Sunderland’s appointment of Paolo Di Canio is a good decision

Sunderland’s selection of Paolo Di Canio to take over from Martin O’Neill is like chalk and cheese. His ex-Swindon chairman describes him as ‘box office’ and he caused more controversies in his 2 years at Swindon than Martin O’Neil has in his career, even with his sharp wit. But do you want a manager to be ‘box office’? Well, in Sunderland’s case, it is exactly what they need. They are in a slow descent towards big trouble with a moribund attack plagued by no creativity causing the free fall. There is a glum atmosphere around the club and no real sense of urgency from the players. What they need is some spark, a shake up, and someone who will instigate a feeling of attacking freedom and confidence to try things.

That man is Paolo Di Canio. When he joined Swindon, they had just slid in to League Two with confidence at an all time low. He left them up near the top of League One, having generated a feeling of extreme belief in a bunch a decent lower league players that they can play proper, exciting football and that they will beat whoever they come up against.

Sunderland need that spirit. Di Canio will bring fresh ideas and infuse his passion and belief in to the team in a very short time period. Where other appointments might have needed time to introduce complex tactical game plans or certain mentalities, Di Canio can come in, bang the drum, and get them playing with more belief.

Sunderland have decent attacking players but they are playing a one dimensional game and without freedom. They have been drilled to play a simple, mistake free game, but in the modern Premier League where every team now believes they can win against each other on a given day, they can’t afford that kind of mindset.

So in the short term, just 7 games left this season, it makes sense. He can bring exactly what they need to help dig themselves out of trouble. A lot of managers bringing new ideas and new passion often have a honeymoon period, such as O’Neill did last year, and that might be just enough to keep Sunderland in the league.

Di Canio also makes sense long term. He’s young but has shown himself to be adaptable to working with players of different standards and also showed himself to be a dab hand in the transfer market. Sunderland will back him with money in the summer and he could have some gems up his sleeve.

This should be the appointment that Sunderland’s talented but grossly underachieving players need to give them fresh belief and new attacking ideas. It should keep them up.