Plenty of Positives: What did you love most about Sunderland’s performance last night?

Andrew Smithson says...

Piece of cake. Sheffield Wednesday looked dangerous in the first ten minutes or so but after that we made it look easy. We dominated at the back and read their attacks brilliantly, and going forward there was a simplicity to our play that was lovely to see. The team are clearly full of confidence at the moment and pretty much cruised through large chunks of the match. Lee Johnson made some in-game changes that once again showed how much the team is playing for him right now and we are at a point where even if one or two have less eye-catching performances than normal everybody is having a positive impact. It has been a long time since I’ve seen us be so comfortable in games; we’ve looked a level above in these last two fixtures.

Home comforts. By my maths this victory means we have now already matched last season’s total of league wins on home soil; our whole approach to games has turned around and the Stadium of Light is becoming a real fortress again. Teams are finding it much harder to come up here and grind anything out, and with a really vocal backing coming from the stands it is great to have the place bouncing again. I cannot get enough of watching us at the moment and I bet Fleetwood Town are over the moon they were able to cry off for Sunday given the form we are in.

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Joseph Tulip says...

Counter attacks. One of my biggest gripes during our narrow failures in recent League One seasons had been our inability to counter attack. It was largely non-existent under Phil Parkinson, almost as poor during Jack Ross’ days, and was lacking during Lee Johnson’s first half season in charge. Now we can’t get enough of it. The way we are working the ball, our players are absolutely determined to turn defence into attack at rapid speed. Wednesday played a very high line but our quick passing, movement and pace on the break saw us get in behind time and time again.

A new belief. After looking like promotion pretenders in recent seasons and much more promising during the first half of this campaign, we’re suddenly showing complete confidence and belief in the way we are starting to put teams away. After Doncaster, Tom Flanagan spoke about how we had “demoralised” the opposition and this was even more pronounced against Sheffield Wednesday.

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Ant Waterson says...

Strong from the start. For me, what got us on the front foot from early on was Bailey Wright going through Calum Paterson. Sunderland showed they were not going to be bullied, and we were not going to let Wednesday stop us from playing football. Lee Johnson said a few weeks ago we needed to earn the right to play football - last night, Sunderland won the right to play and when they did, they played superbly.

Roscoe. What a performance from the frontman - a superb finish after a sublime pass from Dajaku, then a wonderful right-footed effort really showed his class. His third goal was the result of a beautiful team move and it resulted in the perfect hattrick. Stewart has grafted his arse off all season and sometimes hasn’t had the rewards. Last night he did. Well done Sunderland.

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Malc Dugdale says...

A perfect hat trick to bury a dry spell. With one goal on each foot and a header, big Ross won the match ball with style against Wednesday. In doing so, he very much shut up his critics who had started to refer to his dry spell prior to his penalty conversion at Doncaster. This performance has instantaneously eased the nerves of both Ross and the Sunderland faithful, many of whom were quite concerned after the recent injury to red hot Broadhead which coincided with his brief scoring dip. Yes, we still need to recruit up front, but what a fabulous way to ease the nail-biting in the stands. Top class.

Graft, graft and graft again. The effort by the lads to take this game to one of the strongest defences in the league was a sight to behold. Even when 3 or 4 up we were hunting for more, pressing and nipping at heels and generally right up for it. The work ethic which the coach and his staff have engrained into the team is like chalk and cheese compared to some of the squads from our recent dark years. That combination of attitude and application alongside the skill and craft across the team stands us in good stead to finally get out of this league, just in time to have a wander to Sid James’ park for six points next season. Keep it up, lads. Top drawer, to a man.

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