{"id":564598,"date":"2020-09-04T09:21:52","date_gmt":"2020-09-04T13:21:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/?p=564598"},"modified":"2020-09-04T09:21:52","modified_gmt":"2020-09-04T13:21:52","slug":"defender-arbenit-xhemajli-completes-move-to-sunderland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/09\/04\/defender-arbenit-xhemajli-completes-move-to-sunderland\/","title":{"rendered":"Defender Arbenit Xhemajli Completes Move to Sunderland"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/clubs\/sunderland\/\" target=\"_self\">Sunderland<\/a> have completed the signing of defender Arbenit Xhemajli. The 22-year-old Kosovan defender joins after successful trial with the Black Cats during pre-season. The deal was confirmed on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.safc.com\/news\/team-news\/2020\/september\/xhemajli-signs-for-sunderland\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">official Sunderland website<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Xhemajli played in a friendly against Gateshead recently where he played on the left side of a back three. However, the defender&#8217;s versatility across the defence is a major plus for manager <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/02\/10\/manager-of-the-month-phil-parkinson-gets-back-to-winning-ways\/\" target=\"_self\">Phil Parkinson<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>Arbenit Xhemajli Completes Sunderland Move<\/h2>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">\u270d\ufe0f Welcome to Wearside, Arby!<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/ARBYArrives?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#ARBYArrives<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Sunderland AFC (@SunderlandAFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SunderlandAFC\/status\/1301868646348791810?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">September 4, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h3>Who is Arbenit Xhemajli?<\/h3>\n<p>Xhemajli is a Kosovo international and arrives at <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/09\/02\/cult-heroes-sunderland-part-two\/\" target=\"_self\">Sunderland<\/a> having left Swiss Super League side\u00a0Neuch\u00e2tel Xamax during the summer. He is a ball-playing defender who can play anywhere across the defence; however, he has primarily played as a sweeper or on the left side of a back three.<\/p>\n<p>In a recent interview with the<a href=\"https:\/\/www.chroniclelive.co.uk\/sport\/football\/transfer-news\/what-can-sunderland-expect-arbenit-18853596\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> Chronicle<\/a>, a Kosovan football expert gave his opinion on the 22-year-old:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He is particularly good defensively at duels (ground\/aerial), clearances and tackles.\u00a0He covers his space to the maximum, regularly being fouled by opponents by preventing them from getting the ball, and he gets dribbled past very rarely.\u00a0Also, a positive glimpse is that he kicks long balls to find his teammates on the other side of the pitch.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>Parkinson Wanted to Add Xhemajli as Soon as Possible<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2020\/08\/31\/aiden-mcgeadys-sunderland-career-is-over\/\" target=\"_self\">Sunderland<\/a> boss <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sunderlandecho.com\/sport\/football\/sunderland-afc\/sunderland-brink-concluding-defender-deal-phil-parkinson-gives-transfer-update-2960544\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Phil Parkinson speaking<\/a> ahead of the defender putting pen to paper, said he was keen to bring in Xhemajli to strengthen his options: \u201cIt\u2019s been well documented that we&#8217;ve been speaking to Arbenit Xhemajli and he\u2019s a player we\u2019d like to bring in for many reasons.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div class=\"markup sc-lcpuFF fnmRNp\">\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s young, has got good quality and play right across the back three or four. We\u2019re close to bringing him in and that would be a boost for us, another young player who can strengthen us and add competition.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>New Signing Delighted to Have Completed Move<\/h3>\n<p>Speaking about his move to the Stadium of Light, Xhemajli <a href=\"https:\/\/www.safc.com\/news\/team-news\/2020\/september\/xhemajli-signs-for-sunderland\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">said<\/a>: &#8220;It feels great to get the deal done. I\u2019m really happy to be here and I can\u2019t wait to get started. I had some positive talks with the manager and from what I have seen, I believe we will have a successful season.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo<br \/>\n<a id=\"0n6D4U3sSgxqRORqZjmsiw\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.co.uk\/detail\/1257238027\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'0n6D4U3sSgxqRORqZjmsiw',sig:'iY2_D-It2dkWabZ_EmL-BlFl_-_YhFUR8GEoHPXM4QA=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1257238027',caption: true ,tld:'co.uk',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sunderland today completed the signing of Kosovo international defender Arbenit Xhemajli. The 22-year-old impressed on trial earlier in pre-season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":135,"featured_media":564726,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32,34,30,1369],"tags":[6558,168,657,90,35,148,37,136],"class_list":["post-564598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-league-football","category-league12","category-news","category-sunderland-league-football","tag-arbenit-xhemajli","tag-efl","tag-efl-league-one","tag-fifa","tag-sunderland","tag-transfer-window","tag-transfers","tag-world-football"],"modified_by":"Ben Robinson, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/135"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=564598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/564726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=564598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=564598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=564598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}