Tony Mowbray is trying to find a workaround after admitting Sunderland's squad is weighted too heavily in favour of technique instead of runners. Despite star striker Ross Stewart being available for a little over a quarter of the campaign due to injury, the Black Cats are the fourth-highest scorers in the Championship with 49 goals in 34 games - but Mowbray feels they would have even more to their name, if he had more players who could run in behind opposing defences and feed off the creativity of technical players such as Amad, Patrick Roberts, Jack Clarke, and Alex Pritchard.
With Stewart ruled out for the remainder of the campaign with an Achilles injury, and Ellis Simms having been recalled by Everton from his loan spell at the turn of the year, Sunderland's sole out-and-out striker is January loan addition Joe Gelhardt. The Leeds United man will lead the line for the rest of the season but he is not a powerful targetman in the same mould as Stewart, and was originally brought to Wearside to complement the Scot rather than to act as a direct replacement.
And that has left Mowbray trying to coach players - including Gelhardt - to go against their natural instincts and become runners, which is a slow process. "It's very different to try to change the natural habits of footballers," said Mowbray.
