Sheffield United 1-0 Sunderland (H)
Chris Wilder's side battled against one of the division's best sides to record an 8th straight home league win to nil.
These ratings will follow after every game of the Championship season, and they will — depending on your outlook — be harsh or too kind. Any 1-10 rating should make use of every number, and as Riley explains below, the ratings system starts at a 5 (when a player enters the field) and goes up or down depending on their contribution.
Riley Roberts
Michael Cooper – 8
Saved the pen, caught some big crosses, kept the clean sheet. Thought his distribution could’ve been better but can’t complain too much
Alfie Gilchrist – 7
Looked very comfortable stepping into CB, really good defensive performance.
Harry Souttar – 2
Hadn’t had the best game before the red, misplacing quite a few passes, silly to pick up 2 yellows in the first half.
Jack Robinson – 5
Hard to give him too high of a rating when he gave away a penalty but he I thought he was really good outside of it.
Harrison Burrows – 6
Solid, as per.
Vinicius Souza – 4
Sooo sloppy in possession. Why we decided to field the 23/24 version I don’t know. Could you give me the real Vini Souza back?
Sydie Peck – 6
Surprised to see him get pelters from a few. Yes, he gave the ball away a few times but he’s always going to do that due to the nature of how he plays. In tight spaces in the final third, he’s excellent. Helps our play around the box so much. Covered some reyt ground too.
Jesurun Rak Sakyi – 6
Decent. Nothing more nothing less.
Callum O’Hare – 5
Harder to judge on 45 minutes, thought he was fine.
Gustavo Hamer – 6
Some good passes and neat play. Not his best but still very decent.
Tyrese Campbell – 4
Unfortunate that we kept booting it long to him, he was never going to do well at Kieffer Moore’s job.
Subs:
Femi Seriki – 6
Give this boy an end product and he might be the best RB ever. Bit frustrated at his reluctance to cross.
Tom Davies – 7
Could make an argument this was the perfect substitute display. Not sure I can stomach giving higher than a 7 to someone who played less than 20 mins, but he was excellent. Scored and then saw the game out well.
Average rating – 6.55
Ratings system:
0 – Reserved for anyone who has a wayward effort at goal smash me in the face, unlikely to ever happen.
1 – Worst of the worst. Saved for disastrous performances, with result-altering mistakes.
2 – A terrible performance. Performances where a player offers very little and has many unsuccessful actions, ultimately proving to be a major detriment to the team’s overall performance.
3 – A bad performance. Negative contribution. Like a 2, just a bit less rubbish.
4 – A below-average performance. Not necessarily having a negative impact on the game; it could just be a player who struggled to impact the game at all.
5 – The baseline rating. All players go into a game starting on a 5 — it’s bang average, given out for an unremarkable yet solid performance, for a postman delivering the post.
6 – A decent performance. A player who gets a 6 has positively contributed to the game, and at the very least has had some impressive moments while being generally solid outside of them.
7 – A good performance. Awarded for players who had a noticeable positive impact on the game.
8 – A very good performance. A player who made significant contributions to the outcome of the game with their performance and consistently displayed a high level throughout.
9 – An outstanding performance. To score as high as a 9, a player needs to be dominant throughout the match, performing at a level well above the standard and/or making multiple game-changing contributions.
10 – A perfect 10, unlikely to ever see the light of day as nobody has a flawless game. For me to even think about giving out a 10 it would probably have to be a player doing something historic or unheard of.