‘WHO on earth is Chemsdine Talbi?’ would’ve been a common question asked by Chelsea fans on Saturday.
They know to take him and Sunderland very seriously now.
The Moroccan winger sent the visiting end of Stamford Bridge into raptures with a 93rd-minute winner to lift his side to second in the Premier League.
However, Talbi, 20, is just one of several names your average football fan has never heard of in the Sunderland squad, begging the question: ‘What exactly is going on up there?’
Régis Le Bris‘ men have been the story of the season, a team carefully constructed of little-known gems, built not on ego, but on an ability to stay in games, togetherness and belief.
The sharp-suited French boss has something very Arsène Wenger about him, with a knack for finding hidden talents, he’s turned Sunderland into the Premier League’s most entertaining surprise package.
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At the peak of his playing career, Le Bris was a centre-half for Rennes, with whom he spent five seasons before dropping into the second tier, before retiring to become a coach.
As a youth coach, he shone at Rennes again, leading to him being offered a shot at Lorient as the manager of the club’s reserve team.
He built a reputation in France for giving young players a chance and for his tactical prowess, despite Lorient being relegated to Ligue 2 under his command after initial success.
Le Bris was then spotted by Sunderland’s owners as the man to lead their project, rather than just manage their team.
Like Wenger’s early Arsenal, Le Bris’s revolution is built on clever scouting and trusting players many others didn’t even look twice at, but it still didn’t come cheap.
The club spent £161m on 14 new players this summer, a record for a promoted side, and oversaw 17 outgoings, including players key to their unlikely promotion, such as Jobe Bellingham and Tom Watson.
Outside of the Premier League, only Real Madrid spent more than them in Europe.
Last season proved that, as a promoted club, spending big does not guarantee survival, though.
Le Bris deserves immense credit for buying in so many strays and turning them into dangerous Black Cats.
Nine of the Sunderland squad who featured against Chelsea were signed this summer, and their winner was scored by a combination of three new recruits, Lutsharel Geertruida, 25, Brian Brobbey, 23, and Talbi.
Starring forward and scorer of Saturday’s first Sunderland goal, Wilson Isidor, 25, leads the line.
The French frontman drew comparisons with Thierry Henry for his celebration, something even he wouldn’t have been able to fathom when he joined Le Bris’s side on loan after scoring just one goal in three games for Zenit two seasons ago.
22-year-old Robin Roefs in goal has endured a spectacular start to life in the Premier League, having been signed from NEC Nijmegen in the Netherlands for £9m this summer.
At the back, they splashed out £9.5m on former PSG defender Nordi Mukiele, 27, highly rated as a youngster at RB Leipzig before a big move to the French capital, where he struggled to make an impact before getting his Premier League shot.
The man glueing it all together is ex-Arsenal skipper Granit Xhaka.
Mocked by some when he left Champions League Leverkusen for Wearside, the 33-year-old has been nothing short of transformational for Sunderland, leading the team in assists and chances created, but also being their most combative man in the middle.
He’s simultaneously the heartbeat and brain of the side, and not the only star with Champions League experience brought in by Le Bris.
Mozambique international Reinildo Mandava, 31, arrived in England for free, having spent the past three years with Diego Simeone at Atletico Madrid.
The left-back told SunSport of Xhaka’s importance: “Granit is a very big player and talking about him is special. He has such a good mind, he’s different, at such a high level.
“I’m telling you, he has too much quality, not only on the pitch, but off the pitch. When we’re in training, he tries to push us, to pass his experience on. That is very special. I’m very proud to play with him, it’s a dream.”
“We knew it would be a hard game against a big team, but we played together, we suffered together. When we play like this together, good things come because we are working as a team, it’s not about individuals.”
Reinildo added: “Everyone knows the target needs to be to stay in the Premier League. We keep going, keep fighting and at the end, we’ll see where we are.”
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“Don’t talk about winning the title. We’re going game by game. We know our objectives, and so we will keep going. But for now, just fighting until the next weekend.”
For now, where they are is second in the table, and while the players remain humble, the fans who were bouncing in the away end on Saturday feel this could be more than a survival story.
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