Sunderland fans may be enjoying a period of relative success right now, but it hasn’t always been that way, and we’ve picked out the worst Sunderland XI of the last 25 years to prove it.
Under Regis Le Bris, the Black Cats are pushing for promotion from the Championship and the club appears to be in a really great place both on and off the pitch.
The current crop of Sunderland players includes young superstars like Jobe Bellingham and Chris Rigg, but it is not so long ago that there were dark days on Wearside.
Remember slogging it out in League One? Or those disastrous relegations from the Premier League? From useless strikers to calamitous goalkeepers, we’ve assembled the worst Sunderland XI of the 21st century to show just how far the Black Cats have come.
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The worst Sunderland players of the last 25 years
You can’t fault Kristjaan Speakman and Kyril Louis-Dreyfus’ ambition, and the pair are making shrewd moves in the transfer market these days, but it hasn’t always been that way. In fact, many mistakes have been made, and some of the worst Sunderland signings ever have earned their place in our hall of shame.
Kelvin Davis
There’s a reason he was nicknamed ‘Calamity Kelvin’ and it’s not because he had a love of a certain 1950s musical-Western movie. Kelvin Davis signed for Sunderland from Ipswich Town in 2005 for roughly £1.5m, and would go on to endure an awful campaign as the Mackems suffered relegation in his one and only season at the club.
Davis conceded 59 goals in 34 games for Sunderland, making a number of costly errors between the sticks. Funnily enough, he moved on to Southampton the following summer for around £1m, and went on to serve the Saints fairly well for a decade before retiring.
Donald Love
Signed from Manchester United’s youth team in 2016, there were high hopes for Donald Love upon his arrival on Wearside, but the Scotsman was a big disappointment. He spent three years at the Stadium of Light before his contract was terminated. He now plays for Accrington Stanley, having joined the League Two side in the summer.
Alan Stubbs
Mick McCarthy was desperate to find some experience to bolster his Sunderland defence in 2005, and Alan Stubbs was deemed to be the solution to that problem. Mick McCarthy was wrong.
Stubbs arrived on a free from Everton, made just ten appearances for the Black Cats, failed to win a game, and then scurried back to Merseyside in January 2006.
Phil Babb
Surely, signing a player who had spent six years at Liverpool couldn’t go wrong, could it? Wrong again. Phil Babb joined Sunderland on a free transfer from Sporting Libson in 2002, just two years after leaving Anfield, and had a torrid time in the North East.
The defender spent just under two years at Sunderland before deciding to hang up his boots completely in 2004 — read into that what retirement decision what you will.
Laurens De Bock
Luckily, Sunderland only had to deal with Laurens De Bock for half a season, with the Belgian full-back joining on loan from Leeds United in the summer of 2019, before being sent back in January.
Funnily enough, his ten appearances for Sunderland are three more than he ever made for Leeds, who clearly didn’t want the player at all, having shipped him out on loan numerous times across a four-year period.
Cabral
When Sunderland snapped up Swiss midfielder Cabral from FC Basel, they thought they’d hit the jackpot. Coming with Champions League experience and a big reputation, the Paolo Di Canio recruitment came with huge expectations.
He would turn out to be one of the worst Sunderland signings. Even though he cost nothing, the fact he made just two appearances for the Black Cats makes this one feel like a terrible deal for the club, and a real waste of everyone’s time.
Jack Rodwell
When it comes to high-profile mistakes for Sunderland, Jack Rodwell is perhaps the biggest of them all. After a big-money move to Manchester City didn’t work out for the midfielder, Sunderland took an expensive gamble on Rodwell, and paid the price.
The man himself told The Athletic that he felt he was ‘thrown under the bus’ at Sunderland and turned into a villain. Injuries hampered his career massively, and there were many calls for Rodwell to agree to end his contract at Sunderland throughout his four-year spell on Wearside, but he refused.
Rodwell made 76 appearances for the Black Cats, but was never able to put together a consistent run in the team, becoming something of a (very costly) dead weight in the Sunderland squad.
Jeff Whitley
Another player who made plenty of appearances for Sunderland — 73, to be exact — and yet very rarely put in a good showing, is Jeff Whitley. And, once again, he’s a player Man City shipped off to the North East, but at least this time it didn’t cost Sunderland anything.
Whitley was poor in possession, showed relatively poor discipline (picking up two red cards in his short time on Wearside), and fans will attest, was barely able to complete a pass at times. Not exactly the ideal attributes you look for when trying to put together a competent midfield unit.
Jozy Altidore
Signed in July 2013 with a view to becoming Sunderland’s main man in attack, it’s safe to say Jozy Altidore failed in that respect. He would go on to score a measly three goals in 52 games for the Black Cats before leaving in 2015.
Altidore himself told VICE that he was warned the move could be a ‘disaster’, but he went anyway. The only saving grace for this man is that his exit paved the way for Jermain Defoe to join Sunderland.
Jon Stead
After making waves at Huddersfield Town, Jon Stead earned a high-profile move to Blackburn Rovers. Things didn’t quite work out for him there, but Sunderland fancied taking a chance on the striker, which ended up being a £2.5m mistake.
Stead scored just two goals in 39 games for the Black Cats, missing a number of gilt-edged chances along the way. As the pressure built and built on the young forward, things just went from bad to worse, and he’s never been able to get his career back on track since.
Will Grigg
What is it with Sunderland and finding strikers who suddenly lose all their goalscoring instincts as soon as they sign for the Black Cats? Will Grigg was prolific for Wigan between 2015 and 2019, before joining Sunderland in a £3m deal.
He went on to score only eight goals in 62 matches for Sunderland, struggling to find the back of the net even in League One, causing much frustration for fans and teammates alike. Even Grigg himself admitted (via the Sunderland Echo) he never felt like it would work out for him at Sunderland, which says all you need to know about his ill-fated time there.
Honourable mentions for some of the worst Sunderland signings
Honestly, we were spoiled for choice when it comes to picking out the worst Sunderland signings of the 21st century.
There’s Milton Nunez, who had 30,000 fans turn up to watch him in a reserves game, which ended up being his one and only appearance for Sunderland. Or Ignacio Scocco, who lasted just six months in the North East before returning to South America without a goal to his name.
Sunderland fans still can’t get over the failure of Andrea Dossena, who arrived on loan from Liverpool and seemingly forgot how to pass a ball. And there is still confusion over how Jason Steele — who conceded 31 goals in 18 games for the club — was able to forge a Premier League career with Brighton.
Thankfully, Sunderland’s transfers over the last 12 months have been far more successful, with many of the club’s summer signings becoming influential figures in Le Bris’ setup right now.