The Irons have the leakiest defence in the English top flight this season, while a league-high 12 of their 44 goals conceded have been headers \u2013 despite boasting regular centre-back options of Max Kilman (6ft 4in), Jean-Clair Todibo (6ft 3in) and Konstantinos Mavropanos (6ft 4in).<\/p>\n
Wantaway striker Callum Wilson was the hero last Saturday, prompting the powers that be at London Stadium to change tack over his future. The Englishman now looks set to stay until the end of the season, despite the recent arrival of fellow forwards Pablo Felipe and Taty Castellanos.<\/p>\n
West Ham’s home record against promoted side is encouraging \u2013 they’ve lost just one of their last 21 \u2013 but they’ll be wary of a Sunderland outfit who blew them away in the second half of a 3-0 walloping at the Stadium of Light on the opening day.<\/p>\n
Dogged Black Cats continue to impress<\/p>\n
If Sunderland can follow up that August win with another in east London, it will mark just their second Premier League double over West Ham, having previously achieved it in 2010-11 \u2013 ominously, the last time the Hammers were relegated.<\/p>\n
The Black Cats, who sit ninth, are unbeaten at home \u2013 only league leaders Arsenal can say the same \u2013 and have lost just one of their past eight games in all competitions.<\/p>\n
Regis le Bris’ side are becoming increasingly notable for their resilience after going behind, a quality they showed again during last week’s 2-1 win over Crystal Palace. They have won 16 points from losing positions in the Premier League this season, second only to Aston Villa’s tally of 18.<\/p>\n
With 33 points from 22 games, Sunderland are the best-performing promoted side in 16 years. Alex McLeish’s Birmingham City in 2009-10 were the last newcomers to have as many points at this stage of the season.<\/p>\n
Durable Granit’s work is top<\/p>\n
Some shrewd summer signings have played their part in that success, and none more so than Granit Xhaka. The Switzerland captain, 33, has played the most minutes of any outfield player in the Sunderland squad.<\/p>\n
And despite his reputation as a midfield schemer, the former Arsenal player has offered his new employer a perhaps surprising weapon in attack. Xhaka’s role in Enzo le Fee’s equaliser against Crystal Palace last weekend means he has made eight line-breaking passes that have led to a goal, more than any other player in the division this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Irons have the leakiest defence in the English top flight this season, while a league-high 12 of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":433104,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-433103","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433103\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/433104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}