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Adil Aouchiche has impressed from the bench but competition for starting places is intense with Sunderland in good form

Adil Aouchiche will have to bide his time to break into Sunderland’s starting XI – at least as long as the Black Cats keep on performing. That’s the selection policy boss Tony Mowbray is adopting as Sunderland look for a sixth win in seven games as prepare to take on Middlesbrough at the Stadium of Light tomorrow lunchtime.

Aouchiche has figured from the bench in each of Sunderland’s last five games, and marked his debut with an assist for Abdoullah Ba in the win at QPR last month, but has yet to start a game for the club since arriving on deadline day from Lorient. The 21-year-old has made a good impression on Mowbray and the Sunderland fans, however, and it is only a matter of time before he earns his first start.

“Every good team has got competition all over the pitch,” said Mowbray. “It’s a difficult job to coach them because you can only pick 11 and they all want to play.

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“The good thing for me is that they have all shown that they have the qualities required when they have been put on the pitch – Abdoullah Ba in recent weeks, Adil has shown real high quality in terms of possession of the football and desire to win it back when needed. Adil wants to play, but his personality is not to come banging on my door and getting upset.

“I’ve told him that he has come in, and at the moment the team is functioning and winning. He’s had cameos, really, of 15 minutes here and 20 minutes there but done very well in those, doesn’t look out of place, doesn’t weaken the team when he comes on – if anything, he has nlooked threatening and he assisted a goal at QPR for Ba.

“He has to be patient, unfortunately.”

Mowbray has generally stuck to the same core group of players and is likely to do so again when Boro come to town. Alex Pritchard missed the midweek win over Watford with a calf injury and will not be risked, meaning the starting XI could well be unchanged.

But further down the line, Mowbray believes the big test will come when either or both of his first-choice centre-back pairing of Dan Ballard and Luke O’Nien are absent, and he has to call upon summer arrivals Jenson Seelt and Nectar Triantis who have had minimal first-team action so far. Mowbray said: “Everyone will have their favourites, everyone will be saying ‘why isn’t Mowbray playing him, why isn’t he doing that, what’s he doing?’

“I see them every day in training, I see the ones we should keep going with and give them the opportunity to see if we can be a successful team. I don’t think the really successful teams rotate three in and three out every week.

“The best teams have consistency of performance. The test for us will come in the back line, whether Jenson Seelt or Nectar Triantis are ready when either Luke O’Nien or Dan Ballard get injured.

“Are they ready? We’re trying hard to work them every day on the training pitch and giving them enough exposure in the U21s because they have to be ready – it’s unlikely that those two [O’Nien and Ballard] will play 46 games this season.”