Can Sunderland cope without midfield lynchpin Ndong during AFCON 2017?

They may still be third bottom, but Sunderland are actually playing relatively well at the moment. Not for the first time, they are left reflecting on what might have been had they actually turned up in the first two months of the campaign. If the season had begun on November 1st, David Moyes’ side would lie a comfortable 9th in the table. But if that sounds positive, there are shockwaves to come. It’s a little unlikely but Sunderland could lose as many as four players to the Cup of Nations. 

Of course that’s not how football works and so Sunderland are, again, battling for survival. This year it hasn’t really been their fault is neither here nor there. When England came calling, there was nothing they could do to keep Sam Allardyce at the club - the fact that his international reign lasted a single game and that he is now working to save Crystal Palace only exacerbates the bitterness of the situation. 

But Moyes, after an uneasy start in which his realism frequently seemed in danger of toppling into defeatism, has begun to instil a structure. They’ve won four of their last eight games - fortuitously against Bournemouth, doughtily against Hull and Watford, and convincingly against Leicester - and have played well in defeats against Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester United. There was even a 20-minute spell in the first half at Old Trafford on Monday when they looked the better side. Only at Swansea were they poor - and losing 3-0 there this season is as bad as it gets. 

But the worries for David Moyes are threefold - and partly interrelated. With the club up for sale, there is no money to buy new players, leading to speculation one of Jordan Pickford or Lamine Kone - or possibly both - may be sold to raise funds, with both perhaps being loaned back until the end of the season. 

More immediately, their next two games see them go to Burnley, who have the sixth best home record in the league, and then host Liverpool. They could play perfectly well in both games and lose, casting them adrift again. By the time they next have a run of matches in which they might realistically hope to pick up points - Stoke (H), West Brom (A), Crystal Place (A), Southampton (H) around a home game against Tottenham - the Cup of Nations will have begun and they could be without as many as four players. 

Wahbi Khazri, sent off on his last outing for Tunisia, perhaps wouldn’t be unduly missed, having started just four league games this season. But Kone, Papy Djilobodji and Didier Ndong are all major figures. Djilobodji hasn’t been called up by Senegal since the Cup of Nations two years ago, so unless his recent form has caught the eye, he will probably stay. Kone, such a huge part of Sunderland’s survival last season, although rather less consistent this, played in Cote d’Ivoire’s last friendly, against France in November. 

But Ndong is a regular for the Cup of Nations hosts, Gabon - or at least he was until mysteriously going missing before November’s World Cup qualifier away to Mali. He has been named in Gabon's squad, though, and he will be missed. Signed for a club record fee of £13.6m, Ndong has been a sleeper hit. In a team that has a general pass success rate of 72.1%, he has managed 85.5%. But he’s not some dilettantish regista, far from it: he has averaged 1.7 tackles and 1.9 interceptions per game. He is guilty of being caught in possession at times, being dispossessed 0.9 times per game and losing the ball to poor first touches 1.3 times per game, but that is at least partly the fault of those around him. 

And he is only 22. Greater awareness should come with maturity. For now, though, he is by some distance Sunderland’s best passer of the ball as well as being their best ball-winning midfielder. In a difficult season, Ndong has been one of the few clear pluses. January, when Sunderland have to pick up points, could be a struggle without him.