Eliezer Mayenda has been a standout performer for Sunderland this season

Back at the beginning of this wild campaign, when Regis Le Bris was still a relative unknown on Wearside and the prospect of a promotion push felt like a giddy pipe dream, who of a Sunderland persuasion could have predicted that Eliezer Mayenda - that raw, bustling teenager who had just struggled to make an impact on loan at Hibernian - would play such a pivotal role in the Black Cats’ season?

Even when the Spaniard was entrusted with a starting role against Cardiff City on the opening day, and then again against Sheffield Wednesday the following weekend, there was a creeping suspicion that he was merely acting as a placeholder of sorts until a more senior and able alternative - namely Wilson Isidor - was ready to take up the mantle. A quarter of an hour into a 4-0 drubbing of the Owls, Mayenda would put those suspicions to bed emphatically.

Of course, that afternoon the starlet would go on to score a brace for Le Bris’ side, and ever since then, he has - periods of injury aside - never been too far away from the starting XI. Indeed, there have been just two Championship matches this season during which the attacker has been both available and unused, and across the rest of his 36 involvements, he has scored some eight goals, assisting a further five.

But even if we are to take his goal contributions out of the equation, perhaps what has impressed most about Mayenda this season is the rate at which his all-round game has developed. Still only 19 - although he will turn 20 the day before Sunderland’s play-off semi-final first leg next week - the forward isn’t just shining compared to his teammates, but also in the context of the Championship writ large.

For instance, according to stats aggregator FBRef, Mayenda’s average of 2.18 successful take-ons per 90 minutes puts him in the top 1% of all second tier forwards this term. Likewise, his tally of 3.53 progressive carries (carries that occur in the opposition half and take the ball at least 10 yards closer to goal) ranks him in the 98th percentile of players in his position. Elsewhere, Mayenda is in the 90th percentile for assists, the 88th percentile for expected assists, the 79th percentile for shot-creating actions, 86th percentile for touches in the opposition penalty area, and the 79th percentile for progressive passes received. Eye-catching stuff.

But what exactly does this tell us? Well, for one thing, it paints a picture of a prodigious talent coming into his own and establishing himself as a real handful in a notoriously competitive division. For another, it would suggest that he is carving out a masterful niche for himself as a centre-forward capable of holding up play and bringing those around him into the game with great effect.

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And that could be vital for Sunderland over the coming weeks. Since the final international break of the season at the back end of March, the Black Cats have scored just four goals in seven Championship outings. For a side who are a little over a week away from the most crucial juncture of their campaign, that is an unavoidable concern.

Where the goals have gone and how Sunderland can hope to bring them back is a matter of some puzzlement, but it is perhaps worth noting that Mayenda - a player who evidently does an awful lot to act as an adhesive in the final third - has started just two of those seven matches. Moreover, it was in one of those two starts that he scored a stunning solo breakaway strike against Bristol City - an effort that likely would have been a shoe-in for the Black Cats’ goal of the season, had it occurred before the nominations were already announced.

All of this is to say that there is a real argument to be made for Mayenda being reinstated into Le Bris’ starting XI once the play-offs finally get underway. Perhaps that has been the plan all along - certainly, the Frenchman’s policy of rest and rotation, as well as the starlet’s lack of consistent game time in recent weeks, would suggest that his head coach regards him as an asset worth protecting.

But even if he isn’t included from the first whistle, and even if he is to settle for an impact role from the bench, given how far he has come since his initial forays into Le Bris’ plans back in August, you wouldn’t bet against him still have a significant part to play.

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