Sunderland 0-1 Southampton: Player Ratings

Costel Pantilimon – 7

Pantilimon made the saves you’d expect and commanded the box a lot better than he has in previous weeks. He got close to the penalty but it was right in the corner.

DeAndre Yedlin– 6

He got caught a couple of times defending against Tadic but generally he defended ok and got forward regularly.

Billy Jones – 6

Similar to Yedlin as Jones got forward as much as he could and defended well against a very good Southampton attack.

Seb Coates– 7

Both centre backs looked a lot better today than they did at the start of the season as they cleared everything that was thrown into the box.

Younes Kaboul – 7

Kaboul and Coates had to be on their toes for the majority of the first half and they coped well against Pelle throughout.   

Yann M’Vila – 5

M’Vila looked good during the game as he was starting to pull the strings in the middle but then he slid in recklessly to give Southampton a penalty which handed them the game.

Jordi Gomez – 5

He didn’t offer much going forward as the midfield three sat too deep in the first half and in the second half he played the easy pass too often instead of trying to create a chance.

Ola Toivonen – 4

Toivonen looked anonymous in the first half and was brought off at half time.

Duncan Watmore – 7

Looked full of running and he was the only player in the first half that looked like he wanted to create something. However he squandered the best chance of the game just before Southampton scored.

Adam Johnson – 6

Johnson needed to track back all too often and whenever he did have an opportunity to go forward he seemed to take all day to get going. He had a free kick that narrowly went over.

Steven Fletcher – 5

Left stranded for much of the first half against two defenders so his task was nearly impossible. He tried his best.

Fabio Borini– 6 (sub)

Borini gave Sunderland an initial burst of life when he came on at half time and he had a shot saved straight after Southampton scored.

Jack Rodwell – 5 (sub)

Came on at a difficult time straight after conceding and he didn’t see much of the ball as Sunderland kept hoofing it forward.

Jermain Defoe – 5 (sub)

The defence kept launching the ball up to him giving him little chance to do anything.

Man Of The Match – Younes Kaboul

Hard to pick one, but the defence looked a lot more organised today against a very good attack.