Tony Mowbray’s attack hasn’t quite been firing in recent weeks at Sunderland, but now an even longer standing concern has emerged.
Despite overhauling the striker position during the summer, Sunderland have had significant struggles, with not a goal to boast between Mason Burstow, Nazariy Rusyn or Eliezer Mayenda.
This was initially excused this season given all are relatively inexperienced or new to English football.
But now a stat has emerged which demonstrates how severely worrying the striker position is for the Black Cats.
Tony Mowbray even went as far as labelling the entire department ‘frustrating’ recently. Now, Tony Mowbray has been warned of an ever increasingly worrying issue.
Mowbray warned of worrying stat
Speaking on The Roar Podcast by the Sunderland Echo, Joe Nicholson highlighted an issue many have been aware of recently, but then revealed the true extent of the problem.
“That lack of cutting edge is costing them away from home, another game without a striker scoring and that’s now an extended run. I think we worked out it’s around 22 competitive games now that Sunderland have gone without a recognised striker scoring.”
Nicholson then continued to explain that, “obviously they have found other ways of scoring from other areas of the pitch most notably through Jack Clarke, but it is an issue that a lot of people are talking about.”
How can Mowbray solve this issue?
The forward position is the glaring weakness for Mowbray right now. The worst thing is that there doesn’t seem to be an easy fix.
Whoever is thrown in there seems to struggle which is worrying, however there is one clear thing that could be done to solve this concern.
Sunderland need to dip into the market and find someone with a proven record of scoring goals in the Championship.
Currently the playoffs are within touching distance but without a striker it’s unlikely the Black Cats remain here.
Especially considering how most other sides around them do have a player who’s scoring goals up top.