Eliezer Mayenda, a teenage sensation, may make his debut this weekend against Norwich City, as head coach of Sunderland Tony Mowbray hinted at during his pregame press conference.
For an alleged £870,000, Mayenda transferred to the Stadium of Light during the summer transfer window, but his previous team, Sochaux, retained a 25% sell-on clause for any potential future sales of the attacker.
The 18-year-old did, however, rip his hamstring shortly after joining the Black Cats, which kept him out of the team for several months. Nevertheless, he has since resumed training, and Mowbray confirmed that the young player even played the entire 90 minutes at the beginning of the week.
The Sunderland manager remained silent but left the door open when asked if Mayenda would be included in the team for tomorrow’s match against the Canaries. [Sunderland AFC News quotes]:
“We’ll probably bench another striker and see if that helps us,” the analyst said. In the end, the reason he isn’t prepared [to start] is that he hasn’t actually played football in ten weeks.
“After missing ten weeks of action, he won’t be prepared [to start] after having only played one ninety-minute game at the beginning of the week. Is it worthwhile to start him off the bench and perhaps give him a spell towards the conclusion of the match? Perhaps because scoring a goal only takes a moment.” So let’s observe and wait.
Sunderland has only scored once in their last three games, indicating that they have recently struggled to score goals. In addition, Jack Clarke has eight goals so far this season. With just two goals, six players are tied for the second-highest scoring position for the Black Cats.
Writer’s Opinion
Sunderland fans will be eager to see what Mayenda can do for the team after signing three months ago. A debut tomorrow in front of the home crowd could be a nice welcome for the Spaniard and give him the motivation he needs to keep going, even though it might take some time for him to adjust to life in English football.
