Moyes a coup

Duncan Watmore believes Sunderland have pulled off a major coup attracting David Moyes to the club – as he targets a run in his side.The 22-year-old scored twice from the penalty spot in last night’s 2-0 friendly win over Stade Nyonnais, the opening game of the week-long training camp in France.

The livewire forward impressed, leading the line in a youthful team – the first side named by Moyes since he took charge after Sam Allardyce left for England.

Watmore revealed that Moyes has made an instant impression on the squad at their base on Lake Geneva, with the former Manchester United boss wasting no time getting his ideas across.

And the England Under-21 international hopes to have caught his eye with his brace as he targets an extended run in the side following his breakthrough year last season.

Watmore told the Echo: “It was definitely a coup to get him in as manager.

“He has a wealth of experience with some big clubs and the lads are all really looking forward to working with him.

“The club have made a really good appointment and we are all looking forward to impressing him and getting some wins when the season gets going.

“We are all very happy for Sam. To manage England is his dream job, as he said himself many times.

“Sam was really good for me and my development.

“Of course we were sad to lose him from here, but I’m sure he will do well with England and we are now looking forward to working under our new manager.

“He has really impressed us all since he came in and while obviously it has only been a couple of days, we are already getting new ideas of how he wants us to play.

“This week away in France is a great chance for us to get to know him and vice versa and learn from his ideas.

“We are all really enjoying it.”

Watmore is wary of putting additional pressure on his own shoulders by setting goal targets for the upcoming 2016-17 season.

His only target is to get more game time.

“I want to play as much as I can and that is my target – to play as many games as I can,” added Watmore.

“I want to improve and hopefully I can do that under the new manager.

“I don’t set goal targets.

“I just see if I can play as much as possible and if that happens then there must be a reason; hopefully because I am scoring or creating goals.”

The Sunderland players were back on the training ground today ahead of tomorrow night’s friendly against French Ligue 1 club Dijon FCO at the same Stade Camille-Fournier Stadium.

“I really enjoyed the game and thought we did well,” added Watmore.

“Pre-season is all about getting the fitness in, implementing the manager’s ideas and we won, so it was a positive night all round.

“It’s always great to score and I was delighted to get two. To get the win was what we wanted.”

 

Brilliant post - one of my fears about Moyes has been resolved as I was'nt too sure he would engage well with our players - DW has put that to bed At Man U players did not like his training style so just my concern
Onwards

 

And so has Lens now....

Jeremain Lens is delighted David Moyes has been appointed so quickly, and believes he can build on Allardyce's legacy and improve on it

David Moyes can pick Sunderland up where Sam Allardyce left off, and even improve the Black Cats - says Jeremain Lens.

Moyes replaced Allardyce as manager of the Wearside outfit on Saturday, signing a four-year contract at the Stadium of Light.

Lens was disappointed to see his former manager leave the club to become head coach of England.

But he believes the 61-year-old has left his successor a “good squad of high-quality players” with which to “move on together”.

And relieved that Sunderland have made the appointment of Moyes quickly, Lens says he is “excited” about the season to come, but admits his side must start it as they finished the last.

“It’s good to have a new manager because we heard yesterday that Sam was leaving and everyone was disappointed about that,” said Lens, who revealed that Moyes introduced himself to the players in the dressing room at New York Stadium following Saturday’s 2-1 friendly win over Rotherham United.

“But we are happy to have a new manager with us and hopefully we can all move on together.

“It’s really good that he has been able to come in so quickly because it’s not too long until the start of the season so we couldn’t afford to be waiting for a couple of weeks.

“Hopefully, he can carry on the good work that the previous manager did. That is his job.

“The new manager has some good things to work with.

“Since I came here, we have had a good squad – it’s just we were a little bit unlucky at times and didn’t always look like a good team.

“Individually though, we have always had really good, high-quality players.

“Sam made a good group out of us, with a great first XI and everybody else outside that first XI still being really important.

“Now, it is up to the new manager to keep that up, and maybe do even better than Sam did.”

Looking ahead to the start of the new campaign at Manchester City on August 13,Lens added: “I’m really excited about the new season.

“I want to start better than I did last year, and for the team it is also important that we do that too.

“We finished the season really well, but we want to start the new season like we finished the last one.

“This time, it is going to be important that we get the points in the first games because we weren’t able to do that last year.

“We don’t want to be struggling at the end again – that is the most important thing as we look ahead.”

 

Having a focussed and "driven" Lens would be like having a new £20m player! If he plays a season to the best of his ability, he'll be a massive asset to us

 

Sounds promising.

 

Clearly arse licking as he wants to stay in the side. Obvious

 

For a guy who seemed too lose his way with the club last year it was a really positive interview.

He seems to be backing this up with his physique, he looks a completely different bloke to twelve months ago, hope this positivity continues.

 

We've heard a lot of this sort of talk during pre-season for many a year, so I'm not going to get too carried away or buoyed up by it.

Once again, we'll be waiting to see if they can translate the talk into performances and results.

 

On a side note, this is a massive year for Watmore where I suspect it will be a make or break season for the lad..

 

LET THE BUTT KISSING BEGIN!

 

Obvious?

This is a young player, with limited first team experience, speaking on behalf of the entire squad.

“We are now looking forward to working under our new manager. He has really impressed us all since he came in and while obviously it has only been a couple of days, we are already getting new ideas of how he wants us to play. This week away in France is a great chance for us to get to know him and vice versa and learn from his ideas. We are all really enjoying it.”

Obviously much more than just arse licking ..........

 

Showed signs of what he can do last year, which were positive. His attitude is brillant and he seems fit in well with the rest of the squad. Im sure he'll be hoping to improve too, confident he'll come through

 

Any club at our level and a bit higher would be delighted with Moyes.

Right up to Everton (if we remove history) who are effectively 7th (if we go in standard terms) would take him.

We finished 17th. It's a superb appointment and I'm delighted, the players are also football fans of course they see this too.

 

He needs to improve dramatically to stake a claim in the starting line up, still far from convinced that he has the vision to be a top player, useful sub for now tho.

 

Can run with that, over time he may become Defoe's successor because of their similar styles. He is ours for the next four years and could easily slip into taking over as the fox in the box alongside a bigger striker.

 

He hasn't got the nous of Defoe yet. It'll taken a long time before you can compare Watmore and Defoe!

 

Yes, but he can learn from one of the best in the history of the Premier League.

That can't be negative in my way.

 

The kid needs time, hence he could become Defore's successor as written. Defoe's age is against him so Watmoe could save us a fortune.

Do hope I have got this right!

 

Just been doing some reminiscing...

Because of what Moyes got out of Januzaj, I always thought that if Ravel Morrison hadn't left United under Fergie, his career could have been so much different.

Some of you guys may have no idea at all how good this boy was/is, forget about Pogba, he wiped the floor with Paul Pogba, Pogba worshipped the ground Ravel walked on. We're not talking about another Nicky Butt or Phil Neville, we're talking about a player who was probably up there with Gazza and Scholes, he was so much better than Rooney at 15/16/17 years old.

I've never been more gutted about anything in football, we've lost CL finals, been hammered by Liverpool, Cantona retired early, Scholes turned his back on his country, but nowt gets close to watching Ravel Morrison leave United.

Sorry for rambling on about my team etc, the point is, I think Moyes could get his head and empty all of the bad **** out and get him playing. Still only 23 so has plenty of time to fix it up. That's the boy who could change everything for Moyes and if the gamble paid off, you're looking at super money. There's very few coaches in the world who can tame these sort of players, but I think Moyes is one who could.

If Ravel had the attitude of young Duncan Watmore, we'd undoubtedly be looking at one of the best players in the world.

 

I was desperate for us to sign him 2 years back, said similar to you 'most naturally talented since Gazza'.

Nobody is beyond help and I dare say he's pretty unhappy where he is!