Sam Allardyce has admitted that he was "almost brainwashed" into thinking Jermain Defoe would flop as a lone striker for Sunderland.
The 33-year-old has enjoyed an impressive campaign in front of goal by scoring 16 times in all competitions, including a crucial strike at Norwich City last time out.
Defoe has particularly thrived in a more central position since the arrival of Allardyce in October, but the experienced boss confesses that he nearly decided against tweaking his set-up.
"He's been brainwashed - and I was almost brainwashed - into the fact that he couldn't play up front on his own, which is a bit of a nonsense, really," he is quoted as saying by ESPN. "The number of goals he has scored since he has played up front on his own... Long may it continue.
"He's probably played more regularly for us than he has done for clubs in recent years, and most of those now up front on his own, which I am glad to say has borne us 16 goals in all competitions. I know some of them came by playing somebody else up front with him, but we were clearly a team, when I first started, that couldn't play 4-4-2 on the basis of how many goals we were letting in.
"Jermain might score, but we let in one more than Jermain or whoever scored, so if we scored two, we'd lose three if we scored one, we'd lose two and so on and so forth. We had to stop that - and still have to stop it."
Sunderland play host to Arsenal at the Stadium of Light on Sunday afternoon, aiming to claw their way to safety at the bottom end of the Premier League.
