Chris Coleman praised the impact of young duo Josh Maja and Joel Asoro as Sunderland secured their first home win of the year against Fulham this afternoon.
In a match with little to separate either side, Maja and Asoro were introduced midway through the second period as Coleman looked to shake things up.
Replacing Lewis Grabban and James Vaughan, who had both put in respectable shifts, Coleman made the bold move to take the game to Fulham with the introduction of the young pair and within five minutes it paid dividends.
Adam Matthews fed Maja inside the box, and after taking the ball in his stride the striker spun his man and calmly fired across goal to hand the Black Cats an important three points on home soil.
“It was a great finish,” Coleman told safc.com post-match.
“The game was balanced nicely and it was a nice time to introduce two new strikers onto the pitch.
“Grabbs and Vaughany had done their job really well, they had worked really hard and apart from a fantastic save from the Fulham No.1, we would’ve been 1-0 up anyway.
“We thought it was a good moment to bring on two young players and they didn’t disappoint.
“The goal was fabulous, the timing of his run, getting between two defenders and the ball in from Adam Matthews was fantastic.
“It was an amazing time to score and it got us over the line,” he continued.
“Vaughany and Grabban had been running hard for 70 minutes. It is thankless task sometimes but in terms of a gamble we needed some fresh legs on the pitch.
“Didier (Ndong) did a good job for us and the new lads linked up well.
“I could go through all the players in the squad today, it about all of them and they have been great today.”