Sunderland appoint Brayne as Set Piece Coach

Brayne had originally joined the Londoners as Individual Development Coach in March 2024 before being promoted to Set Piece Coach and First Team Coach over the summer.

Before that, he had two spells at Birmingham City, totalling more than 10 years, working with the younger age group players. His last role at St Andrew’s was Head of Coaching and Player Development for the Under-15 to Under-21 age group.

In-between that he worked for more than two-and-a-half years at Manchester City as an Under-15 and Under-16 Performance Analyst and Academy Coach.

‘Leap of faith’

Charlton manager Nathan Jones said: “James is a very good coach who has progressed during his time at the football club.

“He came into a development coaching role with no first-team experience and we saw what he could do and took a leap of faith and he repaid that faith and played his part in our promotion-winning season.

“He’s a great lad, has been an excellent part of our coaching team and he goes with our best wishes.”

Charlton have promoted Danny Hylton, who retired as a player in the summer, to the joint role of Set Piece Coach and First Team Coach to replace Brayne.

Jones said: “We earmarked Danny Hylton a long time ago as someone we wanted in our coaching environment and someone we wanted to give more responsibility to, and he is the natural successor to James.”

Brayne is the latest summer addition to the coaching staff at the Stadium of Light.

Luciano Vulcano and Isidre Ramón Madir have also joined as Assistant Coaches, while Neil Cutler has come in as Goalkeeping Coach.

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