Sunderland’s confidence has taken a knock – but the Black Cats will overcome sticky start
Sunderland defender Dan Ballard says the Black Cats have not got the results their performances deserved in the first two games of the season
Dan Ballard admits Sunderland’s confidence has taken a knock after starting the season with back-to-back defeats – but he is convinced the Black Cats will come through their sticky spell and get the results their performances deserve. Sunderland began their Championship campaign with a 2-1 home defeat at the hands of newly-promoted Ipswich Town last weekend, and followed that with a reverse by the same scoreline against Preston North End at Deepdale.
That has killed off the Black Cats’ hopes of a flying start to the new season, but Ballard believes there has been enough in the two performances to suggest that the results will come. “Obviously, the confidence takes a hit when you lose games but throughout the course of the season there are going to be times when you lose a few in a row,” said the Northern Ireland defender.
“It’s probably a little bit harder at the start of the season but there are always going to be periods in a season when things go against you. We just have to keep working hard and for sure we’ll start picking up results if we keep working as we are.
“It’s a young squad and every game is an opportunity to learn. Last year [when Sunderland reached the play-offs] we had that bit of luck towards the end of the season.
“It’s a long old year, we weren’t right at the top of the table throughout the whole season. We might be like that again this season, we don’t know.
“We’ll pick up a run of form at some point and the team is only going to get better each week.”
After two straight defeats, plus a midweek Carabao Cup exit on penalties at the hands of League Two Crewe Alexandra, the pressure will be on Sunderland to get that first win when they take on Rotherham United at the Stadium of Light on Saturday, but Ballard says the players will not let that affect them. He said: “I don’t think we really think about that.
“We’ll pick up a run of form at some point and the team is only going to get better each week.”
After two straight defeats, plus a midweek Carabao Cup exit on penalties at the hands of League Two Crewe Alexandra, the pressure will be on Sunderland to get that first win when they take on Rotherham United at the Stadium of Light on Saturday, but Ballard says the players will not let that affect them. He said: “I don’t think we really think about that.
“I think when the game starts you don’t really think about those things, you are just invested in the game. We know what they [Rotherham] are going to be like.
“It might be a similar game to Saturday so we just have to work on our quality in the final third and sharpen up things at the back and hopefully we’ll get a result.”
At Preston, Sunderland fell behind to a strike that took a wicked deflection off home striker Will Keane – a near-identical goal to Nathan Broadhead’s opener for Ipswich the previous weekend – and the second goal scored by Mads Frokjaer came after the Black Cats had given the ball away cheaply, just as the Tractor Boys’ second goal had in the season opener, leaving Ballard with a sense of deja vu. He said: “The first goal was identical to last week and was extremely frustrating for us.
“Again I thought we played well as a team but just didn’t have that final cutting edge. It’s a poor second goal, again similar to last week – it was like playing in the same game.
“We’re disappointed but teams aren’t going to score goals like that against us every week. It’s frustrating but we just have to move on from it.”
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