Sunderland face RC Lens in their penultimate pre-season friendly on Saturday afternoon

The Echo is in France this weekend to provide full coverage of Sunderland’s pre-season clash with RC Lens.

Here, Phil Smith reflects on the tie between the two clubs in the first instalment of his tour diary for Echo subscribers...

On Saturday, Sunderland and RC Lens contest the Trophée 1906, a new tradition designed by the Ligue 1 club to celebrate its founding year.

It would be a stretch to say that silverware is on the table, as the trophy is actually built around a lump of which underlines why Sunderland are very fitting opponents. The two clubs share a rich mining history and like Sunderland, RC Lens are immensely proud of their heritage. The original Stade Bollaert-Delelis was built by locals from the industry and the ties between club and industry are still celebrated to this day; a miner’s lamp sitting proudly on the club crest.

As with Sunderland, the success of the team on the pitch is helping to boost the profile of the city as they move through the post-industrial era. The pair produced two of the most impressive campaigns in European football last time out, with RC Lens running PSG close for the title and winning the Coupe de France for the first time. Though boss Pierre Sage has since moved to Crystal Palace and midfielder Mamadou Sangaré to Brentford, this will be as competitive a friendly as Sunderland could have hoped for at this stage of pre-season and there is expected to be a huge crowd to add to the sense of occasion.

The two clubs also share one other very strong link, and it doesn’t take a stretch of the imagination to imagine it is the key reason this game is happening in the first place. It was at RC Lens that Florent Ghisolfi rose to prominence as one of the game’s most talented Sporting Directors, his tenure the catalyst for the success that has followed even if his decision to eventually leave for OGC Nice was no doubt a source of disappointment.

After the chaos of last summer’s transformative transfer window, I sat down with Ghisolfi for what was his first interview since joining Sunderland. Transfers and the future of Sunderland dominated the conversation but revisiting the tape this week, it was interesting to reflect on our discussion of his time at Lens. It informs what we have seen at Sunderland this summer, where stability has been the defining word.

Arriving at RC Lens, Ghisolfi found a historic club with a loyal and passionate fanbase, but one where doom and gloom seemed invariably to win the day. Ghisolfi felt that there was a feeling ingrained that the club was destined to disappoint, leaving the team stuck in a vicious cycle on the pitch. Sound familiar?

Ghisolfi’s mantra at RC Lens was ‘change the culture, keep the identity’. Much of that work at Sunderland had been done by those who came before Ghisolfi, but his arrival has coincided with another surge in standards and ambition. As at Lens, Ghisolfi tries to walk the line between keeping the club humble while stressing that there should be no limit on ambition.

One of the most impressive aspects of Ghisolfi’s work, and something he shares with Régis Le Bris, is his belief that you build a team around the club and the fanbase and not the either way round. There were tactical considerations of course but that Sunderland have built a team where athleticism, hard work and speed are paramount is no coincidence. Le Bris and Ghisolfi understand the football Sunderland fans want to see and it’s not to think that Ghisolfi’s time at a similar club in RC Lens helped with his vision here. You may have noticed that when Ghisolfi poses for pictures with a new signing or to celebrate a contract renewal with a player, the miner’s lamp sits proudly in the corner of the shot.

What’s striking when you review Ghisolfi’s time at RC Lens was that it was not based on relentless player trading, or the appointment of a high-profile head coach. One of his key calls at the club was to promote Frank Haise from B-team coach to the main role midway through his first season, with promotion duly following. There were ambitious signings in the windows that followed as they finished seventh and seventh again in the top tier, but continuity was a core theme. Ghisolfi traded cleverly, and earlier this summer told the story of how panic ensued when star defender Loïc Badé was told to Stade Rennais. Lens signed Kevin Danso as his replacement, and sold him to Spurs further down the line for an even greater profit. The point Ghisolfi was making in telling this tale was that there’s no need to fear player sales when the time is right, but it’s notable that there was continuity right through his three seasons at the club as he gradually lifted the budget and level of the squad.

Perhaps last summer’s necessary but ruthless and extensive overhaul of the playing squad has led us all to misunderstand Ghisolfi and the project at Sunderland a little. When it was clear that changes were happening behind the scenes in the club’s academy earlier this year, the natural expectation was that Sunderland would recruit externally. Instead, Ghisolfi has favoured continuity and promoted from within to key positions.

Earlier this summer, Ghisolfi referenced Athletic Bilbao as a model club who thrive on stability in their playing squad and off-pitch structure. They are of course an extreme example, but you can see what he is driving at when he talks of the importance of stability and building a team with a strong connection to the club.

Sunderland will recruit this summer, and there’s every chance that they will break their transfer record while doing so. Ghisolfi, though, believes the team’s strength this season will be the understanding and strong relationships that have already been built. This summer the aim is to refresh, not restart.

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Both times Ghisolfi has sat down with the media over the last year, he has referenced how at RC Lens he was always being told that they would struggle to replicate the success of the previous campaigns. Sound familiar? It has, he noted, happened at RC Lens even as they continue on their upward trajectory since his departure. The Premier League is a different beast in its current guise to Ligue 1, where the top six enjoy an enormous financial in-built financial advantage. Replicating the second-place finishes Lens have achieved is not realistic at this stage, but Ghisolfi is absolutely driven to replicate their revival and arrival as a top-tier force and European contender. A quiet summer so far should not be mistaken for a lack of ambition.

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