Black Cats claw back from deficit
SKY BET LEAGUE ONE STANLEY....................... 1 SUNDERLAND ............. 3
ACCRINGTON Stanley were beaten at home on Saturday after losing to Sunderland at the Wham Stadium.
Jordan Clark had given the Reds the lead, but goals from Lynden Gooch, Aiden McGeady and Marc McNulty saw Sunderland come from behind and earn the win, much to the frustration of Stanley boss John Coleman.
“We beat ourselves against Sunderland. Let’s get it straight, people will laud Sunderland for being clinical and having good players, and they have, but the game could be a lot different,” he told the club’s official website.
“I think you can see that they tried to play out the game in the second half and I think we were the better team overall, they had a chance and that would have made it disgustingly 4-1, but we’ve got to learn and we’ve got to learn quickly.
“As a team we just don’t defend properly, and if you don’t defend properly then you’re going to lose games, especially against quality forwards like they’ve got.
“We’ve had an unbelievable start with Jordan Clark scoring a great goal, we go to sleep from a throw-in to let them equalise and we don’t have the time to enjoy being in the lead and put the pressure on them and get the crowd to turn on them.
“The turning point of the game is probably Colby (Bishop) hitting the underside of the bar and we’ve stood still like statues instead of following in and putting it in, if that goes in its 2-2.
“Instead we make a pass to give them a clean breakaway and they score and then the other turning point is Jordan (Clark) hitting a shot that’s bound for the net and it’s hit Dion (Charles) right in the face on the line, you can’t legislate for that, it just happens and you have to accept it.
“We showed a lot of desire and work-rate but we’re still naive, and we’re so naive defensively, until we get that right, it’s going to be a long hard struggle.
“I’m really low because we’ve lost to Sunderland the club there, and not Sunderland the team, and that’s the only way I can equate it to our players.
“They were no better than us today, they finished better than us but I can’t say they defended better than us because of the chances we had, but we’ve got to be better than that.
“We set out with a gameplan and it started off like dreamland and it’s ended up in nightmare territory, but the person who has to bare the brunt of it is me, I pick the team, I put the players out there, I tell them the formation to play, I tell them the style to play.
“If you’re asking people to do things and they don’t do them, then somebody else is going to have to have the opportunity to do them.”
Accrington took the lead on five minutes when Joe Pritchard found Clark, who fired past Jon McLaughlin to make it 1-0. They weren’t ahead for long though as Gooch equalised with a volley two minutes later.
Sunderland then took the lead on 26 minutes when McGeady received the ball on the edge of the, before powering it into the top corner.
Accrington almost made it 2-2 when Colby Bishop hit the crossbar on 34 minutes, but Sunderland made it three shortly afterwards. Chris Maguire set up McNulty, with the striker slotting home to add to their tally. It was a quieter second half, with neither team able to find the net, with Sunderland picking up the 3-1 win.