Sunderland vs. Tottenham: Lineups and Match Thread

Happy Spurs Day, everyone! Tottenham heads to the Stadium of Light (which is NOT an evangelical chapel) for an early match to take on the Black Cats in a game that SHOULD be an easy win for the Good Guys. But one only has to look back to the Wigan game to see how those games sometimes turn out.

Sunderland will be without their talismanic midfield general and club captain Lee Cattermole, starting Seb Larsson in midfield, and they're still missing former United starlet Wes Brown. Spurs loanee and Arsenal-killer Danny Rose will not play against his home club. But as we saw Boxing Day vs. Manchester City, the Black Cats have the ability to surprise.

As for Spurs, Steven Caulker turns 21 today, and he's rewarded with an away start, paired with Michael Dawson in the Tottenham back line. Moussa Dembélé took a knock against Villa, but will still start the game; in fact, the entire front 6 is identical to the one that played vs. Villa. Alas, still no Benoit Assou-Ekotto, LOL.

Lineups:

Tottenham (4-4-2): Lloris; Walker, Dawson, Caulker, Naughton; Lennon, Sandro, Dembele, Bale; Adebayor, Defoe
Subs: Friedel, Vertoghen, Huddestone, Livermore, Parker, Dempsey, Sigurdsson

Sunderland (4-4-1-1): Mignolet; Gardner, Cuellar, Kilgallon, O'Shea; Larsson, Colback; Johnson, Sessegnon, McClean; Fletcher
Subs: Campbell, Wickham, McFadden, Vaughan, Dong-won, Bramble, Westwood

As always, do good works, don't be jerks, no YOLO, and have fun!