Written by BillyTheKid

Important Game To Get Our First Win

After playing a Thursday midweek game at home against Sturm Graz in the Europa League, the Cherries are home again in the Premier League against Sunderland on Sunday at 2 pm; the game is being shown on Sky. Sunderland, who qualified for the Europa League, also had a Thursday away game in Portugal against Torreense.

Regis Le-Bris, the Sunderland manager in his first season, took his club up via the play-offs in the Championship into the Premier League. This is his third season as their manager and second season in the Premier League. In his first season, his team finished a credible 7th in the table, one place behind the Cherries.

AFC Bournemouth v Sunderland

AFCB Win

Draw

Sunderland Win

This season in the Premier League, Sunderland haven’t had a much better start than the Cherries, sitting one place and one point above them in the table. They lost their first game away against Ipswich Town 2-1. The other two away games, they drew 1-1 at Brentford and lost 5-3 against Manchester City. At home, they have W1, L 2.

The last time Sunderland visited Dean Court was in February this year. They took a first half lead through Eliezer Mayenda. Evanilson scored the equaliser in the second half, and that was the last goal of the game as it ended in a 1-1 draw.

In all our league games against Sunderland, AFCB have W 1, D 1, L 3.
In all competitions, AFCB have W 2, D 4, L 6.

AFCB Team News
After changes for Thursday’s game, I think we will see our team revert back to normal, with perhaps Justin Kluivert coming back in.

AFCB Player To Watch
Evanilson before his goals at Chelsea and Sturm Graz, the last time he scored was against Sunderland at home in February. He has been one of our more consistent players this season, leading with 3 assists in the league.

Sunderland Team News
They have been missing two key players injured during the international break. Dan Ballard in defence and Brian Brobbey up front, but they hope Brobbey will be available for our game on Sunday, and he was an unused sub on Thursday. Other injuries: Romaine Rundle, Thomas Meunier and Wilson Isador.

Sunderland Player To Watch
Brian Brobbey, in his last game before the international break, scored a hat-trick away against Manchester City. He also scored against us up at Sunderland last season and didn’t play in our home game.

The Referee
The man in the middle is Craig Pawson; last season, he took our home game with Brentford and the away game against Nottingham Forest.

Matt Stevenson added…

I’ve looked at the last 4 league games for Sunderland. They had two home games (Arsenal and Brighton) and two away games (Brentford and Man C). Sunderland have gained 1 point, which is lower than expected, with them having the higher xG in the first 3 games. The xG value for goals scored is 7.80, compared with 4 actual goals, and Sunderland have conceded 10 goals, with xGc estimating 7.32 goals, showing a worse return than would be predicted for both goals for and against.

Sunderland have had 2 different goal scorers (Brobby with 3 and Le Fee), and 4 players have assisted once each.

The average positions of the starting line-ups are below. There doesn’t seem to be a clear pattern, although the keeper often plays high, as Adams noticed last season with his goal from the centre circle.

The following plot compares summary stats of Sunderland and AFCB over the last 4 games. Both teams have had a relatively tough run during this period. Sunderland edge the attacking stats, but not the goals scored, which are 5-4 in AFCB’s favour. Defensively, AFCB have been better, although both teams have conceded 10 goals a long way above the xGc.

Possession and pass completion are comparable. Sunderland create a lot of chances from set pieces, although they also concede more from them than AFCB.

Your say…

Garbo

Back to the PL and a game that we should be winning given our team?

I hope that the more ‘rested’ players like Rayan, Truffert, Kluivert, Adli and Hill will hold us in good stead for this one?

A tough few weeks coming up when PL points will be needed to halt our slide downwards.

Still, we could be worse off and not competing on so many fronts? – To join the conversation, please click here.