Sunderland 0 - 4 SouthamptonManolo Gabbiadini double helps Southampton thrash sorry Sunderland
Away team scorersManolo Gabbiadini 30
Manolo Gabbiadini 45
Jason Denayer 89 o.g.
Shane Long 90 +1:20
Sunderland will fly to New York and a week’s “bonding break” featuring daily runs in snowy Central Park thoroughly chastened by Manolo Gabbiadini and his Southampton team-mates.
Two goals from the Italy striker - along with some splendid support from Dusan Tadic - on a day when Claude Puel’s side remembered how to concentrate not only ended the visitors’ recent wretched run or results but ensured David Moyes’s team remain bottom.
If there was a perfect moment for Sunderland to meet Southampton this – theoretically at least – seemed very much it. Quite apart from David Moyes’s side being fresh from a 4-0 win at Crystal Palace, Claude Puel’s players appeared to have adopted full-on League Cup final mindsets.
This was their last game before meeting Manchester United at Wembley and they arrived having conceded 10 goals in their previous three, lost, matches. If mentality was largely the culprit, Southampton’s problems were seemingly further exacerbated by a central-defensive crisis occasioned by Jose Fonte’s transfer to West Ham and Virgil van Dijk’s untimely ankle injury.
This dictated that the novice Jack Stephens was given another chance alongside Maya Yoshida at the heart of a visiting defence which received a thorough scolding from an angry Puel last week. Indeed their manager demanded his entire team started showing some strength of character.
The conditions – icy, driving, rain, capriciously swirling wind and temperatures only slightly above freezing – were certainly not for the faint-hearted, but although Nathan Redmond initially saw quite a bit of the ball, his team-mates took a little time to deconstruct Sunderland’s new look back three.
Accordingly with Didier Ndong in deceptively dynamic mood in Moyes’s midfield and Darron Gibson beginning by showing off some elegantly incisive passes on his first start since arriving from Everton, the home side began reasonably well.
Deployed alongside Jermain Defoe, Adnan Januzaj cleverly set up Defoe for a presentable shooting chance but, for once, the former England striker – possibly distracted by Yoshida’s attentions – was let down by a poor first touch and it drifted wide.
All this good Wearside work threatened to be undone by a flash of panic which provoked Southampton’s first chance. It came when Billy Jones played Gibson into trouble and he passed straight to Gabbiadini.
Puel’s former Napoli striker screwed that shot wide but some subsequent wily movement, rapid changes of pace, springing of the offside trap and slick combinations with Dusan Tadic on Gabbiadini’s part should have reminded Moyes’s defence that they would ignore him at their peril.
Despite this warning, they had no answer to Ryan Bertrand’s advance from left back and his perfectly whipped in cross, which preceded the Italian’s second goal in as many games. It was met by a combination of Kone and Gabbiadini with the pair both attempting diving headers but the Ivorian missing and the ball seeming to go in off the forward’s shoulder.
Before half time, Gabbiadini scored again, with his latest goal created by a smart pass from the increasingly influential Tadic. All that remained was for an extremely inspired-looking signing to thoroughly wrong-foot Kone and John O’Shea by swivelling sharply and shooting low past Vito Mannone.
By now a study in misery, Moyes replaced O’Shea with Steve Pienaar as he shifted to a back four for the second period but not much seemed to change. Instead, one of the two remaining home centre halves, Jason Denayer, was arguably fortunate not to concede a penalty after sending Tadic crashing in the area.
Undeterred, the Serbian continued to menace Sunderland and soon forced Mannone into a fine save.
It spoke volumes that Fraser Forster was not required to make a serious save until the 67th minute when he kept Ndong’s awkwardly bouncing 25 yard shot out. By way of redressing the balance, Mannone did well to tip a header from Shane Long, on for Gabbiadini, over his bar after Kone’s focus slipped.
When, in the 88th minute, Ryan Bertrand escaped from substitute Wahbi Khazri and crossed low, Long looked set to score but, instead, the ball was turned into his own net by Denayer.
Refusing to be thwarted, Long claimed Southampton’s 90th minute fourth, meeting James Ward- Prowse’s pass and side-footing home.
It promises to be a very quiet flight to New York.
Guardian