The Chronicle (South Tyneside and Durham)
Dodds calls on Cats to trust the process
INTERIM BOSS TASKS SIDE TO BUILD ON CARDIFF WIN
MIKE Dodds wants his Sunderland players to “keep believing in the process” as they take on Blackburn Rovers at the Stadium of Light today.
The club’s interim head coach finally won a game under his latest tenure at the sixth attempt as the Black Cats beat Cardiff City 2-0 in south Wales on Friday.
It was the first victory since the 3-1 victory against Plymouth Argyle on February 10 when Michael Beale was still in charge.
Now Dodds wants to build on the success with a win at home and he said: “I spoke to the players around trusting the process that we’ve put in place as staff and as a group behind the scenes. People aren’t going to see that which I completely understand. The reality is no one really cares about those things. All they care about is the results.
“But I’m really pleased for the players because they’ve stuck to what we’ve asked them to do. We have to keep those processes and keep believing in what we think is right.
“If we do that over a longer period of time then we will be on the right side of the results more than we will be on the wrong side of results.”
On the win against Cardiff he said: “I think it was a really professional performance. I felt the first goal kind of settled us down. I thought we started a little bit nervous but then as the game developed I felt we just grew in confidence.
“And we looked like a really good team at this level.”
He added: “That’s a really big performance from us. They [Cardiff] won their last three games at home and I think they are a really well-organised football team. I thought we defended set-pieces really well. So it was a really professional performance and I’m really happy for the dressing room.
“We haven’t got the results we’ve wanted. The club should be really proud of the dressing room because from the day I came in they [players] have given absolutely everything. The fans should be proud too. It’s a big result in the context of previous results but it’s not lost on us that we’ve got to go and win again against Blackburn.”
There were some good performances in the victory but Dodds said: “I am really conscious about not highlighting any individuals because there were so many professional performances. I don’t want to highlight any one individual. Because we are going to win together and we are going to lose together.
“We had some strong performances across the board. The subs did exactly what we asked of them. I am quite tough on the players at times but we do now have to do it all again.”
He added: “I go back to that word professional. I don’t think they [Cardiff] had that many chances. They hit the crossbar from a set piece, which we knew was going to be a threat which I thought we nullified really well over the 90 minutes, in and out of possession. The thing we asked them to do over the [international] break they executed really well. We scored two but the reality is we should have scored a lot more. As always we are going to be tough on the players and we’ve got to finish our chances but 2-0 against a team who have won their last three at home and in reasonably good form, it’s a positive.”
On Blackburn he added: “They are a well-coached team and they are going to make it really hard for us. They’ve got some really good players at the top end of the pitch but they will be aware of our threats and we have to concentrate on our qualities as well.”
We have to keep those processes and keep believing in what we think is right.
Mike Dodds