Opinion: Man United man’s performances for Stoke should be alerting Sunderland ahead of potential summer swoop | OneFootball

Stoke City's season looked to be going nowhere at the halfway point of the season, but some smart January recruitment has brought some energy and life back to the Bet365 Stadium.

Alex Neil departed Sunderland to become the new head coach of the Potters because of the backing that the Coates family tend to give the manager of the team, and whilst we will only really see the full extent of that this coming summer, it wasn't a bad January at all.

Yes, they lost Harry Souttar, but in came goalkeeper Matija Sarkic from Wolves, along with his defensive team-mate Ki-Jana Hoever from Molineux, midfielder enforcer Ben Pearson was loaned in from Bournemouth and has pretty much almost single-handedly revived the engine room, whilst Bersant Celina also signed but has yet to make an impact.

Neil did recruit one more player and that was Axel Tuanzebe, who over the years has had a big reputation at Manchester United but never quite fulfilled his potential.

An England youth international at three different levels, Tuanzebe has played 37 times for the Red Devils throughout his career but the last couple of years have been tough for his development.

Loan stints at Aston Villa and Napoli haven't been so fruitful and he hadn't actually played a competitive game since January 2022 until Stoke decided to bring him in for the remainder of the 2022-23 campaign on transfer deadline day two months ago.

It took a few weeks for Tuanzebe to get his fitness back up, but he has started four matches for the Staffordshire outfit and he has been incredibly impressive in the process.

He did have to come up against talented Brighton teen Evan Ferguson in one of those contests, but in all three league starts Stoke are unbeaten, and he's managed to keep some good attackers very quiet with his pace, strength and positional awareness.

With a contract that expires this summer at Old Trafford - although there is an option that United could but likely won't trigger - Tuanzebe is perhaps having his shop window moment with Stoke, and there is another Championship outfit in the form of Sunderland who should be keeping very close tabs on his performances.

Tuanzebe did not play in the 5-2 demolition of the Black Cats at the Stadium of Light a few weeks ago, but that game did show that Sunderland do need to strenghten their back-line this summer.

Dan Ballard did arrive from Arsenal in 2022 but it does need a further bolstering - Danny Batth is solid enough for what he is but Tony Mowbray lacks depth in that area and that is where Tuanzebe could come into the mix.

Despite his fitness and injury issues over the years, Tuanzebe would be a bargain on a free transfer and when it comes to the size of the club in question between Sunderland and his current loan employers then it isn't really a question of who is bigger and who has the larger fanbase - that is the Wearsiders of course.

Alex Neil may have favoured the Potters when the chance arose but if Sunderland came calling this summer for Tuanzebe then they'd have to fancy their chances of signing him - they need another younger defender to partner Ballard for the next few years at the heart of their defence and the DR Congo-born powerhouse would be the perfect fit.