GIVEN that he was suspended following his red card against QPR four days earlier, Jobe Bellingham could easily have opted to put his feet up when Sunderland played Preston on Wednesday evening. After featuring in all of the Black Cats’ previous 13 league games, the teenager had earned a rare night off.

Instead, as his team-mates scrapped their way to a hard-earned draw, Bellingham and his father joined more than 5,000 travelling supporters in the away end at Deepdale. Commitment to the cause? A rare chance to experience football as a fan? All that and more, according to Sunderland head coach Regis Le Bris.

“The connection with the fans is very important for us, and I think he is aware of that,” said the Black Cats boss. “In the stands, it probably allowed him to feel something different and see things from a new perspective. That could be very useful for the future.

“He told us this morning that he felt the structure wasn’t so good, so it was a new perspective for him, a good perspective, probably as a coach. That feedback was very good.”

Bellingham will be back in the stands at the Stadium of Light tomorrow, watching on as Sunderland host Coventry City, but the 19-year-old will be leaving Wearside next week now after receiving a maiden call-up to England Under-21s.

The midfielder will join his elder brother and senior squad member, Jude, at St George’s Park ahead of Under-21s matches against Spain and the Netherlands.

The younger of the two Bellingham brothers has represented England at every representative level from Under-16s to Under-20s, and Le Bris feels his call-up to the Under-21s is a fitting reward for an excellent start to the season.

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“He deserves to have this reward because he has played very well so far this season,” said the newly-crowned Championship Manager of the Month for October. “It should be a good experience for him.

“He is very young, but he has shown good consistency. We have tried to find a stable position for him, and the repetition of experiences, game after game, has been useful to stabilise his role.

“He is learning all the different tasks he is having to manage during a game, and during different games. I think he has improved many things in his game. He still has a huge potential to discover, but so far, he has done very well.”

Last season, Bellingham played in a number of different positions under Tony Mowbray, Michael Beale and Mike Dodds. As well as appearing in his preferred central-midfield role, the youngster was often stationed as a makeshift number nine as well as occasionally playing on the flanks.

This term, Le Bris has kept him at the heart of midfield, occasionally asking him to drop deep alongside Dan Neil when his side do not have the ball, but always encouraging him to push forward towards the opposition’s 18-yard box when Sunderland are in possession.

“He played once as a six, at Portsmouth, and then he has played an eight in two different positions really, as a six out of possession but then also as one of the players further forward,” said Le Bris. “When he has been in possession, though, he has always been playing as an eight.

“I think that is a good place for him because he can run in behind, he can play in the triangle, he can shoot, he can score and he can defend and press. He can do many things.

“He is the complete player, with a huge potential to discover. I know that the consistency, and trying to affect the game even more, is the key for him. He wants to improve every day. His standards are high, and sometimes his emotions are high too, but he has managed his performance very well so far.”

Le Bris has also been hugely impressed by Bellingham’s reading of the game and astute tactical mind. Part of the reason why he encouraged the teenager to watch Wednesday’s away game from the stands was because he wanted him to get a better overview of the game, taking in the whole of the pitch rather than the small area he was playing in.

He has asked him for his assessments of Sunderland’s performance, and the way in which the side was set up, and shared his own insights about Preston’s approach. As a result, he is hoping Bellingham will be even better equipped to solve tactical problems that arise during a game over the course of the rest of the season.

“I want the best possible culture for all of the players,” he said. “If they can have a good culture, then they can assess the game and, on the pitch, it will be easier to understand the problems and to react and solve the problems in real time. They need that culture.”