Tony Mowbray admits Sunderland squad has a midfield 'deficiency'
Tony Mowbray has admitted the Sunderland squad have a midfield ‘deficiency’ that sees the over-rely on captain Corry Evans.
Evans was rested against Cardiff last week and his absence was sorely missed. Dan Neil and Abdoullah Ba started the game in midfield but struggled to offer the kind of control the Northern Irishman does.
Mowbray has now delivered a review of his midfield options and he, like the rest of us, is struggling to see anyone able to directly deputise for Evans.
"We have to get a combination, we have to get a balance," Mowbray said.
"It's not just Corry Evans, Dan Neil, Abdoullah Ba - you should really throw in Elliot Embleton, [Alex] Pritchard in there, because they are all midfield players.
“If you play one [number] six and two [number] eights, so one sitter at the base and two midfielders who are more advanced but can break through their back line, you have to say that Embleton and Pritchard fall into that category as the eights.
"Then you bring a [number] ten into it. Are we counting the ten as a midfield player? Again, Pritchard can play there and Embleton can play there, lots of players can play as a ten.
"We seem to have an overload of them, but we seem to have a slight deficiency in Corry Evans-type of footballers."