Sunderland had 7 players in midfield for much of the time, and obviously focussed on him as the player who is at the base of all our play. As for those chipped forward passes that people have complained about, Can also failed with several of those and no one has mentioned him. In fact, I wonder if this was something we were working on, because those balls struck me as looking a bit strange. Nevertheless, despite how terrific Gini and Can were supposedly, neither had as many passes leading to chances as Hendo, who was supposedly shit.
If Hendo had played lots more forward passes (of which many would have been picked off given their tactical congestion of the midfield) some of the same people would be criticising for his attempting too many 'Hollywood' balls.
Several media outlets ? Really ? Actually the numbers do back up the argument. Just look at his pass chart !
Poor old angry, wrong Froggy.