Player ratings: Sunderland 2-3 Fulham

George Rossiter dishes out the grades after the Whites progressed in the FA Cup.

Fulham are through to the fifth round of the FA Cup after a dramatic win over Sunderland, bringing to an end a wonderful cup tie over two gripping games of football. Leeds await the whites in the next round at Craven Cottage on 28 February, with a place in the quarter-finals on the line. Is this the year Fulham go on a real run?

Marek Rodak

Quite a quiet night for the Slovakian, which is strange considering the goalmouth action that occurred in our own box. Rodak wasn’t forced into many saves, bar a brilliant one from Patrick Roberts, who came close to scoring after a wonderful mazy run through the left hand side of the Fulham box. It would be harsh to place blame for either goal on our keeper. 6.5/10

Kenny Tete

This was a much quieter affair for Tete after the heroics he produced on Friday at Stamford Bridge. Sunderland once again focused many of their attacks down Fulham’s left side of defence, giving Tete not a lot to do. His substitution in the 65th minute seemed sensible game management from Marco given the important league game against Nottingham Forest three days later. 6.5/10

Shane Duffy

Duffy showed no signs of rust in just his second start for the club, shown by a gorgeous cross-field pass within the first five minute towards Manor Solomon. His passing was generally of good quality and he was rarely beaten in the first half. While his legs seemed to wear second half, he still popped up with a valuable late assist for Fulham’s third goal. 7.5/10

Tosin

Tosin seemed to take up Issa Diop’s role in the Fulham defence, as the aggressor of the two centre-backs. Winning the ball high up the pitch on numerous occasions early on, Tosin helped to set the tone as Fulham dominated the early proceedings of this replay. Whether he has done enough to earn a league start in the coming games is yet to be seen. 7/10

Layvin Kurzawa

Kurzawa is difficult to judge. He’s a vastly different left-back option to Robinson, which is strange given Kurzawa’s role in this squad is to be a back-up to the American. The man on loan from PSG again struggled with the threats of Diallo and Roberts, yet he was hugely important to Fulham’s attacking threat down the left and scored the third goal. 6.5/10

Joao Palhinha

Palhinha looked a lot more up for this replay than the original game at Craven Cottage where he struggled to leave his mark on the game. His ridiculous abilities to regain possession were on show, especially important in a game against a Sunderland team which we have learnt in recent weeks are so, so good on the counter attack. 7.5/10

Tom Cairney

As Marco Silva pointed out in his post-match press conference, TC was the best player on the pitch. While he is showing this year he can be a Premier League player, it’s this sort of game that shows why he is one of the Championship’s greatest-ever players. Sunderland’s midfield got absolutely nowhere Cairney, who constantly ran through them like a hot knife through butter. 8.5/10 – Man of the Match

Luke Harris

The biggest compliment you can pay the 17 year old is that he didn’t look out of place in just his second senior start against strong opposition. Harris looked comfortable on the ball from the off and constantly looked to play the ball forward. His half-time substitution seemed harsh on the surface, let’s hope he knew how many minutes he was planned to play before kick-off. 7/10

Harry Wilson

Finally, some promising signs from Harry, who scored his first goal of the season to open the scoring after just 8 minutes. While Patterson should have done better in the Sunderland net, it was still a nice finish. Despite the lack of finishing ability on show beyond that, Wilson got into a number of good positions throughout the game afterwards, the goal seemingly adding confidence to his game. 7/10

Manor Solomon

The Israeli winger looked absolutely electric in the opening stages. His close control when dribbling round defenders was a joy to watch and makes you wonder what else is in store when more minutes are in the legs. Despite being slightly less effective as the game went on and struggling for end product; it’s likely that will come with more game time, you would hope. 7/10

Carlos Vinicius

It’s really strange watching Vinicius. He just doesn’t stamp his authority on opposition defences like Mitrovic does. And while his hold-up play and subsequent assist for Wilson’s opener showed his obvious quality, there were many other occasions where the ball simply seemed to bounce off of him. His half-time substitution won’t have done his confidence any good. 6/10

Substitutes

Aleksandar Mitrovic (Half-time for Carlos Vinicius)

Made a brilliant run and showed brilliant perseverance for Pereira’s goal, and linked up well with the Brazilian throughout the second half. 7/10

Andreas Pereira (Half-time for Luke Harris)

Scored one and nearly had another in a highly effective substitute cameo. As previously mentioned, the relationship with Mitro was on show for everyone to see. 7/10

Bobby De Cordova-Reid (65’ for Kenny Tete)

We didn’t see too big of a performance drop at right-back when Bobby came on, but he won’t be happy that the cross for Sunderland’s first goal came down his side. 6/10

Harrison Reed (65’ for Joao Palhinha)

Looked strangely poor on the ball, losing it in midfield on three occasions within ten minutes of coming on. Hopefully the Ginger Iniesta isn’t injured. 5.5/10

Dan James (80’ for Manor Solomon)

Really didn’t see much of the ball in the last 10 minutes as Fulham faced a barrage of Sunderland attacks. 6/10