Mike Dodds admits 'disappointment' as Sunderland away woes continue

Mike Dodds admitted he was ‘really disappointed’ after Sunderland continued their away day troubles at Bristol City.

The interim head coach, probably taking charge of the team for the final time, again lined up without a striker despite deciding to rest Jobe Bellingham.

It was a familiar tale of frustration though as Sunderland dominated but could not score, and ended up losing 1-0.

It means Sunderland have failed to score from open play in their last five away games now, and Dodds was left to wonder what had gone wrong.

“I think the disappointing thing for me was the 15-minute spell of madness where they got caught up in the emotion of the game and don’t manage the momentum of the game well enough,” Dodds told safc.com.

“It’s ultimately cost us the game. We can sit here and talk about referee decisions or how many chances we created, the reality is we lost the game 1-0.

“I’m really disappointed but we’ve got to dust ourselves off. There’s lot of the performance that I liked, but there were also elements of the performance I was really disappointed with.”

Sunderland did improve considerably in the second half, often laying siege to the Bristol City goal and only an inspired performance from Robins goalkeeper Max O’Leary kept them at bay.

However, Sunderland were still unable to make a breakthrough, much to Dodds’ frustration.

“Second half was how we should have set up from the first whistle. [In the first half] I thought we were laboured, slow in possession, allowed them to get a press on our backline.

“My frustration at half time with the players was that there was nothing happening in the game which I didn’t say would happen.

“There’s nothing in the game we haven't prepared for, it’s just your ability to move the ball quicker and with a little bit more tempo, a little bit more desire to get the ball wide and forwards quicker.”

“Lo and behold, we do that in the second half and completely dominate the game! I looked at the clock on the 70th minute and that was the first time [in the second half] they got in our half.

“So I’m really frustrated and gutted for the group, because I know how hard they’ve worked in the last two weeks. We came here like we do every single game to come and win the game.”

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