While a number of Sunderland’s signings last summer were relative unknowns, Diarra had already established a considerable reputation prior to moving to Wearside thanks to his performances with Strasbourg and Senegal.
He has struggled to hit the heights that were expected of him since joining the Black Cats, although his cause was hardly helped by the knee injury that sidelined him for much of the first half of the season or the lengthy period he spent away from England at the Africa Cup of Nations.
There have been signs of improvement in his last few outings, with his midfield display against Tottenham at the weekend undoubtedly one of his best performances in a Sunderland shirt.
Le Bris was willing to be patient with all of last summer’s additions, and feels Diarra is coming along nicely now his injury issues are behind him and he is enjoying a sustained run in the team.
“Like for many players, Habib is getting better,” said the Sunderland boss. “He needs minutes in the Premier League because he's a new player at this level, to be fair.
“He has this power and energy, we need to combine this activity with clean execution in the future. Overall, though, I think it was very good from him [against Spurs].”
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Along with the rest of last summer’s acquisitions, Diarra has helped Sunderland enjoy an extremely successful return to the Premier League.
Internally, there is a strong desire to keep progressing, with Le Bris claiming the club’s next main ambition is to become established as a regular presence inside the top ten.
“The main objective of the club was to stay in the league,” said Le Bris, whose side are next in action on Sunday when they head to Aston Villa. “Now, it’s achieved, so the vision, although we don’t know when, is to be a consistent top-ten club in the Premier League.
“After that, if you are consistent at that level, depending on the table, sometimes you can reach another level, so we’ll see.”
That ‘other level’ is regularly competing in Europe, but while Sunderland climbed to within a point of seventh-placed Brentford when they beat Spurs at the weekend, Le Bris will not be altering his stance of refusing to pay too much attention to the battle for European qualification in the remaining six games of the season.
“For me, it's not on my mind at the minute because we are tenth,” he said. “I think we want to move forward step by step and the next challenge is Villa. We expect a tough challenge, but an exciting one.
“The way we prepare for this one will define the energy we'll have, the solutions we'll have and the opportunity we'll be able to manage. It's always like that, and then after that, we'll see at the end of the season. But I think the energy of the squad is really positive.”