Red and White army! Sunderland AFC (FM24)

[Mackem742]

Sunderland AFC

Sunderland Association Football Club is an English professional football club based in the city of Sunderland, Tyne and Wear. Formed in 1879, Sunderland play in the Championship, the second tier of English football. The club has won six top-flight titles (1892, 1893, 1895, 1902, 1913, and 1936) in the First Division, and has finished runners-up five times. The club has also won the FA Cup twice (1937 and 1973) and been runners-up twice (1913 and 1992), as well as winning the FA Charity Shield in 1936 and being finalists the following year. Sunderland have also been Football League Cup finalists in 1985 and 2014.

Nicknamed the Black Cats, Sunderland play their home games at the 49,000-capacity all seater Stadium of Light having moved from Roker Park in 1997. The original ground capacity was 42,000 which was increased to 49,000 following expansion in 2000. The club has a long-standing rivalry with nearby club Newcastle United, with whom the Tyne and Wear derby has been contested since 1898. The club has played in red and white-striped shirts and black shorts for nearly the entirety of its history.

                                                                         

 Current squad

Stand out players

Anthony Patterson – Young goalkeeper who has come through the ranks at SAFC and has well established himself as the clubs No 1. Excellent shot stopper, maybe needs to command his box more but is more than a decent keeper for the Championship.

Daniel Ballard – Central defender brought in from Arsenal, a commanding figure in the heart of the defence.

Luke O’Nien – Has become known as “Mr Sunderland” after we signed him from Wycombe a few years ago, good squad player who has played central midfield, right back and currently playing in central defence. Not the most spectacular player but makes up for it in passion. A real character.

Timothee Pembele – Right back brought in from PSG, has been injured in real life so has not played a first team game yet but is highly rated.

Trai Hume – An unknown player (to us in England at least) when he was signed from Linfield but has gone on to be a quality addition at right back.

Adil Aouchiche – Another young Frenchman brought in from Lorient, haven’t seen much of him yet but another player thought to be highly rated.

Pierre Ekwah – A bit of a beast in central midfield, started the season really well and was a commanding figure in our 5-1 win over Southampton earlier in the season.

Jobe Bellingham – Younger brother of superstar Jude, brought in from Birmingham. Has shown some good qualities so far but he is only 18. If he can become half the player his brother is then we will have one cracking player.

Chris Rigg – Another youngster brought through the ranks, has had some Premier League clubs scouting him and in his few cameo appearances so far he has looked an excellent player. Played well against Fulham in the FA Cup last season and scored the 5^th in the win against Southampton.

Dan Neil – Yet another youngster brought in through the ranks, another player who has had a few Premier League clubs looking at him. He has become one of the most vital members of our midfield.

Jack Clarke – Our best player on his day, his trickery and goals have lit up the Stadium of Light and many other grounds around the country. If this is replicated in the game it may be hard to keep hold of him.

Patrick Roberts – Like Clarke he can be one of or best players on his day, has the skills and tricks to open up a defence but he just needs to be more consistent.

Nazariy Rusyn – Young striker brought in from Ukraine, hasn’t featured a lot so far but he looked very impressive in the 3-1 against Norwich recently and the signs are promising.

 

I am a Sunderland supporter so my first save is always with my hometown club and I have just begun my serious save with them which I will update the post with soon.

I have got off to a bright start with a 3-0 home win over Ipswich.

I hope others take on the Sunderland challenge and try to get them back into the Premier League. The Championship is very competitive this year with Leeds, Leicester, and Southampton joining us. As well as the usual contenders Norwich, Blackburn etc.

Good luck to anyone taking the challenge on and I hope to see your progress so far.

PS – My first ever team thread so I hope it looks okay!

[alwo]

I signed Jewison Bennette on loan in my first season at Aberdeen and he had an incredible season 31(1) apps, 7 goals, 11 assists, 5 POM and a 7.24 AV R. I wanted to sign him permanently but they'd just given him a bumper new contract at the time I eventually got enough money to put together a bid. After a season back at Sunderland he's gone to Norwich for £10.75m. So he's a great prospect!

[Hero of the Day]

Jewison is good, as are most of sunderlands young players. I was promoted by March!

Patterson

Pemebele/Hume, Ballard/ Seelt/Trantis, Cirkin/Alese

Bellingham/Rigg/Ekwah/Neil/Dack/Aouchiche

Roberts/Ba

Clarke/Bennette

Rusyn/Semedo/Mayenda

 

All the above are really good championship players, most are young and can probably develop into lower prem std.

 

It's a really fun save 👍

Edited November 28, 2023 by Hero of the Day

[w_x]

Rigg is an absolute monster, give him playing time early and often

[VeteranFM]

Awesome with a thread! Started a new save the other day inspired by @MattyLewis11brilliant The Ajax Way-save, which you can read more about here: 

 

Ajax and Eredivise are not my cup of tea, so I wanted to see if I could bring many of the same principles to England and make Sunderland a team to be reckoned with in the Prem again. Decided on Sunderland due to the amount of young talent and the Academy of Light. With a few db addons online even more of the youngsters was in the game as well (Holcroft, Struk to name a few).

I shamelessly copied the spreadsheet from The Ajax Way and made the DNA my own parameter to assess the players' suitability and who the key players are. I feel that the DNA is best suited for midfielders, but it's a great baseline for all positions for the kind of football I want to us to play. 

 

I spent the majority of the first half of the season developing my tactics and testing a whole lot of different settings and setups. The baseline principles are three at the back, possession and attacking football. I landed on this due to the lack of wingers.




I had to sell Pat Roberts in January because he didn't want to sign a new deal. Dan Ballard, who I originally used as the Libero, left for Leverkusen in a deal worth £19M. With the state of the club's finances, I couldn't afford to refuse that kind of money. Brought in Amad Diallo on loan again and what a immense player he is! After scouting in the Nordics, I found two players in Norway that score well on the DNA and are somewhat undervalued. Aksel Potur from Moss (managed by former Sunderland player Thomas Myhre) and Aleksander Hammer Kjelsen, Potur comes in for just £165K while Kjelsen is a more expensive one with a total potential deal of $3.4M. I have high hopes for Kjelsen, and with Potur it's worth the risk. 

They ended the season placing 5th, bringing a good run of form into the playoffs. First beating Southampton 7-2 over two games and winning the final 2-0 against Leeds after goals from the new libero star Pembele and Rusyn. Promotion in the first season seems a bit premature, and another season in the championship would probably make us even better suited for top-flight football. However, we take challenges thrown at us head-on! 

A key performer during the season was Amad Diallo, with 13 goals and 5 assists in just 20 games. What a star!
Rusyn chipped in with 25 goals, but I doubt he'll be a key player in the prem. 
Jack Clarke is an absolute star and vital to the team. 13 goals, 11 assists and 7.19 OR prove he's a man we can trust in the top flight.
Pembele made the libero position his own after Ballard's departure and will hopefully continue his good form in the prem next year. 

 

[VeteranFM]

The first season in the prem played out way better than expected! 

 

I had no expectations other than surviving and continuing to build the squad according to the style I wanted to play. From finishing fifth in the Championship and now qualified for Europe within twelve months is a huge achievement, I guess that will also help us continue the project and give it a huge boost!

I'm really satisfied with the transfers in. Delap was brought in to be the main threat up front, and boy, did he deliver. He scored 20 goals in 38 games in his first-ever season in the prem. The main man! Harwood-Bellis proved to be a real bargain for that price and is now one of the first players on the teamsheet. 
Archie Gray and Valentin Barco are signings I didn't think we could pull off, but somehow they ended up here. According to the DNA score, they're already our two best players and mainstays in the team for years to come. 

I only brought in Barco when Jack Clarke decided to go for the Saudi money. £625k p/w is silly money and no wonder he left. In my opinion, £21M in for Clarke and £11,5M out for Barco is one hell of a deal. I had to change the tactics a bit for it to suit Barco's qualities better, but I think I managed to keep the same style and idea. I pulled one of the AMs down to CM and changed one role to a mezzala to get more width on the right. To good effect, that 's with ten assists from Rigg throughout the season. Unless something unexpected happens, a new right-back and a new centre-back are the main priorities before the next season. 
.

 

By the way, The definitive highlight of the season: