The Sunderland Echo’s Phil Smith, Richard Mennear and Mark Donnelly discussed all of the latest Black Cats news on the most recent edition of The Roar Podcast and Smith discussed Sunderland attacker Benjamin Mbunga-Kimpioka’s chances of getting some action for the North East club’s first team during the show.
The 20-year-old attacker first joined Sunderland back in the summer of 2016 from Swedish side IK Sirius.
He was recently involved in a ‘lengthy stand-off with the club’ over a new contract but that came to an end at the beginning of this month when he signed a new deal with the Black Cats that is set to keep him at The Stadium of Light for at least one more year, with the option of one additional year on top of that.
As per ChronicleLive, due to his contract stand-off with the club, Mbunga-Kimpioka didn’t take part in the North East club’s pre-season preparations and as a result, ‘he will have to work hard to make up for lost time’ in order to feature for Sunderland’s first team and during this recent edition of The Roar Podcast, Smith discussed the Sweden U21 international’s chances of featuring for Sunderland’s first team.
He said: “That contract situation went on for far longer than it should’ve done. He missed pre-season, he allowed some other young players to kind of get ahead of him in the pecking order but to be fair, once that got sorted all he could do was come back and get his head down and Phil Parkinson was very clear about that and since then he’s scored, I think, four goals in three U23 games – maybe four games but either way he’s made a good start on that.
“We all know that in terms of his match fitness and in terms of the options Phil Parkinson has, Benji’s not near the top but he’s made a good start in terms of, he’s blocked out that outside noise, he’s got his head down and he’s started scoring some goals.
“He does, theoretically, bring something a little bit different in terms of that pace that he has. I’m not really expecting to see him in the picture any time soon but I do suspect he’ll get a chance.
“There’s that [EFL] Trophy game which is only a couple of weeks away against Fleetwood now, obviously, Sunderland are already through so that might be a good point for him to get a bit of an opportunity in the senior team and let’s see what he can do then.
“Phil Parkinson was very clear, he’s got to produce in the U23s and he’s got to do it consistently, so yeah [there’s a] long way to go for him but that’s all he can do and he’s made a start on that front.”
Should Sunderland give Mbunga-Kimpioka a chance in the first-team?
YES
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TIF Thoughts on what Smith had to say about Mbunga-Kimpioka…
Mbunga-Kimpioka made his senior debut for the North East club back in 2018 when he was just 18 years old and thus far in his young career, the forward has made a total of 14 appearances for the Black Cats’ first team, scoring three goals and providing one assist in those 14 games.
The 20-year-old has also made just eight league appearances for Sunderland so far in his time at the club.
It may be fair to say that Mbunga-Kimpioka hasn’t played a great number of games for the Black Cats so far, however, it is, perhaps, encouraging to hear that he has been performing well for the U23s of late.
It will be interesting to see if he does get a first-team opportunity at some point this season and if so, whether or not the Swede can then make the most of that opportunity in front of goal.
If he can, then given that the Black Cats have scored just eight league goals so far this term, perhaps he will make a case for himself to feature for the first team more regularly.