Kristjaan Speakman explains thought process behind Michael Beale Sunderland appointment

Kristjaan Speakman has revealed the details around the appointment and sacking of former Sunderland head coach Michael Beale.

Sunderland have enjoyed a tremendous start under new head coach Regis Le Bris but things were very different last season with the ill-fated decision to replace Tony Mowbray with Beale.

Sporting director Speakman was under heavy scrutiny from the day of the Beale appointment but has since revealed what happened behind the scenes.

In a podcast with The Second Tier, Speakman said: "At the time we made what we thought was the right decision, to change the coach to try and improve some of the areas we wanted to improve.

"There's so many variables that go into a coach change and a coach's success and some of the things went against us on that change and I don't believe in saying we should go back and say we shouldn't have done it. We made the decision for the right reasons, the outcome wasn't the outcome we wanted it to be.

"There were some really good things that happened behind the scenes, some things that happened under that coach's tenure that we are still doing today. Ultimately we weren't able to get the results on the pitch and we didn't get a connection between our fanbase and our coach for various reasons."

Michael Beale and Sunderland a poor match

When taking into account the club achieving a top-six finish in their first season back in the Championship and now topping the table after nine games, it's hard to believe the season in between almost ended in relegation for the Black Cats.

However, the work of Beale very nearly achieved that and had the club not acted when they did, it could have been a reality.

Sunderland were dire to watch under Beale and the atmosphere from the moment he was appointed just bred toxicity.

After Mowbray led the club to a play-off semi-final, fans were hoping it would be used as a platform to build from and his eventual sacking left many confused but many others excited to see how the club would replace him but it couldn't have possibly gone worse.

Sunderland's excellent start to the current campaign has somewhat left the memories of last season's downfall behind but it is very hard to forget what actually happened.

In other Sunderland news, Sunderland striker Aaron Connolly has lifted the lid on the struggles that have plagued his career so far

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