Why Sunderland held their nerve on Régis Le Bris and how it paid off in crucial Chelsea win
Sunderland returned to winning ways in the Premier League by beating Chelsea at the Stadium of Light
That the conversation even had to be had spoke volumes.
Régis Le Bris is now undoubtedly one of the best managers of the modern era at Sunderland and yet in the aftermath of the defeat to Coventry City, something had shifted. How could Sunderland not turn up for a game of such obvious importance? Had the messages stopped getting through to the players? The decent performances that hadn’t been converted into results were starting to become poor performances and poor results too frequently. It was a sad conversation to be having, but it was a valid one.
Sunderland’s response, to their credit, was as emphatic as it could have been in the circumstances. By Monday morning, they had moved to head off any speculation at the pass by making clear Le Bris retained the support of Florent Ghisolfi and the club’s board. Unity, collective responsibility and stability were cited as being key to how Sunderland would get themselves out of the spiral they had started to enter.
Undoubtedly, pragmatism will have played its part in this decision. Sunderland’s punishing schedule meant it was a poor time to make a change, and this is an ownership with first-hand experience of the immense risks of changing head coaches both in the middle of a run of fixtures and more broadly in the middle of the campaign.
The decision also came from a genuine belief that Le Bris was the right person to turn things around. There was and remains recognition that it has been a difficult start to the campaign for a number of reasons, from a challenging summer transfer window to the injuries and errors that have led to constant reshuffling in defensive areas. It was no coincidence that with Nordi Mukiele and Thomas Meunier fit again and with Brian Brobbey leading the line, Sunderland produced a performance much closer to that of last season’s level. Though the performances against Coventry City and Dinamo Zagreb were alarming, there were good reasons to think that the primary issues did not stem from the head coach. What Le Bris needed was a reaction from the dressing room to show there was still belief and against Chelsea that is exactly what he got.
Le Bris had spoken well in his pre-match press conference, perhaps a little more open and a little punchier on some topics than normal. It felt clear that he understood the significance of the moment, and was determined to lead from the front.
While the selection of two full backs down the right flank always divides opinion, the XI and the set up was so recognisably Sunderland under Le Bris. Stability and holding your nerve won the day.
Having spoken so consistently over the last six months about the importance of stability to the club’s project, Ghisolfi will also have known that making a change would have risked sending a message of panic both to the dressing room and the club more broadly. Sunderland wanted to stick by Le Bris because they know what he can do, but also because they are determined not to fall into the classic Premier League cycle of chop and change.
Le Bris cut a typically-measured figure after the game, well aware that one win was a tonic but only the start. That Sunderland were able to produce a performance that mirrored the resilience and intensity that defined them last season raised confidence that he can begin to haul the way up the table, particularly if they can keep together a more stable back four which can cut out the individual errors central to their slow start.
Hitting this level of performance consistently is the key challenge, particularly in games where it isn’t as easy to summon the underdog spirit that has proven so powerful for this team over the last few years. Things also looked promising in terms of performance if not results before the last international break, only for injuries and fatigue to strike in key positions. Granit Xhaka and Brian Brobbey have already emerged as two early injury concerns ahead of the Aston Villa game and the busy schedule that follows, underlining the fragility of Sunderland’s position. Le Bris, Ghisofli and the club will be fully aware that Sunderland are only a couple of poor performances away from the debates which marked the build up to the Chelsea game returning to the fore.
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Relief, nevertheless, comes from Sunderland looking like Sunderland again. It did not feel like a coincidence that both Le Bris and Enzo Le Fée referenced a forty-point target after the game, a motto that was mentioned every week without fail last season but had been absent this time around. Le Bris senses that his players had understood the situation they were in, and their response had been to embrace it rather than shirk it. The social media posts from the dressing room afterwards referenced team work, passion and identity. It had felt like a long way off as they had trudged away from that Coventry City defeat, but in this performance they found light at the end of the tunnel by going back to their basics.
For Le Bris and his side, this was a start and nothing more. Le Bris said, as he so often does, that ‘the journey is long’. For now, though, a journey that had looked like it might be coming towards a premature end can hope for many new chapters still to be written.
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