changes, the team that you work with on a daily basis changes, but we still hold true to our standards and our traditions and our expectations of our performance and the players know that. But success doesn't always come on the pitch. You're seeing it at the moment because we're winning, but success will also come from young players striving to come through.”

Murty also pointed to goalkeeper Joe Cowan as one example of that progress, with Dan Cameron and Issac Allan currently out on loan. “We've got first years (scholar) in goal, Joe Cowan's played a number of games now, so that for us is a success and hopefully the fruits of that will pay off in the years to come.”

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