{"id":641546,"date":"2025-11-10T11:57:56","date_gmt":"2025-11-10T10:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/?p=641546"},"modified":"2025-11-10T11:58:02","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T10:58:02","slug":"granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/","title":{"rendered":"Granit Xhaka Hailed As Premier League\u2019s Signing of the Season After Sunderland\u2019s Stunning Start"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Sunderland&rsquo;s remarkable return to the Premier League has been one of the season&rsquo;s standout stories, and at the heart of it all stands their captain, Granit Xhaka. The 33-year-old Swiss midfielder arrived from Bayer Leverkusen in the summer for &pound;13 million. The veteran midfielder has quickly established himself as the driving force behind the Black Cats&rsquo; success, both on and off the pitch.<\/p><p>Named captain immediately by manager Regis Le Bris, Xhaka has brought composure, leadership and top-tier experience to a young Sunderland squad. His consistency has been unmatched as he has played every minute of their 11 league games so far. The former Arsenal midfielder has contributed one goal and three assists for the Black Cats. Notably, Xhaka also leads the team in chances created, successful passes, duels won and distance covered.<\/p><figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Only Erling Haaland (7.94) has a higher rating than Granit Xhaka in the Premier League this season (7.39). &#128170;&#128293; <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/DaxwEjmuHL\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>pic.twitter.com\/DaxwEjmuHL<\/a><\/p>&mdash; WhoScored (@WhoScored) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/WhoScored\/status\/1986743304449364291?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>November 7, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure><p><strong>Also Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/sunderland-end-arsenals-winning-streak-with-dramatic-late-equaliser\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>Sunderland End Arsenal&rsquo;s Winning Streak with Dramatic Late Equaliser<\/a><\/strong><\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Granit Xhaka &lsquo;Probably Signing of the Season&rsquo; &ndash; Wayne Rooney<\/h2><p>Former Manchester United and England striker Wayne Rooney has labelled Granit Xhaka as &ldquo;probably the signing of the season,&rdquo; highlighting Xhaka&rsquo;s transformative impact. <em>&ldquo;Coming back to the Premier League with a promoted side, there were questions about how he&rsquo;d adapt,<\/em>&rdquo; Rooney said on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=DU4JhUk0L7g&amp;list=PLC8GlM8JtFN6bP9ijtMTj8QFC2RmSxEUn&amp;index=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>The Wayne Rooney Show<\/a>. &ldquo;<em>But he&rsquo;s been absolutely brilliant &ndash; a leader, a controller, and exactly what Sunderland needed.<\/em>&rdquo;<\/p><p>Currently sitting fourth in the Premier League table with 19 points after 11 games, Sunderland look well on course to secure their top-flight status and Xhaka&rsquo;s leadership has been central to that push. For a club that has defied expectations this season, their captain&rsquo;s resurgence is proving to be one of the stories of the campaign.<\/p><p><strong>Also Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/pep-guardiola-thanks-jeremy-doku-manchester-city-incredible-present-in-triumph-liverpool\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>Pep Guardiola Thanks Jeremy Doku and Manchester City for &lsquo;Incredible Present&rsquo; in Triumph Over Liverpool<\/a><\/strong><\/p><p>Rooney concluded by saying,<\/p><blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>&ldquo;Sunderland have got a very young squad as well. He&rsquo;d almost be like a father figure and he&rsquo;ll be a big help for the coach as well to be the in-between man as captain. And they made a lot of signings in the summer, he&rsquo;ll be a massive help for the manager and with them players, for sure, using his experience.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<\/blockquote><figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Granit Xhaka &#129309; Mikel Arteta<br><br>The pair certainly enjoyed working together at <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Arsenal?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>@Arsenal<\/a> &#10084;&#65039; <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/Jj7bHs448k\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>pic.twitter.com\/Jj7bHs448k<\/a><\/p>&mdash; Premier League (@premierleague) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/premierleague\/status\/1986810881075024290?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" class=\"trk-cta-link\" data-cta-trk='{\"ctaType\":\"Link\",\"ctaSubType\":\"main\"}'>November 7, 2025<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n<div class=\"mm-layout mm-layout-type-post mm-layout-slot4\">\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sunderland&rsquo;s remarkable return to the Premier League has been one of the season&rsquo;s standout stories, and at the heart of it all stands their captain, Granit Xhaka. The 33-year-old Swiss midfielder arrived from Bayer Leverkusen in the summer for &pound;13 million. The veteran midfielder has quickly established himself as the driving force behind the Black [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":641550,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_mux_skip_reasons":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[5618,4038],"tags":[8613,1182,8618,6637,4136],"class_list":["post-641546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-premier-league","category-soccer","tag-granit-xhaka","tag-premier-league","tag-premier-league-2025-26","tag-sunderland","tag-wayne-rooney"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Granit Xhaka Hailed As Premier League&rsquo;s Signing of the Season After Sunderland&rsquo;s Stunning Start - The Playoffs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Veteran midfielder Granit Xhaka has brought composure, leadership and top-tier experience to a young Sunderland squad.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Granit Xhaka Hailed As Premier League&rsquo;s Signing of the Season After Sunderland&rsquo;s Stunning Start - The Playoffs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Veteran midfielder Granit Xhaka has brought composure, leadership and top-tier experience to a young Sunderland squad.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Playoffs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-11-10T11:58:02+01:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/imago1068728940-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1707\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Abhinav Goel\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ThePlayoffsEN\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ThePlayoffsEN\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Abhinav Goel\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"NewsArticle\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Abhinav Goel\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/560f53c1b7b036779d2efecc3dc9bc35\"},\"headline\":\"Granit Xhaka Hailed As Premier League\u2019s Signing of the Season After Sunderland\u2019s Stunning Start\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-11-10T10:57:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-11-10T10:58:02+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/\"},\"wordCount\":386,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/cdn.theplayoffs.news\/en\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/imago1068728940-scaled.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Granit Xhaka\",\"Premier League\",\"Premier League 2025-26\",\"Sunderland\",\"Wayne Rooney\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Premier League\",\"Soccer\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"copyrightYear\":\"2025\",\"copyrightHolder\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/#organization\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/theplayoffs.news\/en\/granit-xhaka-hailed-as-premier-leagues-signing-of-the-season-after-sunderlands-stunning-start\/\",\"name\":\"Granit Xhaka Hailed As Premier League\u2019s Signing of the Season After Sunderland\u2019s Stunning Start - 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