​What was arguably the biggest game in world football on Saturday wasn’t even Sunderland’s biggest game in the next seven days.Imagine saying that five years ago.Régis Le Bris described the 90 minutes on Saturday evening as “frustrating”. There’s no doubt this was not because of his displeasure at the quality of the performance, but because the key moments in the game didn’t go Sunderland’s way. It was, in many aspects, an improved showing from last year’s gutsy 2-2 draw. At no point, for example, did Arsenal pin them back as they did last time at the Stadium of Light. The save from Enzo Le Fée was only David Raya’s second in the Premier League from the spot. Without that, Bruno Guimarães doesn’t stick an absolute beauty into the top corner. There’s no doubt about it; it was a magnificent strike – but one that more often than not doesn’t end up in the back of the net. These are the small margins our results can live or die by.It was just a pity for the barcodes he didn’t perform like that in a black-and-white shirt at the Stadium of Light, when he – alongside his colleagues – had a heart the size of a school lunch tinned pea.Sunderland should take almost, but not quite universal, positives away from the performance against the league’s leading side. Was it deserved? No. Could it have turned out very differently? Yes. Crucially, can they improve? Absolutely. “We were close,” Le Bris said. He wasn’t wrong.Grit, guile, togetherness, organisation. It all bodes well for the remainder of the season. The key factor now is whether they can replicate this performance when coming up against sides which do not possess Arsenal’s quality – i.e. Sunderland’s 18 other opponents in the league this season.It could have been so different. The Raya penalty save was the dictionary definition of a sliding-doors moment. As an aside, it was a penalty. We should take time to remember that Arsenal’s behaviour from set plays last term has led directly to the rules being tightened around holding. So for Mikel Arteta to complain when it was enforced against them was mightily rich. Of course, it wasn’t that the Spaniard truly believed what was coming out of his mouth, but an attempt at pseudo-psychology in order to limit his side’s undoubted losses in this area as the season progresses. He wants to make referees think twice about sanctioning this sort of physicality – Howard Webb and his merry band of men in black would be wise to sidestep this pantomime nonsense.Each player on the pitch had his own defined role. Régis Le Bris is The Scientist, and he knows exactly what each man must do in order to play to their strengths. Take Brian Brobbey as a case in point; the Dutchman will have woken up this morning feeling like he’d spent the night in a particle accelerator. A worry all managers have is: will their sides eventually be worked out? But no amount of homework or preparation will enable you to negate his physicalit