Preston North End host Sunderland in the first round of the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night.
Here, popular Black Cats fanzine ‘A Love Supreme’ give us the lowdown on the start to life under Regis Le Bris, Alan Browne’s first impressions at the Stadium of Light and more.
What impression has Regis Le Bris made?
We had a long saga between the conclusion of last season and his appointment where it seemed the club were never going to appoint a new head coach, so the reaction from a majority was just that we were pleased somebody was coming in at last. There was some negativity initially, mainly centred around his poor final season with Lorient. But I think as people learned about the specifics of his situation there (them basically selling all of their best players and bringing in a bunch of uninterested mercenaries) that’s sort of died down a bit now.
He’s spoken well in interviews and at a fan-attended talk-in at the Stadium of Light, which has helped his position greatly. However, the discourse around the club has been dominated by our current lack of a first-team ready striker still (at the time of writing anyway) and off-the-pitch goings on (the new Hummel kits have gone down really well, our new shop opened and the public relations has been really good over pre-season), so he’s not been talked about as much as a new manager normally has, I feel. Overall, he’s not done anything to suggest things will go badly and the atmosphere around him is generally more positive than when he first came in.
Possession with purpose is how I would summarise it. To be totally honest with you I’m not the most knowledgeable on football tactics, but from what I’ve seen in preseason (after the initial experimentation was over and done with) he likes a high pressing game and is attempting to make our game plan less focused on Jack Clarke. In the last game versus Marseille, we used dribbling from the likes of Browne, Mayenda and Roberts to move up the pitch more quickly. In the previous campaign that was very rare from anybody other than Clarke. We also seem to be crossing the ball more, something that was almost comically absent last year and in general we are much quicker and effective at creating chances when we get in and around the box. He likes his full backs to come high up the pitch as well.
How do you expect Sunderland to approach the tie?
We aren’t that great when we have our second-choice XI out on the pitch. We may see some new signings feature as well and that means they won’t be completely up to speed (thinking of Ian Poveda with that one). I’d expect us to have more than a fair share of the possession, but struggle to actually find the back of the net. Perhaps we won’t be going all out to win it, as most Championship sides quite frankly are ambivalent to the League Cup – but some of our players will have a point to prove. If Preston want the tie though, it’ll probably be there for you because we aren’t clinical enough without our main players. Just remember your shooting boots and you’ll most likely win.
